Highly debated Jackson flood control project gets green light, local officials announce ...Middle East

A controversial flood control project that would transform Jackson’s waterfront is set to move forward after decades of debate over how the project would impact an ecosystem stretching into Louisiana, local officials announced Thursday.

The Rankin Hinds Pearl River Flood and Drainage Control District said the assistant secretary of the Army for Civil Works, Adam Telle, selected a proposal to dam and lower the banks of the river near Jackson. “Alternative D1” was one of a few proposals the public weighed in on during U.S. Army Corps of Engineers comment sessions last summer.

The flood control district’s board, comprised of elected officials from Rankin and Hinds counties, is the project’s local government sponsor. The board and the Corps are the agencies in charge of designing and proposing the project. As of Thursday morning, neither the Corps nor Telle had announced the project selection.

During a press conference Thursday, Pearl Mayor Jake Windham said the agencies still need to finalize an environmental assessment and then “get a final decision, hopefully this summer.”

“After that, we will begin the intensive design and engineering process to get us ready for construction,” Windham said.

The Corps in 2022 dedicated $221 million from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act for this project, which would only cover a portion of the estimated cost of $873 million to $918 million. The federal government is supposed to pay for 65%, with the rest coming from state and local governments.

Keith Turner, attorney for the flood control district, said he thinks the Corps’ estimate of the project cost is too high. He said he hopes to have a design agreement with the Corps in the next four weeks, and to begin construction by the end of the year or by early 2027.

The news would conclude a decades-long journey among Jackson metro officials to address flooding from the Pearl River, which caused record destruction in 1979. More recently, a 2020 event flooded over 200 structures in Jackson and Flowood, and was the third-highest crest in history.

Since the 1979 flood, which caused over $200 million in damages (the event would cause over $1.2 billion in damages today, the Corps estimates) local officials have worked with the Corps on a number of solutions. In 2011, the late oil businessman and developer John McGowan proposed a flood control and recreational development plan known as “One Lake,” which the local flood control board supported until the Corps rejected the idea in 2024 because of its high cost. Before that, McGowan proposed a “Two Lakes” solution in 1996. Alternative D1 is a scaled-back version of One Lake.

Ever since McGowan presented the idea, opponents — including environmental groups such as Healthy Gulf, Audubon Delta and the Sierra Club, as well as officials from downstream places such as Monticello and Slidell, Louisiana — have panned the idea for its potential to disrupt downstream flow and destroy valuable habitat.

Jackson-area officials on Thursday celebrated the project’s potential to reconnect Jackson with the Pearl River, opening up an array of recreational and economic development opportunities. In additional to providing flood control, the plan would include new riverfront development, parks and trails, its website says.

Jackson Mayor John Horhn said critics of the proposal are “not listening to the science.”

“They’re not listening to the fact that the Corps has vetted this project for more than 25 years,” said Horhn, adding he thinks the development will be the “most transformative project we have seen in the Jackson Metropolitan area, probably in its history.”

Two protesters showed up at the event, shouting that officials were lying about the project’s impacts. Both were detained by Pearl police officers.

What the last Corps study said

Last year, the Corps narrowed a list of proposals to “Alternative D1” and “Alternative E1.” Both proposals included an array of measures: building new levees, elevating the most flood-prone structures, offering voluntary buyouts, and excavating the stream’s banks to widen and lower the river.

E1 would not have included a dam, though. That difference made it a cheaper option than E1, but it also meant it didn’t have the recreational benefits that would come with turning that section of the Pearl River into a lake.

Downstream communities fear the dam would disrupt the Pearl River’s flow once it reaches them, harming both economic and recreational use of the stream. In response, the Corps said last year that neither alternative would impact the Pearl River’s flow once it reaches Monticello, about 80 miles south of Jackson.

The agency admitted that both alternatives would “likely adversely affect” several endangered or threatened species along the Pearl River, including three different types of turtles. D1, though, would affect a wider range of species, including the Gulf sturgeon.

The 2025 study estimated both D1 and E1 would remove 740 acres of forested wetlands. D1 would also remove about 230 acres of riverine habitat, the study said. The Corps’ proposal includes a mitigation plan to compensate for any wetland or habitat losses.

Critics have also asked why the agency didn’t more seriously consider another option from its study, “Alternative A1.” A1 would have only included the nonstructural measures, meaning no excavation or dam. But the Corps’ study limited A1’s scope, for instance including just one levee in the proposal versus the four in D1 and E1. In doing so, the agency limited the benefits associated with A1, those critics argued.

Moreover, A1 would have cost up to $22 million, the agency estimated. D1 and E1 would cost up to $960 million and $788 million, respectively. The state and local governments would be on the hook for 35% of those costs. For D1, that would mean needing to raise between $306 million and $321 million through state appropriations and local taxes.

Should the project go through, the flood control district would expand to include more homes, mainly in northeast Jackson and Flowood, said Turner, the board attorney. Those homes would then be subject to taxes to help fund the flood control project. For many, though, reduced flood insurance costs would offset those taxes, Turner added.

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