​Why Preserve French Creek?

 

“Awareness is key. In the absence of information, none of us know what is happening and what could be jeopardizing our health, our water supply, and our planet.”

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~ Erin Brockovich

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• In August 2022, Custer County residents living along, and near, Lower French Creek learned that the City of Custer’s new Wastewater Facility Upgrade Plan would include the Black Hills of South Dakota’s clean, historic French Creek as the dumping ground for its sewage wastewater. They immediately contacted the City and its contractor to request a meeting for the purpose of hearing firsthand the City’s Plan to move its wastewater discharge location an area of French Creek outside Custer City limits.

 

• At the requested meeting - attended by contractors DGR & KLJ, Custer City Mayor, Custer City Administrator, and the Custer City Planner, the following was learned:

  • The proposed French Creek discharge location begins approximately one mile below Stockade Lake, about 3 miles outside of the Custer City limits.

  • The discharge location selected is a short distance from the site of the historic Glen Erin School, the 1882 first public school building in the Black Hills.

  • The City chose French Creek as its new sewage wastewater discharge location because it was the least costly alternative presented by the contractor (DGR Engineering of Sioux Falls, SD), who was hired to assist with the City’s required wastewater plant upgrades. DGR, in turn, subcontracted with KLJ Engineering of Rapid City, South Dakota, along with others, to complete work under the plan.

  • The selection of French Creek was made with full knowledge by the Mayor and Council that the waters of French Creek would be “degraded” by their actions. Further, the City indicated to the State of South Dakota DANR that it would be “too costly” for the City to keep the waters of French Creek at its current CLEAN level, or, even to just MEET the State’s anti-degradation level.

  • The City was able to obtain a wastewater permit from the South Dakota Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources (SD-DANR) without communicating with, nor soliciting input, from private property owners who will be having the city’s sewage wastewater flowing through their properties.

  • Approximately 100 private property owners along the French Creek discharge route have confirmed that they were never communicated with by the City of Custer or by its contractor about the plan, at any time; even though such contacts were identified as required within the City’s plan.

  • The City’s February 2020 plan states:

    • "ALL stakeholders will be communicated with directly, in addition to publishing public notice announcements in its designated newspaper." (During this period when the Public Notices regarding actions related to the Wastewater Plant Upgrades were printed by the City’s designated newspaper, approximately only 10% of the County residents subscribed to the newspaper.) Council meetings were held, and decisions were made during the height of Covid 19 - when Americans were advised to stay home, and thousands were dying in South Dakota. Still, no effort was made to engage the 100 private property owners (stakeholders) located along the first few miles of the sewage wastewater discharge area These were the ones who would be most impacted by their actions.

  • The Custer City Council wrote in their permit application that “no comments regarding the French Creek alternative were received.”

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• Following the August 2022 meeting with the Custer City officials, concerned residents of Custer County and the area organized as a group to protect French Creek from being polluted. During this time members learned:

  • ​NO Environmental Assessment (EA) and NO Environmental Impact Statement had been completed for the NEW French Creek wastewater discharge location prior its selection. The EA included in documentation actually pertains to the "plant location", not French Creek, itself.

  • NO socio-economic study regarding the French Creek Alternative was ever completed regarding effects to the area, despite provisions of the contract indicating the need to do so. Reference is made in City documents however to a socio-economic study of Beaver Creek residents and businesses, and the City of Custer occurring.

  • The Custer Facility Plan indicates that residents and businesses affected by the Beaver Creek options, apparently, participated in a socio-economic study; as those options “were excluded from consideration” due to the negative impacts (the alternatives) would have on businesses and residents of those (Beaver Creek) areas. The socio-economic impact to Custer County and the State of South Dakota, by choosing to pollute French Creek, would have been found to be greater than Beaver Creek. Therefore, they should have also caused the exclusion of that alternative for the same reasons given for the Beaver Creek exclusion.

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• French Creek flows through Custer State Park beside lodges, restaurants, campgrounds, and trails. The park hosts more than 2 million visitors annually and the millions of sales tax dollars received from those visitors supports state government, schools, city and county governments, and the livelihoods of businesses in communities throughout the Black Hills, including Custer. Yet, the City of Custer chose to NOT perform any environmental or socio-economic assessments relative to the French Creek Alternative. They have chosen to disregard the negative environmental and economic impacts of selecting this as their sewage wastewater discharge location.

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“Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.”

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~ Chief Seattle

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More Background

• In the early 1980’s, a committee of community leaders and government officials was formed to determine a new wastewater discharge location for the City of Custer. This was after the cleanup of Stockade Lake was mandated, following years of it being polluted by City of Custer wastewater.

• Records from that period indicate that several public meetings were held and several studies completed, resulting in the decision by the City of Custer to move its wastewater discharge location to Flynn Creek, where no private homes, household wells, businesses or public visibility was present. This location is where Custer’s sewage wastewater has been discharging since the mid-1980s.

• So why change now?

  • ​Simply because discharging wastewater into French Creek was the cheapest alternative provided by their contractor(s).

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There is no indication recent Custer City leadership reviewed or considered any of the historical information and studies of the 1980s that led to selecting Flynn Creek, not French Creek, as its wastewater discharge location.

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Also, disregarded by the City is SD Codified Law 34A-10-8, which states

“…No conduct may be authorized or approved which does, or is likely to, pollute, impair, or destroy the air, water, or other natural resources or the public trust in the resources, if there is a feasible and prudent alternative consistent with the reasonable requirements of the public health, safety, and welfare.”

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The City of Custer was given Alternatives* to polluting a clean French Creek under its Wastewater Treatment Facility Upgrade Plan. These included:

1. No Action (i.e., leave facilities and routes as they currently exist)

2. Flynn Creek (included upgrading equipment and continuing to discharge to the current discharge location). *Pipelines for nearly 2/3 of the distance had been upgraded with pipe that has a lifetime expectancy of approximately 100 years. * *Costs for this Alternative were calculated/presented to include pipe replacement costs for the entire distance involved when that is not necessary; thus, making it more expensive than the French Creek Alternative.

3. Beaver Creek (Sidney Park Basin Outlet)

4. Beaver Creek (Airport/Hwy 385)

 

*Other alternatives, including more environmentally friendly and less costly options, than those presented by the contractors, were provided by Preserve French Creek in its presentations to the City Council, County Commissioners, and DANR. 

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*Per the South Dakota law cited above, no permit should have been granted by DANR to the City of Custer for discharge of its sewage wastewater into a CLEAN French Creek when other “feasible and more prudent” alternatives were available.

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Preserve French Creek, Inc. Outreach and Actions

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•  October 2022, Preserve French Creek provided a presentation to the Custer Mayor and City Council wherein alternatives to polluting French Creek were given. No questions were allowed to be asked of the Mayor or Council at this meeting, and no feedback was received. No response was ever given to the alternatives presented by the concerned citizens present.

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