Mongaup kayaking back on UDC agenda

By DAVID HULSE

NARROWSBURG, NY — The Upper Delaware Council (UDC) is again reviewing the issue of Rio Dam powerhouse water releases for recreational boaters as federal energy regulators have ordered increased Rio boating flows.

Powerhouse releases were a sensitive safety issue for the National Park Service (NPS), who combined with UDC to limit those releases in the 1990s.

The UDC reviewed last week a May 2004 Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) order directing utility owner, Mirant-NY, to schedule both turbines at the powerhouse to release water for boating on one weekend day per month from June to October. The order went on to require that in the absence of reported safety issues, FERC reserved the right to direct two-turbine releases on a permanent basis thereafter.

The May FERC order noted that Mongaup River recreational boating reports between 1999 and 2002 had revealed no safety problems reported by boaters. Boating reports have been monitored by state and federal agencies including the NPS. Upper Delaware Superintendent David Forney confirmed last week that there had been no incidents.

The order is a change from the existing dam license agreement, with former operator Orange and Rockland Utilities, which had limited Mongaup releases to a single turbine out of concern for boaters in the Delaware downstream of the rivers’ confluence. Kayaking groups, principally the Kayak and Canoe Club of New York, sought releases from both turbines initially and have continued to lobby for its enactment. “They’ve been the proponents of it since day one,” said UDC Executive Director Bill Douglass. “Now they seem to have won enough support to bring this to a head,” he added.

In May of 1990, then NPS Superintendent John Hutzky said that NPS was concerned the releases would increase safety problems near the confluence of the rivers. “If we see that adding slugs of [Mongaup] water create conditions to potentially cause more [Delaware] problems than exist there now, its going to be a matter of record,” he said.

Hutzky said agency statistics show 104 search and rescue operations, including three drownings and two near drownings in the immediate area since 1980. Some 88 of the incidents occurred on weekends, when proposed Mongaup releases would occur, he said. Since 1988, when the NPS began reimbursing local rescue squads for river related calls, the NPS costs for Mongaup area search and rescue incidents have totaled $22,395, he said.

Deerpark delegate Phil Chase, who opposed recreational boating in 1990, reminded the UDC that the issue had not been the safety of experienced kayak users on the Mongaup, but for novice boaters in the nearby Delaware. Boating tests in the Delaware in 1990 determined a noticeable flow change in the Delaware as both turbines released.

The UDC decided to reissue a letter of concern to FERC about the change.