Dear editor,

Your comments published in this weekend’s issue are greatly appreciated. In my meeting on Feb. 7 with One Lake executive director Dallas Quinn and attorney Keith Turner, I was promised a meeting in Monticello as soon as their Feasibility and Environmental Study was published.

This obviously has not occurred, so we held our own meeting on Aug. 23, with presenters from the One River No Lake Coalition, attended by just under 200 residents from five counties. Copiah County, Monticello, Lawrence County, Columbia, Marion County and continuing on 176 road miles south and over 250 river miles south of the proposed project, have been completely disregarded, most likely due to the known opposition at all points down river.

The Rankin Hinds Pearl River Flood & Drainage Control District is in violation of Federal Law required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Water Resources Act — which calls for peer review — and by the Corps of Engineers Regulations calling for fulfilling NEPA requirements. I have reports from US Dept. of Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service and from E.deEtte Smythe, Ph.D, debunking extremely pertinent portions of the Pearl River Drainage report.

One of the most disturbing facts of this project is that the City of Jackson’s Savanah Street sewage lagoon, which has been non-compliant for many years, will be on our side of the proposed weir. Without substantial water flow, lack of dilution will be a huge health and environmental concern for all of us down stream.

The list of issues with this project are too many to be named here, but I do want to thank you for raising awareness of one of the many problems with this project. We, Pearl River South and One River No Lake, should only be so fortunate as to receive the same financial considerations from our state to fund our own study, as has the Rankin Hinds Pearl River Flood Control District.

Mayor Martha Watts, Town of Monticello