Against the flow

Group presses for faster dam cleanup

The Friends of Little Sugar Creek apparently aren’t in the mood to just let it flow.

Don’t get us wrong: The organization, as it long has, wants the creek returned to its natural, free-flowing condition more than 100 years after it was dammed up to form the first lake of the Bella Vista resort.

The flow they’re not into is the city of Bentonville’s pace in removing what’s left of the 600-foot-wide dam that failed two years ago when it gave way. It had been topped by floodwater several times in the previous decade. Parts of the dam have washed downstream and the gap in the earthen portion has continued to widen through erosion.

Although once part of Bella Vista, the 150-acre park around the lake and stream as well as the dam is today owned by the city of Bentonville, which has for a long time hoped to revive the neglected area into a more attractive amenity for city residents. For a long time, moving forward was limited by a dispute over whether Cooper Communities Inc., developer of the modern-day Bella Vista and onetime owner of the lake and surrounding land, could force Bentonville to replace the dam and thus preserve Lake Bella Vista.

But last December, the Bentonville City Council and Cooper Communities formalized an agreement in which both agreed the dam — what’s left of it — could be removed, returning the creek closer to its original condition. Just how close remains to be seen, as the city continues to design renovation plans.

A free-flowing stream has been the goal of the Friends of Little Sugar Creak all along. So why have they now notified the city of their intent to file a lawsuit over the situation?

At the time of the agreement with Cooper Communities, a Bentonville official predicted designing the park and stream restoration will take time, perhaps a year. Getting U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permits for what the city wants to do could take another year, officials said. The corps is the agency authorized under the federal Clean Water Act to evaluate and approve any discharge of dredged or fill material into any waterway.

Meanwhile, the wreck of a dam still sits in the water. Greg Van Horn of the Friends group says the situation continues to pollute Little Sugar Creek, upsetting its delicate ecology in violation of the Clean Water Act. Van Horn said the city, to prevent further pollution, could remove the old dam now before it develops grander plans for the creek and park area. His group doesn’t want two years of pollution to continue while the city develops a grand plan.

So now, two entities that were rowing in the same direction appear to have become adversaries.

It’s disappointing the Friends of Little Sugar Creek has signaled they’re in a litigious mood. They appear to have little faith in the city’s intentions, or at least its timeline.

The city is dealing with a federal agency. We all know how fast those move, right? But we also have to wonder: Given the corps is charged with preventing ecological damage to the waterways it regulates, is there no option for removing what’s left of the dam, to end its disruption to the stream? Sort of a reverse. “Field of Dreams.” You know, “clear it out and they will come.”

Is it too much to hope these troubled waters can be calmed? Can further legal entanglements be avoided? Can water that broke through a dam become water under the bridge? We sure hope so, because there has been enough of that already, considering the city and the Friends group really want to be rid of the dam.

Perhaps it’s time to test the waters to see if the corps could expedite a basic cleanup of the old dam, with the rest of the project to follow as designs emerge and corps permission is granted. The dam’s got to go anyway, right?

Time will tell, but we have a feeling the Friends of the creek aren’t going to let this go like water off a duck’s back.