There could be a wash of changes coming for Clarke County Reservoir’s (CCRC) watershed project.
During a Nov. 17 Osceola City Council meeting, Mayor Fred Diehl, who also represents the city on the CCRC, spoke publicly during the meeting’s mayoral comments section.
“We’ll have bought and purchased a majority of the land,” he said. “Now, there a couple of hitches and we are, because of this legislative ruling or law or whatever you want to call it, we are going to change our plans. I don’t want to, and I am very much opposed to it. But, I may get outvoted.”
Diehl said the potential upcoming plan would “shrink” the reservoir by half. This would potentially avoid using eminent domain in the project.
Eminent domain is the government’s power to take private property for public use by a state.
The actual project
CCRC is in the process of building a reservoir project located in northwest Clarke County.
The reservoir is to provide a water supply for Osceola and Southern Iowa Rural Water Association (SIRWA) with an 816-acre lake, which could provide 2.2 million gallons of water per day.
West Lake, the current water source, doesn’t meet the needs of Clarke County and SIRWA.
Funding for the project includes many sources, especially funding from the local-option sales tax.
However, there have been many legislative setbacks, including the most recent one from July.
The recent Iowa law on eminent domain created language that changed the law on use of eminent domain for the creation of public water supply surface water reservoirs throughout the state.
This doesn’t stop the CCRC from purchasing land from willing sellers in the project area, which is currently going on.
Meetings
A CCRC meeting was held Wednesday, Nov. 18. However, the commission’s engineers weren’t at the November monthly meeting, so no new logistics and updates on the task order were available yet.
The next CCRC meeting is planned 9 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 17.
“Hopefully, we’ll hear from the engineers,” said project coordinator Dave Beck.
In other CCRC news:
• CCRC approved a letter of request to Clarke Board of Supervisors to issue local option sales tax revenue bonds for expenses of implementing the project.
• CCRC approved “binding agreements” with Clarke County Board of Health conceding building sites and septic systems.