The last one always put up a big fight – and so it is with the $43 million Milltown Hill Dam in western Oregon.

The federal program that would fund the dam was eliminated in 1991 because it was fiscally and environmentally wasteful — but not before eight projects of a dying breed were grandfathered in. Milltown Hill Dam is the last of the eight projects remaining, leading the Oregon Register-Guard to describe the dam as the “sole remaining project under a program that no longer exists.” The dam also faces heavy criticism from locals on financial and environmental grounds.

If the project is built, federal taxpayers would give Douglas County a $5.8 million grant and $24.5 million low-interest loan to build a 186 foot tall concrete structure on a free-flowing tributary of the Umpqua River. It is unclear whether or not Douglas County will ever be able to repay the loan.

Sale of irrigation water, the largest single purpose of the dam, would only cover 1 percent of the dam’s cost. Douglas County proposes to make up the difference from a water fund which already has an annual deficit of $93,000 a year, leading critics to worry that loan default would stick federal taxpayers with the entire cost of the dam. Additionally, a dam built 10 years ago in Douglas County under the same defunct federal program has lost $100,000 per year. Douglas County officials continue to push for the project even though recent developments make the dam look like even more of a money loser for federal taxpayers. In early April, the National Marine Fisheries Service released a draft opinion stating that the dam would jeopardize continued survival of the federally listed endangered Umpqua searun cutthroat trout because among other reasons, the dam contains no fish passage facilities. Building the fish passage, as required by Oregon State law, would likely add millions to the cost of the project.

Additionally, mitigating mercury contamination from a mine just 500 feet above the proposed reservoir would increase the project’s cost even further.

For further information contact Carrie Stilwell with the Western Environmental Law Center at (541) 485-2471.

Naval Cows May Be Sent To Pasture

The Navy may soon end its money losing dairy operation at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD according to an April 10 Baltimore Sun account. The Navy is seeking Congressional approval to terminate the 300 cow dairy farm which loses $1.2 million each year. The Naval Dairy Farm was profiled in April 1996 by Taxpayers for Common $ense in its “Pentagon Follies” report.