County to spend $15 mil. to curtail erosion

Friday, July 9, 1999 | 10:40 a.m.

After decades of talking about erosion in the Las Vegas Wash, Clark County is doing something this year to stop it.

After Oct. 1 the county plans to begin building the first of 14 barriers to prevent erosion that has reduced 2,000 acres of vibrant green wetlands in the Las Vegas Wash to less than 200 acres of marsh.

Without stopping valley runoff and flash floods -- such as Thursday's major disaster -- from tearing through the 15-mile strip of struggling wetlands, water quality will continue to deteriorate, officials said. Also as a result, there will be no desert wetlands park, and hundreds of birds, animals and plants will lose their homes, they said.

For more than 20 years increasing flows of treated sewage, floodwaters and surface runoff have torn away cattails and other.

Veteran conservation expert Vern Bostick has been urging county officials to stop the damaging flows in the wash since the 1970s. As a County Conservation District employee, he warned of damages to the wetlands. After a 1975 flood hit the wash, waters scraped away all plants, carving a 50-foot-wide channel in the wash near Henderson. Continued flooding has deepened the damage.

Retired biologist Larry Paulson said he worries about the increasing contamination pouring into the wash waters from a growing Las Vegas Valley.

Without wetlands, it will be impossible and very expensive for the county and cities to clean those waters that drain into Lake Mead.

The first step is to stop the erosion, lake expert Jim LaBounty of the Bureau of Reclamation said. LaBounty serves on the committee with Paulson and has studied pollution from the valley streaming into the lake for the past nine years.

The entire Las Vegas Valley between mountain ranges north, south and west drains into the Las Vegas Wash, acting like a funnel channeling the water into the wash.

Expected to cost $15.5 million for the 14 projects, the first barrier at Pabco Road will run less than $2 million, county planners estimate.

County project leader Michael Goff said that once the county gets necessary permits and puts the Pabco Road barrier project out to bid, construction could begin after Oct. 1.

Another erosion control barrier not far away from the first one will include a demonstration project on what happens after wetlands are created, said Kim Zikmund, Southern Nevada Water Authority team leader for improving the Las Vegas Wash.

In addition, the county plans to improve the existing D-14 dike, a structure that ponds enough water to attract water birds.