Residents of northern Wayne County turned out to a meeting hosted by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission (PFBC) in Forest City on October 22, and let officials know they are not pleased with the decision of state officials to drain state fishing spots.

The PFBC and the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) have determined that the earthen dams that created Miller Pond and White Oak Pond, which both date back more than 150 years, represent a risk to the public and need to be immediately drained, so they can be examined and eventually repaired and rebuilt. The problem for the people who use the two lakes is that officials at PFCB don’t expect them to be back online until 2022.

Until then, the lakes won’t be able to be used for fishing or boating; people with lakefront homes will see the value of their houses diminished at least temporarily; and the drained ponds will be an eyesore. It’s not surprising, however, that PFBC does not have the funds to address the dams in a more timely matter—the agency receives no money from the Pennsylvania General Fund, but gets its revenue from fishing licenses and fees, and also receives some federal funding.

Like most other states in the country, Pennsylvania has ignored its infrastructure over recent decades, and that includes dams. PFBC manages 23 lakes or ponds that are owned by the state and are considered high-hazard and unsafe.

According to the PFBC, funding for the upgrade of 13 of those dams has been secured, and construction is either complete or on the way, but an additional $65 million would be needed to address the remaining dams. That includes $6 million for the two water bodies in Wayne that are being drained.

But what we’ve discussed so far are only the high-hazard dams managed by the state. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), there are a total of 518 dams in Pennsylvania that are considered “deficient” and therefore possibly subject to some sort of failure. ASCE estimates the cost to bring all of the dams up to standards is $1.4 billion. However, as high as this might seem, according to ASCE, Pennsylvania is ahead of many other states regarding the condition of its dams.

A 2014 “report card” on Pennsylvania infrastructure from ASCE said, “Because of the Dam Safety Program, established in the late 1970s, Pennsylvania has remained ahead of most states in dam safety. For Pennsylvania dams, a grade of C- reflects the positive benefits of Pennsylvania’s Dam Safety Program, balanced against the high number of dams in need of repair, the $1.4 billion needed for repair and rehabilitation of deficient high hazard potential dams, and the significant threat a dam failure would pose to public health, safety, property, the environment, and to local, county and state economies.”

A C- is not such a bad grade from ASCE; the Commonwealth does worse in some areas of infrastructure, such as the state of its wastewater systems. In the report ASCE gives the state a D- to those, and writes, “Aging wastewater-management systems discharge billions of gallons of untreated sewage into Pennsylvania’s surface waters each year. In fact, Pennsylvania has the greatest number of combined sewer overflows (CSOs) of any state. The Commonwealth must invest $28 billion over the next 20 years to repair existing systems, meet clean water standards, and build or expand existing systems to meet increasing demands. The Pennsylvania Infrastructure Investment Authority’s (PENNVEST) budget in 2013 for grant and loan awards for sewer projects is $335 million, less than 25% of the required annual investment.”

On the subject of bridges, Pennsylvania does a little better with a D+. The report says, “Of Pennsylvania’s more than 22,660 bridges, 23 percent are considered structurally deficient, which is the highest percentage in the nation. While the most important concern regarding bridges is the safety of the public, a bridge closure or weight restriction will do more than just create local traffic delays. It can impact both local and regional traffic, and the economy of the region.”

The lack of attention to infrastructure is not unique to Pennsylvania, and the state’s overall grade of C- is the same as New York’s, but the grades—like the two ponds that are being drained in Wayne County—clearly show that our leaders have been neglecting infrastructure for far too long.