Dredging Keeps Golf Course Dry

In past years, rapid snowmelt has sent Chester Creek surging over its banks, drenching Painted Hills Golf Course and nearby neighborhoods in the south Valley.

But thanks to recent channel dredging, there were no problems this week when fast-warming weather and heavy rain washed away the big Christmas snowfall.

The creek runs through Painted Hills Golf Course on Dishman-Mica Road, but the course came through this week’s warmup just fine, said owner Mike Senske.

“These conditions last year would have caused the creek to go over Thorpe Road and would have probably caused it to flood the golf course for weeks after,” Senske said.

Now, “the water level (in the creek) is probably two and a half to three feet lower than it was prior to the county’s (dredging) project,” he said.

What little water has pooled on the course in the last week is from rain and melting snow, which is not a problem, Senske said, and certainly not a deterrence to avid golfers, a few of whom were out on the course this week.

The county finished dredging the one-mile section of Chester Creek between Thorpe and Schafer roads last summer. Using backhoes, construction crews removed about 1,450 dump truck loads of silt from the waterway. The silt is composed of fine sand and clay that wash down with run-off from the surrounding hills and farms. When the silt settles, it clogs the creek channel, causing flooding.

Dredging cost the county $308,000 - about $39,000 more than expected.

The extra expense was for additional erosion control measures not anticipated in the original estimate, said Brenda Sims, county stormwater utility manager.

Those measures included fortifying some creek banks with rock and laying down erosion control matting on other areas, particularly on the creek banks near the golf course, to provide support until plants can take root and prevent erosion.

The channel will be able to handle routine to moderate runoff, but a severe storm would still flood water over the channel, Sims said.

Ponderosa Care-A-Lot Pre-School Day Care, located 100 yards from the creek, has in years past been hit hard by the flooding creek, said Assistant Director Anne Crosby.

The school is particularly vulnerable to stormwater flooding because it is located in a depression. In the past, the creek’s rising waters have swamped the road and driveway to the school.

Since the dredging, the area near the school has not flooded at all - “knock on wood,” Crosby said.