Fish kill may force city to change some policies

Type of 'enforcement action' depends on investigation's outcome, DHEC says

Published in the Greenville News Online, Friday, August 18, 2006 - 6:00 am

By Paul Alongi
STAFF WRITER

Little more than a week after a fish kill in the Reedy River, state health officials are taking the first steps in an investigation that could require the City of Greenville to take actions to make sure it doesn't happen again, according to the state Department of Health and Environmental Control.

Researchers believe fish may have suffocated when the city opened a three-foot floodgate last week, kicking up enough sediment to lower the water's dissolved oxygen content, DHEC spokesman Thom Berry said late Thursday.

The agency has decided to initiate an "enforcement action" against the city, he said.

The possible actions could include a requirement the city do remediation to make sure a fish kill never happens again, Berry said.

"What kind of action is going to depend on what the investigation determines," Berry said. "It's too early to say what we'll be looking at."

Mayor Knox White, Mayor Pro Tem Lillian Brock Flemming, city manager Jim Bourey and city attorney Ron McKinney couldn't be reached for comment late Thursday.

The city opened the gate to lower the river near a staggered dam, visible from Main Street, on Aug. 7 or 8, Greenville Public Works director Mike Murphy said earlier.

When the water fell, it exposed a year's worth of silt that had built up on a rocky shelf, he said.

Bulldozers pushed some of the silt into a part of the river that was still flowing to prevent a sandbar from building up, Murphy said.

A fine is possible but unlikely because DHEC usually prefers that the money be spent on correcting the problem, Berry said. Revenue from any fines would go into the state's general fund, he said.

The state Department of Natural Resources has declined to disclose how many fish died or what species they were until the information is presented to the DNR board.

An enforcement officer with DHEC's Bureau of Water Quality will be assigned to the case, Berry said.

It's tough to say how long the investigation will take, he added.