PPL holds first public meeting on flooding

Progress made on lake releases

By TOM KANE

HAWLEY, PA - PPL has finally given people hope that releases the company made from Lake Wallenpaupack during three recent major storms will be handled differently in the future.

In July 2006, PPL Utilities, which control the waters flowing from Lake Wallenpaupack, formed a task force of local citizens and businesses at the insistence of residents and municipal officials after the area experienced three major floods within 18 months.

The task force, which was divided into three subcommittees, met numerous times and purposely excluded the press and the public.

On Thursday, March 1, the press was invited to attend the advisory committee, which met at the PPL Educational Center in Hawley.

The company formed the task force in an attempt to listen to residents’ concerns and explore ways to avoid releasing water at the height of a storm. Residents believe past releases caused the loss of and damage to several homes in the area around the Wallenpaupack Creek and the Lackawaxen River into which the waters were channeled.

“Up to this meeting, I was going to quit the committee,” said Donald Kyzer, president of the Hawley Borough Council. “Today, they’re considering things like lowering the lake a little bit in anticipation of storms. That’s what we’ve been working for.” Just lower the lake and watch it closely, he said.

For over an hour, PPL staff and engineers presented a progress report on what the company and the task force has accomplished.

PPL flood expert Gary Petrewski presented a model that put forth scenarios of water releases depending on the expected rainfall and the melting of the snow-pack around the lake. Historically, the effect of the melting of snow was not considered in computing the timing or length of the release. It will be now, Petrewski said.

“We have to take a conservative position so we must insure that we will fulfill our other obligations to recreational groups, boaters and fishermen,” Petrewski said. “We are attempting to find the right mix to allow a certain amount of space in the lake so that if a serious storm is predicted, we will have room to contain some of the water.”

Both Kyzer and Julia Crowder, owner of the Country Inn at the Old Mill in Hawley, want the company to take some responsibility for strengthening a retaining wall on the Wallenpaupack Creek and the removal of debris that has collected under a bridge along the creek. The creek connects the lake with the Lackawaxen River.

“I have been after them to clean up the debris,” Kyzer said. “Another big flood will take down that bridge.”

“Many agencies have partial responsibility for the wall and the debris under the bridge,” Crowder said. “Hawley hasn’t the funds to replace the wall or remove the debris. It’s a disaster waiting to happen.”

PPL will be meeting with the Army Corps of Engineers, the Pike Conservation District and the Honesdale-Hawley Shippers Association to discuss the situation along the Wallenpaupack Creek and the Lackawaxen River.

The shippers association, which owns the railroad between Honesdale and Lackawaxen Township, wants to separate the task of the removal of debris in the streambed from repair of the broken railroad trestle between Hawley and the Upper Delaware River since combining the two projects might delay the repair to the trestle. The shippers are negotiating with a company in White Mills that plans to use the railroad connection to the New York, Susquehanna and Western Railway line along the Upper Delaware River.

The next meeting of the full task force will be held on Thursday, June 7 at noon at the PPL Learning Center, and is open to the public.