ONE STEP FORWARD, TWO STEPS BACK: Borough receives violation notice for Pumping Station Dam

BRANDONVILLE – Two days after friends and boosters celebrating a milestone in the revitalization of a local recreation area, a potentially major setback came from the state.

Proponents have been working tirelessly for the past several years to bring the Pumping Station Dam off Pole Road in Brandonville back to life.

The Shenandoah-owned water dam had sat inactive for over a decade until the current Pumpy Association formed with the backing of borough council and state legislators like Rep. Dane Watro and Senator Dave Argall.

Sunday, August 16 marked the ribbon cutting of the new grant-funded pavilion.

Two days later, on Tuesday, August 18, the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) stopped by, concerned with the dam behind the pavilion.

“DEP met with state, county, and municipal officials to hold a comprehensive discussion of the condition and situation at the dam and to address violations of an existing order to keep the dam drained due to its poor condition,” a DEP spokesperson told the Sentinel.

Last week, DEP shared a notice of violation addressed to Shenandoah Borough Manager Mike Cadau with the Sentinel, alleging numerous violations of the Pennsylvania Dam Safety Act.

Chiefly, DEP alleges the borough has no permit to operate and maintain the dam, which predates the agency itself by nearly a century.

It also states that DEP had ordered the dam drained and plans for the removal or repair of the dam to be submitted to them. The borough hasn’t done so.

“Shenandoah Borough has failed to demonstrate to the Department that Brandonville Pumping Station Dam is structurally sound,” DEP writes. “Shenandoah Borough has failed to properly operate, maintain, and repair a dam. Your lack of maintenance may allow a potentially unsafe condition to develop.”

The borough also hasn’t updated its emergency action plan for the dam since 1995. It is required to be updated every five years.

“It did catch us off guard, Cadau said. “It caught us really off guard.”

Cadau discussed the meeting and the letter with the Sentinel on Wednesday. He said representatives from the borough, Argall’s office, and Watro’s office were on hand for the meeting.

“Since 2009, they’ve had this order, to [drain it], but I guess it’s been ignored,” Cadau said.

Cadau challenged the hazard assessment of the dam. He said he asked numerous times and DEP wouldn’t elaborate beyond the citing the flood inundation maps or minor deterioration in the spillway.

“The full dam, if it would’ve breached, would’ve gone to impact two houses by maybe four inches,” Cadau said.

Cadau said that the borough hopes to lower the dam below the spillway to “make it like a pond.”

DEP, Cadau said, will give the borough 60 days to develop a plan and he said they will develop a “tiered-approach over the next few years.”

“We just don’t have the capital to go ahead and spend $3M to $5M to put a brand new spillway in,” Cadau said. “We want to make sure that we can do a phased approach but we want to be able to keep the dam.”

Cadau also praised the Pumpy Association volunteers.

“They’re fighting real hard for a dam and they’re not getting paid for this,” Cadau said.

The dam was built in the late 1800’s as part of the Shenandoah Borough Waterworks. It served as a water source for the community until the 1940’s, when the Waterworks merged with the Citizens Water Co. and Girard Water Co. to form the Municipal Authority of the Borough of Shenandoah.

Micquelynn Kapuschinsky contributed to this report.

The article ONE STEP FORWARD, TWO STEPS BACK: Borough receives violation notice for Pumping Station Dam first appeared on The Shenandoah Sentinel.