Lewis Lawrence lives on an island in Gloucester County his family has occupied for six generations. For 30 years he served as managing director for the Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission.
These days he’s a self-proclaimed “Dredging Czar,” working to find funds to maintain safe depths for creeks and river channels silting in.
He says none of the localities were prepared for the expense of taking over Army Corps maintenance of their federal shallow channels and the consequences when they couldn’t afford to.
"Nor was the Commonwealth. So, we could see that the problem was coming," Lawrence remembers. "And then, as the problem began to show up, the U.S. Coast Guard began to pull out channel markers."
Without local channel markers, boaters called snowbirds, who move from north to south during winter, were no longer stopping here along the way.
"So, we could see that the larger collapse of the economic coastal system happening in slow motion."
Communities also pay for studies required before dredging projects are approved. And, there’s one more big expense - disposing of what’s dredged.
"Because if you don't have any place to put the material, you can't dredge. And that’s never talked about," according to Lawrence. "Everybody thinks that you can just put that material wherever you want. And that is not the case."
The rural communities of the Middle Peninsula, Northern Neck and Eastern Shore compete for limited funding. They can go to their senators or apply to the congressional Community Project Fund through their local representative. Last year, Lawrence got nearly $3 million from the fund. But it’s highly competitive.
"The likelihood of whether or not your senators or congressmen will introduce an earmark or community assistance or whatever they want to term it for each budget cycle is completely up to them."
The Northern Neck District Planning Commission has struggled to find money to dredge the federal channel and repair jetties on the Little Wicomico River. Last year, they were told they were ineligible for congressional funding. As conditions got worse, they applied for emergency funding from the Virginia Waterways Maintenance Fund. In February, they received $2.6 million, more than half of the $4 million funds available.
But it still doesn’t cover the millions of dollars it costs to study, repair and fortify the jetties that keep the Little Wicomico open once the channel is dredged. And that’s just one channel.
"We have 142 water bodies in the Northern Neck, 13 of those are federal channels," says executive director Jerry Davis. "The question always is that 'well whose responsibility is it to maintain those federal channels?' Well, it's the Corps of Engineers. But they don't have the adequate funding to fulfill their responsibility. So, it falls on the counties."
So, they’re back to knocking on doors along with neighboring communities around the Chesapeake Bay as they all step into an arduous role once held by the Army Corps of Engineers.
"It's a complex situation," admits Baltimore District spokeswoman Cynthia Mitchell. "There are so many facets to this where unfortunately, you know, when we do get that call from the watermen saying 'Hey, I can't get my boat out and I'm, you know, on the Little Wicomico,' for example, or wherever that might be. It's so much more than 'We can't be there next week.'”