APNewsBreak: Corps not budging on Miss. River flap

Yahoo News ^ | December 7, 2012 | By JIM SUHR and JIM SALTER | Associated Press

[Uncle Chip]

ST. LOUIS (AP) — The Army Corps of Engineers has turned back requests by federal lawmakers and the barge industry to release more water from the Missouri River, believing the drought-starved Mississippi River it feeds still will remain open to shipping despite mounting concerns about water levels.

Army Assistant Secretary Jo-Ellen Darcy, in a Thursday letter obtained by The Associated Press, told lawmakers from Mississippi River states she doesn't consider it necessary to boost Missouri River flows into the Mississippi — something the politicians urgently had sought.

Darcy, a top Army Corps official, noted this week's revised National Weather Service forecast, which showed the Mississippi's level wasn't falling as rapidly as expected. She also said the corps is hastening its push to rid the river of rock pinnacles south of St. Louis that endanger barges when the water level is low.

Darcy also reinforced what the corps has been insisting for weeks: Reducing the Missouri's flow is necessary because low levels in its upper basin could negatively affect recreation in the upper Missouri while impacting drinking water supplies, animal habitat and hydropower. Darcy added that the corps is legislatively bound to act in the best interest of the Missouri River, with what happens on the Mississippi incidental.

U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill did not greet the letter warmly. The Missouri Democrat asserted Friday the corps would be to blame if shipping on the Mississippi — a corridor on which everything from grain to coal, chemicals and petroleum products is transported — gets slowed or shut down completely.

[Sacajaweau]

another government entity with too much power

[ShadowAce]

If it would impact drinking water and hydropower, they are doing the right thing.

[Don Corleone]

Lets see. They burned most of the San Joaquin valley dry and now they have set their sights on the heartland and the Mississippi River. WTG Obama. We’ll be as progressive as Zimbabwe in no time.

[TexasCajun]

Obama says Corpse not moving.

[hinckley buzzard]

The Army Corps of Engineers has never seen a dam they didn't like or wanted to build. That's how they stay in business. To release water now would be like admitting bureaucratic incompetence. And while the Corps has been under scrutiny for at least a generation, they have not yet ever admitted their bullheadedness has harmed the public they pretend to serve.