Jasper Common Council pays $180,000 from gambling fund for Beaver Lake project

Jim O’Neal, News Director at WITZ AM/FM contributed to this report

The Friends of Beaver Lake won’t be saddled with a $180,000 loan from the water utility.

Wednesday night, the Jasper Common Council appropriated money from the Riverboat Casino Fund to pay the balance of the project to raise the lake level about 11 inches.

Beaver Lake representative Brad Popp said this was a great outcome for the city and the lake. “I’m glad to see them step up and just say ‘you know what, it’s time to do what’s right for the community,'” he said.

According to Popp, as of Wednesday, The Friends of Beaver Lake had raised the $140,000 set as a goal. He also said that more could be coming. Those extra funds could leverage grants for future work needed at the lake.

With the $140,000 from the group, plus the $180,000 from the city and $50,000 from the Jasper Utility Service Board and a commitment from the Jasper Parks Department of $15,000 from timber sales around the lake, $385,000 has been allocated to the project. The approved bid from Krempp Construction was $334,400.

Proposed fee increases at the lake could also raise $36,775 over the next five years.

The city added a 5% contingency cost of $16,500 to the Krempp Construction bid and appointed Christopher Burke Engineering as the engineering oversite of the project for up to $37,500.

The Friends of Beaver Lake formed soon after the Jasper Utility Service Board decided not to pursue the project to raise the water level. In exploring the problem, the board had spent about $73,500 to investigate what went wrong and then have a solution engineered.

The Friends asked the board to hold the low bid from Krempp Construction open until August 28 to give them time to collect funds and work out a solution to get the project completed.

At a recent Jasper Park Board meeting, Popp revealed discrepancies between measurements taken at the direction of Christopher Burke Engineering in 2010 and measurements taken in 1980 and ’82. Those differences were revealed to the utility services board prior to the work but according to board members, at the time, they did not know how impactful the discrepancies would be.

When the lake filled back up after construction of the new spillway and dam was completed in 2012, the water level was about 11 inches lower.

On Monday, the utility service board approved $50,000 to go to the project under the agreement a $180,000 loan would be extended to cover the balance on the project.

The council decided to go a different route on Wednesday when they were expected to approve moving money from the electric utility to the water utility to cover the costs.

Councilman Kevin Manley, reading from a prepared statement, explained that he disagreed with the loaning of money to the Beaver Lake group. He said the value of the extra water — estimated to be about 60 million gallons — and recreational opportunities of the lake made it worthwhile for the city to assist in the project cost.

He also pointed out that holding back another 60 million gallons of water would also likely help with the complaints the city has received from landowners dealing with flooding issues downstream from the dam since the spillway was completed.

He then recommended using the money from the Riverboat Casino Fund the city receives; an amount that wasn’t funded through property taxes or utility fees.

After the unanimous vote for the $180,000 appropriation was made, the crowd in attendance at the council meeting erupted in applause.

Utility Service Board chairman Rick Stradtner was in attendance at the meeting.

“I was very happy to hear that council also agreed that the public/private partnership was a wonderful approach to achieving a solution to kind of a difficult problem,” he said. “I’m happy to hear that no one’s going to have to stand by behind this individually.”

According to Manley, this is a win-win for the city and the public. “There was a lot of effort and work put in by a lot of people and our ability to work together on this is how we were able to get to where we are today and accomplish the goal of getting the lake back to the way we want it,” Councilman Kevin Manley said.

Manley said the decision to use the Riverboat Casino Funds came together on Monday. The fund currently has about $452,000 in it and another $89,000 is due from the state this fall.

The Park Board has a special meeting Friday at 7:30 a.m. at the Jasper City Hall to discuss additional funding and potential fee increases.