The city of Homer is mostly built on an alluvial fan, consisting largely of dirt and rock that has eroded over the eons from the thousand-foot-tall bluff on the northside of town. And as more and more raw land in the townsite is turned into subdivisions, streets and structures, it affects the water run-off, in some places increasing flooding, and in some places increasing erosion.
City of Homer Public Works Director Jan Keiser has floated a plan to initially bring environmentally sound storm water runoff control to four areas of town.
“The first area is up at Baycrest, that's high priority because we know there's an existing problem of drainage coming off the Sterling Highway and saturating private properties up there. And also we know that there's an existing erosion problem as that water from the drainage finds Its way to the bluff. So that's one of the projects that we have in mind as the first go-around. The second project is down at Bishop's Beach. That's a priority for a couple of reasons, one that, that is the receiving basin for the Main Street storm drain, and we know that there's a pollution issue there. Also, Fish and Wildlife owns a lot of that property, so it's already in public hands,” Keiser said.
She said drainage along Ben Walters Drive and where Kachemak Drive meets East End road round out the top priority projects, but that there are a few others on her radar that will be addressed in a future round of planning.
Keiser pointed out that creating comprehensive drainage solutions is a goal that can serve both the environment and commerce.
“Course we have industry out there, Northern Enterprises, Bay Welding. Those are economic engines for the city. We want them to succeed, we want them to thrive, we want them to grow and, and so we want to work with them to figure out how to best do that. So we've had some initial conversations with some of the industrial property owners about what is your vision for your business and what kind of property do you need to support that, and how can we help you? While you're helping us address these drainage problems, the thing that all these issues have in common, is that everybody wants a solution so as industry continues to grow they need to solve a drainage problem too, and they need access to their properties and they need to know that they're going to be able to expand their businesses without interference or objection from the natural resource organizations. So if we can partner with them to help them achieve their goals, while actually trying to address some of these drainage issues as well, then everybody benefits,” Keiser said.
The State Department of Transportation is scoping out a rehabilitation of Kachemak Drive, and Keiser says it’s vital they work with the city on it to provide drainage control and other amenities.
“What we're going to do is talk to the Department of Transportation about putting a joint project together. This, the state already has plans to repave Kachemak Drive. They're in the process of scoping that now, we know that, that scoping will not include a non-motorized pathway. They've already told us that and we suspect that it does not include any plans for improving the drainage. So what we'd like to do is work with them to get some grant funding that will allow us to address the non-motorized pathway and the drainage issues, while the state is doing their repaving project, have a co-state and city project," Keiser said.
Kyra Wagner of the Homer Soil and Water Conservation District said that project in particular would be of great benefit.
“The idea of being able to control some of the erosion there and slow that down is vital. And it would be spectacular to be able to have an example like to answer the caller to be able to show how this works to the state and the borough is really important to be able to show some form of infrastructure that had the capability of not slicing through the wetland and ruining the circulation of water but instead creating a manner of controlling it, and moderating it in a way that was beneficial to the landowners and kept the petlands,” Wagner said.
Coowe Walker of the Kachemak Bay Estuarine Research Reserve says those peatlands along Kachemak Drive would make a great demonstration project for drainage control, and have other benefits.
“From the reserves perspective thinking, the definitely the big Petland that is you know, part of beluga Lake, the headwaters of beluga lake is really important because not only is it function as stormwater drainage but it also provides a lot of other services to people and Wildlife and there's also some exciting new ideas that we’re lifting up for example a carbon project. So these peetlands are really deep and we're measuring how much, how deep they are. And also how much carbon is in that so you can take a core of the Pete and then you can basically burn it off and figure out how much carbon is in it at different depths and we can use all that information to figure out volume and that carbon is valuable on a world carbon market and it's substantial income potential, so I guess for the reserves perspective, you know, understanding connectivity and understanding the role of these petlands in that connectivity is really important which is why we want to put a proposal and to purchase some of those lands,” Walker said.
Keiser says she plans to make a presentation to the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly to hopefully get them onboard with some projects as well.
To hear more about green drainage, check out Wednesday’s Coffee Table, available to stream online at KBBI dot org, and as a convenient podcast on your favorite app.
