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Wetlands project may force family off ranch again
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Wetlands, by federal definition, requires the existence of a natural spring or river head as a water source...areas that are wet or have standing water, due to drainage, are not natural swamps, er...wetlands--but that seldom stops an environmentally conscience bureaucrat.
When I lived in Ohio, two departments of the Federal government declared a water-retention basin for run-off from the freeway and nearby on-ramps as a wetlands. . . well, it was large, there were cattails growing and ducks & geese liked it.
It originally was supposed to percolate run off into the soil...but Fed Highway topped the area off with clay--so the water sat stagnate, stinking and breeding mosquitoes.
When the city demanded a rehabilitation & clean up to the original master-plan, actions were delayed 2 years because someone designated it as a historic wetlands. It was pointed out that swamp was the result of failed engineering, not nature--no matter.
3 years, several studies, & millions later, the drainage was redirected. Where once was stagnate water, now sits a fed protected dry wetlands area--the irony.