MARSHALL — This week, the city of Marshall gave the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) permission to design a repair project for flood controls along the Redwood River. The project would focus on areas of erosion as the river approaches Marshall, near Wayside Rest Park.

“During some routine inspections and reviews of our flood control project, staff identified some areas where there’s some future concerns for us of washing out along the river,” Marshall Public Works Director Jason Anderson said at Monday’s city council meeting. Anderson said he anticipated that the USACE would be able to make repairs to those areas without a cost to the city. However, USACE needed authorization from the city to get access to the property.

Anderson said city staff identified some areas of erosion that could damage the flood control armoring along the Redwood River. One area was across from a bend in the river near Wayside Rest.

“The water kind of cut a different path,” Anderson said. “We’re concerned that it’s going to start to erode toward the (weir) wall.”

Further downstream, he said, “There’s some washouts occurring behind the armored portion of a bend in the river, and that’s starting to fall into the river.”

Anderson said Marshall city staff had worked with USACE, and provided them with drone photos of the eroded areas. “They came down a few months ago and did some inspections and reviews,” he said. The USACE agreed to design a repair project for the flood control system.

“We’ve determined that these are eligible for federal participation under public law,” Anderson said. “We’re connecting these washouts to some high-water events in the river, which triggers the federal participation.”

“It’s our understanding that this will be, eventually when we get this done, a no cost to the city type of project. It’ll all be federal dollars, similar to the project we did a couple years ago, in a couple other locations,” Anderson said. “If that changes, we’ll certainly let the council know.”

Council members voted to approve authorization for USACE to access the property for flood control repairs.

“We’re fortunate our engineering staff and public works staff are really watching this, so they can identify a potential risk before it becomes a problem,” Mayor Bob Byrnes said.