DISTRICT MUST TRADE WETLAND FOR SCHOOL SITE; WORK CAN'T START UNTIL REQUIREMENT SATISFIED

The Army Corps of Engineers and Missouri Department of Natural Resources confirmed Tuesday that a wetland area exists on the site of a planned Cape Girardeau vocational-technical school and high-school campus.

A two-person regulatory team from the Corps and Department of Natural Resources designated about three and one-quarter acres of the 72-acre property as a wetlands area. Most of the wetlands area is in a wooded section on the property, which is west of Kingshighway and Southern Expressway and borders a gravel section of Silver Springs Road

Because of the wetlands designation, the Cape Girardeau School District must now hire a surveyor to determine the exact size of the area so it can enter a process called mitigation with the regulatory team. If the wetlands area exceeds three acres, the mitigation process could take up to six months. If it is smaller than three acres, the process is expected to take 30 days.

Work can't start on the site until the mitigation is resolved.

The process will include submission of an application for a permit to disturb the land and will offer substitute property for the wetlands.

Mitigation would mean the district won't be able to begin the bidding process for dirt work for both schools at the end of the month as originally planned. Instead, superintendent Dr. Dan Tallent said the jobs probably will need to be bid separately, which could mean a larger price tag for both schools and a delay in starting construction of the vo-tech school.

Even so, school officials said the vo-tech school still will be completed in time for the 1999-2000 school year, as initially scheduled. The high school is part of a long-range improvements plan.

"My hope would be that we could make some kind of decision on that in the next 30 days, but April is probably the soonest we could work this out anyway," said Tallent. "I don't think it'll affect the vo-tech project. The wetlands area is all south of the vo-tech site, so that area won't be affected."

A wetland is soil saturated or covered by water most of the growing season. Disturbing a wetland is a federal violation because of the diminishing number of wetlands in the United States.

Mitigation allows property owners to offer substitute property "with wetland characteristics" at varying ratios to replace natural wetlands. The replacement land can be natural wetlands that have been used for farming or a planned wetland created to meet mitigation requirements.

In this case, the school district will have to offer some 10 acres of property in mitigation, about three and one-half new acres for each acre of wetlands.

Board member Dr. Bob Fox said mitigation is a viable option at this point. Whether the school board decides to mitigate will be based upon the most cost-effective alternative, he said.

"Basically we've got a few options," said Fox. "We talked about substituting some of the Sprigg-Bertling land, but the cost could be the deciding factor. We really won't know what we're going to do until we get it surveyed to find out exactly what the expenses would be."

Tallent said dirt would have to be removed from the Sprigg-Bertling site to consider it for mitigation. Members of the wetland team said that work could cost between $2,000 and $10,000 an acre, which is "not a good option for us."

Tallent and Fox said a landowner could accelerate the mitigation process and save the district land and money by volunteering land to be designated as a wetland. Anyone can enter mitigation on the district's behalf, and that action could save the district thousands of dollars.

Fox said the district will soon find a viable solution. Board members most likely will look for assistance with the mitigation process.

The end result will be buildings constructed on the property at the least cost to the district, Fox said. "It's just another hurdle we've got to look at," he said. "I hope we can do this without any expense."

Tallent said neither the school district nor the property owner knew the wetland was on the property when it was purchased last spring.