A public notice has been issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for a sediment management demonstration project at Benson Beach in Pacific County, Washington.  The project involves placing sand on to Benson Beach to offset beach erosion and to supply sand to the littoral drift system.  The Army Corps is considering two options for accomplishing the sand placement.  The first option is to directly pump disposal material from a hopper dredge over the north jetty by pipeline.  The second option is to excavate a sump south of the north jetty using a suction pipeline dredge.  The material excavated from the sump would be pumped onto Benson Beach and the sump would be refilled by a hopper dredge with material dredged from the navigation channel. 

A draft Environmental Assessment is available for public view and comment at the following website:

http://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/op/n/projects/mcr/docs/mcr/BBeachFinalDraftEA31May06.pdf

Public comment will be accepted by the Army Corps until July 5, 2006.  Written comments should include the public notice number (CENWP-PM-E-06-02), title (Southwest Washington Littoral Drift Restoration at Benson Beach, Regional Sediment Management Demonstration) and date (June 5, 2006) and be mailed to:

District Engineer
U.S. Army Corps of Engineer District, Portland
Attn:  CENWP-PM-E/C. Schneider
PO Box 2946
Portland, OR 97208-2946

The Corps public notice also includes links to two studies related to species composition, density and relative abundance of biota in the vicinity of the sump as follow:

“Impact to Dungeness Crab from the Southwest Washington Littoral Drift Restoration Project” (Williams et al., Nov. 2005)
http://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/op/n/projects/mcr/docs/ImpactsDungenessCrabs1105.pdf

“Benson Beach Demonstration Project:  Composition and Abundance of Biota at Three Alternative Sump Sites” (Williams et al., Jan. 2004)
http://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/Op/n/projects/mcr/docs/reports/bensonbeachcomp.pdf