Federal delays affect tornado debris cleanup at area creeks

Grant money for cleanup of Hurricane Creek in Peterson, pictured Thursday, isn’t expected until Congress appropriates money for the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. Federal emergency agencies are strapped for cash after a year of disasters. Volunteers have done much to clean up the creek.
Buy Photo Dusty Compton | The Tuscaloosa News

By Robert DeWitt
Senior Writer

Published: Monday, September 19, 2011 at 3:30 a.m.

TUSCALOOSA | Federal money that Tuscaloosa County officials hoped to use to clean tornado debris from area creeks is on hold.

“For right now, there’s no money for it, but there might be after Oct. 1,” said County Engineer Bobby Hagler.

In July, the Tuscaloosa County Commission approved a 10 percent match on a grant of almost $650,000 from the Natural Resources Conservation Service. The money was to be used to clean up seven Tuscaloosa-area creeks choked with storm debris.

However, federal emergency agencies are cash-strapped after a year of unprecedented disasters, including the April tornado outbreak, the Joplin, Mo., tornado and Hurricane Irene, which caused extensive damage on the East Coast. There is no money to fund the grant until Congress appropriates money for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1.

“It’s been submitted for consideration,” said Mike Henderson, an engineer with Tuscaloosa County. “They don’t have money to give us right now.”

Photo by Beth Maynor Young

John Wathen, Hurricane Creek Creekkeeper, said Friends of Hurricane Creek, an environmental advocacy group, didn’t wait for federal money to arrive. The organization headed a volunteer effort soon after the tornado to get debris out of the channel.

“We went ahead and cleaned the creek out,” Wathen said. “I know enough about government services to know things can go wrong.”

Volunteers removed more than a ton of scrap metal, mostly from metal buildings and mobile homes, from the creek and opened up the channel by removing trees.

“There were monster trees in there,” Wathen said. “We spent weeks cutting up trees and making them into smaller debris.”

Volunteers constructed a “crane” by stringing high-strength rope from the bluff above the creek to the other side. Using pulleys and a tractor, logs were lifted out of the creek bottom onto higher ground.

Volunteers stacked lighter debris in the creek bottom and burned as much as possible. Bigger debris was lifted to higher ground. The intent was to keep the debris from matting up on the Holt-Peterson Cutoff Road Bridge and putting pressure on it that could damage the structure.

“What we were able to accomplish was to get a channel cleared up, and when (Tropical Storm) Lee came through, it floated out the debris in stages,” Wathen said. “Everything we’ve done so far has been with donations and volunteers.”

Tropical Storm Lee Removes Hurricane Creek Tornado Debris

The tropical storm’s torrential rain washed most of the tornado debris out of the creek. Only one of the creeks became clogged with debris during the rain, requiring county crews to dislodge the debris raft and restore flow, Henderson said.

At Hurricane Creek, volunteers concentrated on clearing the channel. Efforts will now focus on the creek bank and cleaning up the Watson Bend campground, a private campground maintained by the Friends of Hurricane Creek, Wathen said.