Dierks...Random thoughts

[hdh]

After reading several articles on whitewater parks and the economic impact. It appears to me , that the city of Dierks is missing out on a simple way to bring in revenue. With the facility in place and only the need of a regularly schedule release.

I realize that the COE controls the water flow and that boaters in the past have tried to get releases. Just thinking if I were the Mayor, a Business owner, tax payer,ect. of Dierks I would love to see a few more cars in my town on a weekend.

I guess my point is the City of Dierks should have more "pull " with the COE than a below average boater from Louisiana.


Harlan Hughes

[turboturtle]

The Ex G type works for the COE. She had said at one time to put in an application for a scheduled release. It's a very small lake and even smaller watershed, but theirs no reason they should deny a scheduled release.
Now getting a regular release would be a different matter, specifically on such a small lake. I don't think that will ever happen.
Didn't mean to burst your bubble Harlan! Lol

[ScottH]

The “City” of Dierks is a population of about 1200. So not too sure about the level of their pull with the Corp. Dierks is a micro lake in a massive water system. The problem is the lake size and the levels they need to keep it between. Without regular rains, the window of available water to be released is only a couple of days. But I am not saying that they could not accommodate a release weekend or two with some pre-planning.

Many years ago, when we had momentum and some great contacts with the Corp of Engineers in Dierks, we meet with them and the Dierks Chamber of Commerce and I think the Mayor. All were excited and interested, but I think when the Corp Official took it up the ladder it got squashed. A little while after that, management in the Corp office changed around.

A couple of years ago, representing the Arkansas Canoe Club, I have made a couple of official looking, formal requests for a release through both the local Corp of Eng office and the main office in Little Rock. Requests have been denied every time.

A good, new angle may be for the new ArkLaTex ACC Chapter to pursue this for “instructional purposes”. Get together, get organized and make a presentation to the Mayor, the Corp and the Chamber of Commerce and see if you can make something happen. Don’t think you could hurt anything at this point.

Give me a call and we can discuss what I know, what I think and what I have done

Scott Hanshaw

[CSH]

Harlan,

as discussed, I am with you on this. I think we should at least be able to get one or two release weekends per summer. I like Scott's approach. We should discuss and see if we can get some meetings set up.

Chris

[Jim E]

Special releases are possible as the city gets one every summer for their annual duck race. Of course that release is smaller than what "we" would need and only for a few hours on a Saturday.
My past experiences when ever the COE is involved is that if someone "knows" someone (politically speaking) ALOT can get done! Realize there are and have been other entities that do not want releases. Last year there was a bass tournament organization that requested the COE to shut down releases for their event. They were denied.
As Scott mentioned too, the lake has very little water to work with unless it is above normal pool levels.

For more of a consistant summer play place, hydro-electric projects are where to look. Of course Rockport is a perfect example. Lil' Mo' at Narrows would be another good place to start. Trout programs are in place at several southern hydro projects as part of federal mitigation. We would be hard pressed to interupt any of those "roots" as they go pretty far up the chain. But, the Lil' Mo'/Narrows trout program is mainly a winter only fishery. So I think there is potential there for it to be more of a summer time white water play place. Also, SWEPCO has full rights to all power produced there, rather than the SWPA. I think that they would be easier to work with. If I'm not mistaken I believe Mike Coogan has talked to them some about it already. Just a thought.

[Heath]

its not that often that I post on sensitive subjects, but there is a couple things that still baffle me about this situation.

In the past there were sceduled releases at Direks lake,

1. Turant county college got 2 weekends a year, usually in Oct. these releases were usually on a friday sat and sunday, water would come on around 9 and shut of by 4.
The man that used to teach the class has since retierd so those spots are no longer being applied for. I dont recall his name.

2. Many moons ago there were slalom races held there, this would have had to of been a sceduled event. not sure how good the course was then, but I would be willing to bet that you could make an even better one now.

It seems to me that with the ACC being as big of a group as it is we should have a bigger presence now than in past years, We already have a spring canoe school, Vous, and a surfn turf. why not push for a learning or teaching seminar of sorts for the club, at Dierks. with Jeremy hosting throwdowns at rockport, seems like this would be a great place to throw in the mix as we did last year.

I know it is a small lake, and an even smaller watershed, but at the same time others have been able to do this in the past, sems to me that we should be able to in the present.

End of rant

[Randy Dodson]

Jim Simmons could be some help on this.

Don't remember the name of the canoe instructor from Tarrant Co. College that got the releases but Jim will know as well as several ACC members.

Max Wellhouse or Don Walls might have info about the slalom races that used to take place there as it relates to getting releases.

Just thinkin out loud.

[Dave Thomas]

Jim Simmons would definitely be a great person to talk to about this. I bet Halff Associates Inc. would have some good input from the private sector point of view.
The following was taken from the 2010 UCACE Contracts and More memo: Dierks Lake Corps Water Management System: On Sept. 30 the district awarded a $162,514 contract to Halff Associates Inc. of Fort Worth, Texas. The ARRA funds are being used to develop input data files to facilitate daily real time water management of Dierks Lake. The forecast model will be used to calculate inflow into Dierks Lake, make calculations for a pool elevation forecast and forecast stages at the downstream regulating control point. Work began in October and will be completed in November.
http://www.swl.usace.army.mil/contracta ... eJan10.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Jim E]

That's good. A working model of the lake will give them alot of "what if" data. Does make me think that they (the COE) have something they want to justify paying for a model. Just wonder what it is.

There are bound to be more studies planned in the future too as a lake model is always the first step towards something...