Two local waterways will be getting some upgrades, thanks to grant funding from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources. The latest round of Lake and River Enhancement program grants includes funds for projects benefiting Lake Maxinkuckee and the Tippecanoe River.
The Lake Maxinkuckee Environmental Council is embarking on a $48,000 engineering study, for future improvements to the Kline Wetlands. They serve the important role of cleaning water before it drains into the lake from the surrounding area. “It has a levee system and a control structure, and we put in baffles back in 1992,” explains Lake Maxinkuckee Environmental Council Executive Director Kathy Clark. “We built small islands, and we curved the ditch back to what it used to be from when it was straightened as a strictly farm ditch. . . . We built that to slow the water down, so that the fertilizers and the sediment could fall out of the water before it went into the lake because those two things promote weed growth in the lake.”
Now, she says that system is ready for an upgrade, with weather having taken a heavy toll on the levees in the last couple years. “We’ve had five breaks since the spring of 2015,” Clark says. “And every time, they started out very small, and we went out and fixed them. And then the next one would be a little bit bigger and a little bit further down the levee. And the last one was about an 80-foot span that just collapsed.”
Clark says the council plans to work with three engineering firms to identify some options on how to proceed, whether that means rebuilding the system as it is, redesigning it to modern standards, or doing some additional dredging.
To pay for the engineering phase, the council got $38,400 through the Lake and River Enhancement program, as well as $4,800 from the Marshall County Community Foundation. The rest of the cost will come from other fund-raising or in-kind donations. Clark says the council hopes to select the engineers by November, and have the plans in place by next spring.
In Pulaski County, plans are moving ahead for a $142,000 project to stabilize a stream bank in the Tippecanoe River State Park. “For 50 or more years, the bank has been eroding really, really bad there,” says Pulaski County Soil and Water Conservation District Support Coordinator Quentin Blount. “There’s sort of a meander bend that comes around, and the water picks up velocity right there and just crashes into the bank. And it’s been eating away at that bank for 50 or more years, as long as anyone can really remember.”
Blount says the engineering work is already complete. He expects construction to start in the fall of 2018, with work wrapping up the following year.
The Lake and River Enhancement program provided $100,000 for the project, while $14,000 will come from the DNR’s Division of State Parks. Additional grant funding has been provided by Arrowhead Country Resource Conservation and Development, NIPSCO, and Fulton County REMC. That leaves the soil and water conservation district with about $5,500 it still needs to raise.
The Lake and River Enhancement program is funded by boat registration fees. Nearly $1.2 million was awarded throughout the state, during the most recent grant cycle.
