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Vermont floods raise concerns about future of state's hundreds of aging dams

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Vermont floods raise concerns about future of state's hundreds of aging dams
News

News

Vermont floods raise concerns about future of state's hundreds of aging dams

2024-07-14 01:54 Last Updated At:02:00

BOSTON (AP) — The latest flooding in Vermont has added fresh urgency to concerns about the hundreds of dams in the state, a third of which are more than a century old.

This week’s deluge from the remnants of Hurricane Beryl wasn’t as bad for the hundreds of dams compared to last year’s floods, when five failed and nearly 60 overtopped. But the second bad flood in a year raises concerns about the viability of these structures as climate change brings heavier rains and more powerful storms.

“The many thousands of obsolete dams that remain in our rivers do not provide protection from flooding, despite what many may think,” Andrew Fisk, the northeast regional director for the environmental advocacy group American Rivers, said. "Dams not created specifically for flood protection are regularly full and do not provide storage capacity. And they also frequently direct water outside of the main channel at high velocities which causes bank erosion and impacts to communities."

The challenge facing dams in Vermont is playing out across the country as more dams overtop or fail during heavy rains. The Rapidan Dam, a 1910 hydroelectric dam in Minnesota, was badly damaged last month by the second-worst flood in its history. And in Texas, flooding damaged the Lake Livingston Dam’s spillway about 65 miles (105 kilometers) northeast of Houston.

There are roughly 90,000 significant dams in the U.S. At least 4,000 are in poor or unsatisfactory condition and could kill people or only harm the environment if they failed, according to data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. They need inspections, upgrades and even emergency repairs.

Like the rest of New England, Vermont has mostly older, small dams built to power textile mills, store water or supply irrigation to farms. The concern is they have outlived their usefulness and climate change could bring storms they were never built to withstand.

The floods last year in Vermont drew outsized attention to dams mostly due to the failures and near failures. In the capital Montpelier, a dam was at risk of sending water over the emergency spillway and through parts of the town. The National Inventor of Dams, a database regulated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, lists 372 dams in the state, with 62 rated as high hazard, which means lives could be lost if the dam fails. Ten of those were rated in poor condition, which means remedial action is necessary.

State officials say they actually regulate 417 dams and that there are hundreds more too small and of minimal hazard to be regulated.

The storms last year led to a rapid inspection of all the state's dams, with more than $1.5 million spent to stabilize and repair storm damage.

“The team had never been faced with a situation of, you know, 8 inches of widespread rain across essentially the entire state of Vermont,” Neil Kamman, the director of the Water Investment Division in the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation, said. “It stressed all of the facilities that the state of Vermont owns and that the dam safety team manages but filled up hundreds of dams, caused the failures that you know about and created a whole bunch of unknown uncertainties out there on the landscape in terms of downstream risk due to, you know, prospective dams having been destabilized.”

In response, the legislature approved the hiring of four staffers in the dam safety program, bringing the total to nine, and allocated an additional $4 million to a dam safety program, up from $200,000. That money can be used for emergency risk reduction, restoration or removal of dams.

This time around, dam safety officials said the damage has been minimal. No dams are believed to have failed and only one dam — Harvey’s Lake in Barnet, which is classified as a low hazard structure — overtopped. But even in that case, there was not likely to be any significant impact to property nor the nearby roadways, officials said.

Julie Moore, secretary of the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources, said during a news conference Friday that inspections found that Winooski River Valley flood control reservoir “continue to do their job well” and that levels at the Waterbury Reservoir “are stabilizing with plenty of storage remaining.” Those dams and the East Barre Dam are critical to flood control in an area that stretches from Barre to Essex.

She also said that officials had completed inspections at “seven particularly at risk” dams in the northern part of the state and that “no damage was identified.”

The floods this year came too soon for the additional money and staffing to have an impact. But Kamman said the experience of responding to last year's flood helped shaped a more robust response from the team this time around.

“The biggest difference between the response this year and last year is the fact that we had the game plan worked out for a widespread event that would stress a large number of facilities all at once," he said.

August Thompson walks over the washed out remains of the road in front of his grandfather's home after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

August Thompson walks over the washed out remains of the road in front of his grandfather's home after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

An excavator and loader clear Hudson Avenue of mud after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

An excavator and loader clear Hudson Avenue of mud after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Walker Blackwell, right, cleans up the damage to his home after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Walker Blackwell, right, cleans up the damage to his home after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

A loader dumps dirt along a washed out portion of Mill Street after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

A loader dumps dirt along a washed out portion of Mill Street after remnants of Hurricane Beryl caused flooding and destruction, Friday, July 12, 2024, in Plainfield, Vt. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

President Donald Trump moved to end a decades-old immigration policy known as birthright citizenship when he ordered the cancellation of the constitutional guarantee that U.S.-born children are citizens regardless of their parents’ status.

