Although inclement weather has delayed repair work to the dam in the Longleaf Acres subdivision outside Petal, officials are hopeful that process will be finished within the next 30 days, depending on the availability of local paving companies.
The project was originally expected to finish late last year, but Forrest County District 3 Supervisor Burkett Ross said work was postponed several times because of rain or severe cold
“We’re pushing to get it shaped back up – now, when we can get a company to pave it, I don’t know,” Ross said. “Of course, all that depends on the weather; in a project like that, everything hinges on the weather and you have to work with whatever God gives you.
“I don’t know how many days they couldn’t work (because of bad weather), but there were some. It was pretty wet out there (last week), but they were able to work.”
The repairs, which started in the spring of last year, will bring the dam into compliance with new regulations from the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, which classified the dam as a “high hazard” based on the amount of water in the system. In late 2021, Forrest County received a $481,000 grant from MDEQ for the work.
Ross previously said officials hoped to get the repairs done for $480,000, which would prevent any of the cost from being passed on to taxpayers.
The project entails facing the front side of the dam with a heavy clay material, as raising the dam approximately 30 inches. In addition, a new spillway is being constructed, and the back of the dam is being rebuilt with a graded slope.
“The front of it’s finished, pretty much, and then they’ve got to put down the spillway material,” Ross said. “Then we should pretty much be away from there, and on to another project – I have another two I’m hoping to get started shortly.
“I just want to get through with that; we’ve been there so long. All that was hinging on government money, and you’re at the mercy of when they release it.”
The dam was given the “high hazard” designation in 2018. According to engineers, a failure at the dam could possibly affect 12 residences downstream.
“That was because conditions changed below it, which would be downstream, so to speak – that’s what caused all this,” Ross said. “It wasn’t anticipated – they just came and told us.
“They’ve done it in other areas of the state, where they’ve reclassified dams where conditions have changed. So that was why we had to do this.”
Back in June 2018, supervisors approved a payment of $3,408.38 to Hattiesburg firm Shows, Dearman & Waits to draw up a flood inundation map and look at ways to minimize the effects in case of dam failure. Shortly after that, David Hogan, who serves as president of the Forrest County Board of Supervisors, stressed that there was no problem with the dam as is.
“It’s strictly a designation because of the water volume amount,” he said. “I want to say that dam has over 25 acres of water.
“There is no current threat or danger of dam failure or anything else.”
Ross said the rebuilt dam will be a boon to the Longleaf Acres neighborhood.
“It should be there for a long time,” he said. “We should never have any more problems with it, and there wasn’t anything wrong with it in the beginning.
“(MDEQ) just changed the classification, and they certainly have a right to do that – they’re the authorities over that. But hopefully in a month, we’ll be gone from there.”
