Riverton may receive flood-prevention funds

RIVERTON — Barkhamsted may receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal funds — as well as the assistance of a group of Yale University graduate students — to help protect portions of the village of Riverton from flooding.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation earlier this month that includes $500,000 in federal funding for Barkhamsted to improve the Mountain Road Stream’s watercourse and prevent flooding in Riverton.

The funding is part of broader legislation, the Agriculture Appropriations Bill, according to U.S. Rep. John Larson, a Democrat who represents Barkhamsted as well as the 26 other towns that make up Connecticut’s First Congressional District.

“The Senate will take up the legislation in the coming weeks, the last step before the bill is signed into law by the president,� Larson said in an Oct. 7 press release announcing the bill’s passage in the House.

If the funding is approved by the Senate and President Barack Obama signs the bill into law, the town will use the money to move forward on a proposed project to widen the riverbank, as well as to make repairs to the Mountain Road and Old Riverton Inn culverts.

The Mountain River Stream runs from People’s State Forest in the Pleasant Valley section of Barkhamsted to the Farmington River.

Barkhamsted First Selectman Don Stein told The Journal Tuesday that for the past three decades, the stream occasionally overflows its banks after a heavy rainfall, causing havoc all along its path.

Stein said the stream overflowed last year, damaging two culverts and flooding a local farmer’s fields and the parking lot of the Riverton Inn.

“Normally, it’s a little stream,� Stein said. “But it just overflowed onto everything in sight. It made a big mess.�

Town officials met with members of the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection after last year’s flood. Stein said the state officials estimated it would cost $770,000 to correct the stream bed’s watercourse and make the necessary repairs to the damaged culverts.

To help bridge the funding gap, a group of Yale University graduate students have stepped forward and offered to develop the design plans for the project in an effort to fulfill a portion of their required coursework in watercourse management.

Stein said although the students have yet to officially commit to taking over the design portion of the project, the group was expected to visit the Mountain Road Stream area last Sunday.

Riverton, sandwiched between the Farmington and Still rivers, is on the Federal Register of Historic Places, and the Farmington River is a federally designated Wild and Scenic River.