Jacobs Creek tributaries targeted for flood control study

Three Jacobs Creek tributaries in Scottdale and East Huntingdon are targets of a study designed to prevent the kind of flooding the borough has seen all too often after heavy rains — flooding on streets and in some basements.

“When we get these 100-year rains, we get the surface water from East Huntingdon,” and the stormwater system can’t handle it, said Angelo Pallone, Scottdale borough manager.

A federally funded study will look at ways to prevent flooding on Anderson Run, with its 720-acre subwatershed; Little Sherrick Run, with its 250-acre subwatershed; and Stauffer Avenue Run, with its 170-acre subwatershed. All of the streams flow into Jacobs Creek in Scottdale.

“We’re getting too much water from the (East Huntingdon) township. Scottdale Borough is a tight little bowl,” Pallone said.

To conduct a feasibility study of the flooding problem on the three streams, Scottdale was able to land a $440,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture two years ago, Pallone said.

Stauffer Run, in particular, causes flooding when it gets high and the stormwater system that empties into the stream backs up, Pallone said.

The floodwaters also cause problems for some East Huntingdon residents living along those streams, said Alexandria Torock, secretary-treasurer for the township.

“We’re hoping to alleviate some of the flooding by working with the (Scottdale) borough and the (Westmoreland) Conservation District,” Torock said.

With the project in the beginning stages, it is too early to say what kind of flood control measures should be installed along the streams, said Denise Coleman, state conservationist for the Agriculture Department’s Natural Resources Conservation Service in Harrisburg.

“We’ll start finding out more in six months to a year,” Coleman said.

When the study is complete, it will move into the design phase that might take two to three years. The entire project might take seven to 10 years, said Heather Smeltz, project manager and a civil engineer for the federal conservation service overseeing the initiative.

Flooding has been a “historic problem” along Jacobs Creek and its tributaries for several decades, said James Pillsbury, a Westmoreland Conservation District hydraulic engineer who is involved in the study.

The main channel of Jacobs Creek in Scottdale was the site of a flood control project by the Natural Resources Conservation Service in the 1990s. Three dams were constructed on Jacobs Creek to control the flow of water through the Scottdale-Everson area: the Acme Dam in Mt. Pleasant Township in 1975, the Green Lick Run Dam in Bullskin Township in 1973 and Bridgeport Dam in Mt. Pleasant Township in 1990.

“Those projects, in combination with the channel reduction (on Jacobs Creek), reduced flooding in Scottdale,” Coleman said.

But, after the more expensive dams were finished, Pillsbury said federal funding dried up for similar projects along the tributaries that funnel water into the creek.

“Now we have the funding to do the small streams,” Coleman said.

A survey crew with Michael Baker International of Pittsburgh has checked the stream and the culverts to determine whether they are too small for the amount of water flowing through them, Coleman said. Part of the problem in determining the cause of the flooding problem is that the streams were piped and the pipes covered up, so it is unknown if the pipes are sufficient to handle a high flow of water, Pillsbury said.

Residents will have a chance to provide input on the projects, review proposed plans and get an outline of the planning process during two public meetings from 3 to 5 p.m. and 6 to 8 p.m. Dec. 1 at the Scottdale Firemen’s Club, 405 Porter Ave. There are two meetings to reduce the number of people gathering at the club because of the covid-19 restrictions. Masks will be required and social distancing will be practiced, according to an announcement from the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

“We want to get the public’s ideas about what should be done,” Coleman said.