Trump's roughly 700-word executive order, issued late Monday, amounts to a fulfillment of something he's talked about during the presidential campaign. But whether it succeeds is far from certain as attorneys general in 18 states and two cities challenged the order in court on Tuesday, seeking to block the president.

Here's a closer look at birthright citizenship, Trump's executive order and reaction to it:

Birthright citizenship means anyone born in the U.S. is a citizen, regardless of their parents' immigration status. People, for instance, in the United States on a tourist or other visa or in the country illegally can become the parents of a citizen if their child is born here.

It's been in place for decades and enshrined in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, supporters say. But Trump and allies dispute the reading of the amendment and say there need to be tougher standards on becoming a citizen.

The order questions that the 14th Amendment extends citizenship automatically to anyone born in the United States.

The 14th Amendment was born in the aftermath of the Civil War and ratified in 1868. It says: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Trump's order excludes the following people from automatic citizenship: those whose mothers were not legally in the United States and whose fathers were not U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents; people whose mothers were in the country legally but on a temporary basis and whose fathers were not citizens or legal permanent residents.

It goes on to bar federal agencies from recognizing the citizenship of people in those categories. It takes effect 30 days from Tuesday, on Feb. 19.

The 14th Amendment did not always guarantee birthright citizenship to all U.S.-born people. Congress did not authorize citizenship for all Native Americans born in the United States, for instance, until 1924.

In 1898 an important birthright citizenship case unfolded in the U.S. Supreme Court. The court held that Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, was a U.S. citizen because he was born in the country. After a trip abroad, he had faced denied reentry by the federal government on the grounds that he wasn't a citizen under the Chinese Exclusion Act.

But some advocates of immigration restrictions have argued that while the case clearly applied to children born to parents who are both legal immigrants, it’s less clear whether it applies to children born to parents without legal status.

Eighteen states, plus the District of Columbia and San Francisco sued in federal court to block Trump's order.

New Jersey Democratic Attorney General Matt Platkin said Tuesday the president cannot undo a right written into the Constitution with a stroke of his pen.

“Presidents have broad power but they are not kings,” Platkin said.

Not long after Trump signed the order, immigrant rights groups filed suit to stop it.

Chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts along with other immigrant rights advocates filed a suit in New Hampshire federal court.

The suit asks the court to find the order to be unconstitutional. It highlights the case of a woman identified as “Carmen," who is pregnant but is not a citizen. The lawsuit says she has lived in the United States for more than 15 years and has a pending visa application that could lead to permanent status. She has no other immigration status, and the father of her expected child has no immigration status either, the suit says.

“Stripping children of the ‘priceless treasure’ of citizenship is a grave injury,” the suit said. "It denies them the full membership in U.S. society to which they are entitled."

In addition to New Jersey and the two cities, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin joined the lawsuit to stop the order.

President-elect Donald Trump, from left, takes the oath of office as Barron Trump and Melania Trump watch at the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP)

President-elect Donald Trump, from left, takes the oath of office as Barron Trump and Melania Trump watch at the 60th Presidential Inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque/Pool Photo via AP)

President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

U.S. flags around the Washington Monument are at full staff during the 60th Presidential Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. Flags are supposed to fly at half-staff through the end of January out of respect for former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

U.S. flags around the Washington Monument are at full staff during the 60th Presidential Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. Flags are supposed to fly at half-staff through the end of January out of respect for former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

A young man reacts to information on how to prepare for the upcoming changes to undocumented families living in the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)

A young man reacts to information on how to prepare for the upcoming changes to undocumented families living in the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 19, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)

Sonia Rosa Sifore and other anti-Trump protesters gather in Federal Plaza to rally for a number of issues, including immigrant rights, the Israel-Hamas war, women's reproductive rights, racial equality and others, on the day of President Trump's Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Erin Hooley)

Sonia Rosa Sifore and other anti-Trump protesters gather in Federal Plaza to rally for a number of issues, including immigrant rights, the Israel-Hamas war, women's reproductive rights, racial equality and others, on the day of President Trump's Inauguration, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Erin Hooley)

President Donald Trump signs an executive order on birthright citizenship in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump signs an executive order on birthright citizenship in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

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