City work along Glade Run continues to upset some residents.
Michael Holtz, director of Public Works, said work began earlier in the spring to cut trees and clear the levee. It is not designed to lower the bank as one resident believed.
A Department of Environmental Protection report issued a year and a half ago provided a number of line items for clearing the floodway. Workers are cutting trees and general cleanup, Holtz said, as well as spraying for weeds.
Article Photos
Times Observer photo by Colin Kyler
Along the bank
Esther Wonderling looks along the Glade Run levee where she once had lilac bushes and steps.
"It's done to keep the levee certified," Holtz said.
Since the levee must be free of foreign debris, Holtz said workers had to clear it. Some of the items removed had been there for several years.
Esther Wonderling, a Locust Street resident, said her father refused to sell the house when the levee was built. Still, the city has a right of way to maintain it.
Lilac bushes and steps Wonderling had behind her house were both removed. The workers told her they didn't want anything on the bank.
"I had the bushes there for all those years," Wonderling said. "I don't know how they can do it, but they do it."
The levee was built as a flood control project in 1956. Without the current work, Holtz said it won't be recertified by the state..
"I realize for some residents it is an inconvenience," Holtz said. "Certainly, the city can understand that. But we also have to keep the dike in line with what the DEP says."
Already, most of the work has been complete. Once work started in the spring, Holtz said it continued on and off for several months.
All that remains now, Holtz said, is some general cleanup. This should be finished within the next two weeks and residents are advised not to put anything on the bank which isn't there now.