NEWINGTON - The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) will be removing vegetation and making infrastructure repairs along 25,000 cubic yards of a floodway that runs through Newington and West Hartford.

       The $4.5 million state bonding-funded project comes five years after the Natural Resources Conservation Services (NRCS), the DEEP’s South Branch Park River Watershed maintenance sponsor, issued an inspection report ordering parties within a local, state and federal partnership to perform comprehensive flood prevention work along the channel.

       Towns could lose a major source of funding for dam and flood control projects in the future if the project is not completed, personnel from DEEP told Newington residents at a public information meeting that was held in the Town Hall auditorium last Thursday night.

       The last major maintenance work that was done on the floodway, established through a series of agreements that were put in place with participating municipalities in response to the 1955 flood, was in 1999, according to Jennifer Perry, supervisor of the state’s Dam Control Program.

       â€�"It’s been 15, 16 years since this work was last tackled,” Perry said. â€�"Over the last few years, those [NRCS] inspection reports have shown deficiencies in the way the work is being performed.”

       But DEEP did not have the funding right away, so the agency sought, and received, a deferment from NRCS. The project got its $4.5 million state-bonded construction funds in 2014, but public backlash over tree removal that residents said caught them by surprise prompted a stop-order on floodway work in West Hartford recently, according to reports in The Hartford Courant.

       â€�"This is a project that’s about balancing a lot of competing issues,” said DEEP Commissioner Rob Klee. â€�"I’ll admit, we got off on the wrong foot as far as balancing those issues and we’re certainly trying to make up for it.”

       The project will involve the removal of large, waterway-blocking trees and other vegetation, which has prompted concerns in Newington regarding the protection of endangered tree species such as the Swamp Cottonwood.

       â€�"We do have a good group of people in Newington that are environmentalists and we want to protect our town as best we can,” said Newington resident Gary Bolles during the public comments segment of the meeting.

       DEEP personnel said that endangered species have not been detected along the floodway, but that even if they were, they would have to be removed if the channel is to work to its intended purpose.

       â€�"There will be some disturbance, but we will try to make it as minimal as possible,” Perry said.

       The other concern is what happens after the project is agreement. Currently, no agreement exists between DEEP and municipalities regarding who is responsible for maintaining the channel in the future.

       The town needs to know if it will be left with those responsibilities because flood control measures would have budgetary impact, said then-Mayor Stephen Woods.

       DEEP personnel described that process as â€�"a negotiation”.

       â€�"We look forward to having that conversation with the town,” said Project Manager Dan Biron. â€�"We would have to have a conversation as far as what their capabilities are-we do realize the towns have limitations too.”