Work soon could begin on stabilizing stream banks along creeks damaged by flooding last year in central and eastern Lycoming County.
On Tuesday, the Lycoming County commissioners opened bids for stream bank construction on eight properties along Pleasant Stream, Loyalsock Creek, Little Muncy Creek, Glade Run and Plunketts Creek.
The work includes the installation of riprap, or stone reinforcing, along the properties to prevent further erosion, said Mark Davidson, county Conservation District manager.
Bids were sought for each property as a separate restoration project.
Each property was put out to bid as a separate project, said Mya Toon, county grants administrator. Eight contractors submitted bids for some or all of the projects.
Those bids will be considered on a project-by-project basis, Toon said.
According to Davidson, a recommendation as to which bids should be accepted could be made during the commissioners Thursday meeting.
The work will be paid for through a federal Emergency Watershed Protection Program grant, Davidson said. A state Department of Environmental Protection grant, which recently was announced by state Sen. E. Eugene Yaw, R-Loyalsock Township, will be used as the 25 percent local cash match needed for the county to receive the federal grant, he said.
The funding will pay to stabilize stream banks damaged by "severe flooding by Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee in August and September 2011," Tom Santana, director of the DEP's office of legislative affairs, wrote Yaw in a letter informing him of the grant award.
"Hopefully, we'll be getting started, depending on the contractors' schedules, immediately," Davidson said of the work.
The commissioners also will consider approval of agreements and supporting documents that will allow stream bank work to be completed on five other properties, four of them along Loyalsock Creek and one along Lycoming Creek. Those projects will be put out to bid as soon as possible, Davidson said.
