Charenton floodgate will have inner basin structure

After years of planning, seeking support and waiting for funding from the federal government, the first steps to construct a new Charenton Floodgate on the west Atchafalaya Basin Protection Levee is at last under way.
Kimberly S. Walden, Chitimacha Cultural Department Director and Tribal Historic Preservation Officer, said that in 2009 the tribe learned that the United States Corps of Engineers and the St. Mary Parish Levee Board planned to close off the floodgate. Pumps would be installed in place of the gate.
“In our meetings with the Corps of Engineers we were able to talk to the colonel,” she said. “They come anytime a new colonel is installed to meet with the tribal council and those of us who work with the agency. I asked the Corps if they had the legal basis to close it, since the structure had been installed originally for two things, access and flood control.”
“Through research, they found that we were correct, and that the floodgate was put in for both reasons,” Walden said. “After that finding, they told us it would take a literal act of Congress to decommission the floodgate’s access component.”
The tribe continued to express a desire to keep the access between the channel connecting Bayou Teche to the floodgate, and subsequently the Atchafalaya River Basin. “At another meeting, they said that in checking their records no one was using the floodgate, so they would be justified in closing off the access point,” Walden said. “We asked, ‘Where is the phone number posted? What are these people told when they do call?’ We inquired about a chance to prove that people would use the gate if it was safe and operable.”
A public meeting was held and attended by some 77 individuals interested in the issue in October, 2010 at the tribal school gym. “Tribal members, people from surrounding communities and even people from Iberia Parish attended, which created a very impressive showing,” Walden said. “People took comment cards home and we really impressed upon the Corps that people would in fact do what we told them they would do: use that as an access point.”
At the meeting, discussions began on how to accomplish that, and Walden said ideally, the best avenue was a lock system. But the Corps said it could not be funded because it “couldn’t meet the economics of how their projects are funded. My husband asked, ‘If you put a new floodgate (on the basin side of the levee) and keep the existing structure in place, wouldn’t it create a lock system?’ And they said that it would. People in attendance were supportive of that idea.”
That ended up being the design that was settled on.
In a later conversation, Corps officials contacted Walden and said that due to cost, the gate width on the new structure would have to be smaller. “But we need to have access; that was the point of the design.” Walden noted. “They were questioning the maximum width of vessels that would use the floodgate.”
Walden herself spent much effort consulting with potential users and measuring houseboats to find a happy medium. “The problem then became funding,” she said.
The floodgate sits at the lowest point in the West Atchafalaya Basin System, and is also the oldest structure, having been built in 1948. “It has always been identified as a critical need, and now we have a design, so it was a shovel ready project waiting on funding since 2011,” Walden said. “We were told to press upon Congress the need for this budgeted project to be funded, because without design was as far as the Corps could go.”
Prior to a planned trip to Washington, DC in March of 2019, Walden sought out Congressmen Clay Higgins and Garrett Graves and scheduled appointments for Tribal Chairman Melissa Darden and herself. A meeting was held with their staff, and “the information was well-received; they seemed to appreciate our situation and need. Their staff committed to working together on this issue.”
There was no further contact for a time, until Valentine’s Day this year. “Not quite a year from our visit, I got a call from a very shocked senior project manager at the Corps,” Walden said. “She had gotten word that the Charenton floodgate had been funded. Not fully, but funded for the first phase.”
Walden said it is anticipated that the $17 million first phase will be followed by a budget for a second phase and third phase to complete. “They’re hopeful that phase two and three will be funded because the Corps doesn’t like to start a project and not complete it. So what we can announce is that phase one will begin very shortly. People will see dirt work beginning on the new alignment and other components that the current funding allows.”
As far the current structure, there are lead paint issues with the floodgate that must be mitigated. The structure has actually been listed on the National Register of Historic Properties, so it will remain. “Ideally the gates would be made operable so that we could utilize both the old and the new gate to create a lock system for safe passage. That is not in the scope of this project however.”
The floodgate has been closed and welded shut for a number of years now. Walden said, “Just for the health of the fisheries, keeping it closed all that time has had an impact, not to mention the silt that’s built up around there. Just having that flow would be important. Our idea (that of the Chitimacha Tribe and the Lake Fausse Point, Grand Avoille Cove, Lake Dauterieve Advisory Board) is to improve fisheries through dredging. Dredge barges will need to pass through the structure. It’s also important beyond just flood control…it’s economics, it’s history, and it’s tradition that held importance for a lot of people for a long time.”
Walden concluded that she is thankful to tribal members and residents of the surrounding area for supporting the tribe in its effort. “To come out and show the Corps what that structure meant to them, and express what their desires were,” she said. “I want them to know that their voice was heard, and it made a difference.”