Agency seeks $856,000 to repair local flood damage

Requests for $856,000 in federal cost-share funding have been submitted to help Baker County farmers and ranchers repair irrigation systems and fish screens damaged in recent flooding.

Trent Luschen, manager of the Farm Service Agency in Baker County, said he applied for the money under the Environmental Conservation Program, which pays 75 percent of the cost of repairing head gates, diversions and irrigation ditches and fences, repairing or replacing fish screens, and removing debris and grading, shaping and leveling fields.

“Those are the things we asked for to help farmers and ranchers that were damaged by the flooding,” Luschen said.

Most of the flood damage occurred in the Pine and Eagle valleys in eastern Baker County, but Luschen said some also occurred in Baker Valley.

Congressman Greg Walden said he has received assurances from the head of the Farm Service Agency that fish screen repairs will be covered under the Environmental Conservation Program (ECP), provided additional funding becomes available.

Walden said he sent a letter and followed up with a phone call Thursday to the National Farm Service Agency Administrator Jonathan Coppess.

Walden said Coppess agreed to expedite that sweep and to allocate any money available for Baker County’s application, which is second on the list for ECP projects.

“I think it helps to focus attention of these federal and state agencies that this is a real problem and it demands rapid response,” Walden said. “The agencies have a lot on their plates. Part of my job is to make sure this is on top of the pile. I have been very pleased with the response we are getting. They are stepping up really good.”

 To speed the process, Luschen is asking landowners who have flood damage to give him a call at the local FSA office — 541-523-3621

“We’ve heard from quite a few producers with flood damage, but not all of them,” Luschen said. “Our goal is to put everything back in prior flood condition. That would include fish screens.”

Those screens are designed to protect bull trout, a threatened species.

Walden sad he is pleased to see that three officials with the Department of State Lands (DSL) visited Baker County last week to survey flood damage and initiating a streamlined permitting process so farmers and ranchers can make repairs needed to get their irrigation systems and running before crop damage occurs from lack of water.

Bill Ryan, the DSL chief of fill and removal, joined Baker County Roadmaster Ken Helgerson to tour the flood damage and develop a communication plan.

Although the current focus is on getting farmers and ranchers the funding and necessary permits to make repairs, Walden is also working with federal, county and state officials to identify long-term solutions to prevent similar flooding problems and damage in the future.