Good news for boaters transiting via La Conner is this news item run today by the Skagit Valley Herald (excerpted here with permission)
Keeping the channel open is important for the economic vitality of the region by supporting marine manufacturing businesses such as Mavrik Marine, providing safe passage to mariners sailing through the area — loosening their pocketbooks along the way — and for La Conner Marina, a property owned by county taxpayers that brought in $2.6 million in revenue in 2011, Ware said.
Col. Bruce Estok, Seattle District commander for the Army Corps, said in a speech that the channel is authorized to a 12-foot depth, but sediment build-up in some areas of the 11-mile-long channel has left a depth of only 5 feet. He said in a few instances of mariners getting stuck on sandbars, the U.S. Coast Guard has been unable to immediately help due to shallow conditions.
The project was awarded $2.2 million from a federal fund of $30 million for low-use navigation projects on the nation’s waterways.
Port Director Patsy Martin said in an interview that port officials had visited Washington, D.C. for a number of years to lobby for earmarks to dredge the highest areas of the channel. This dredging, however, will be more extensive and take the whole channel down to its authorized depth of 12 feet, with over-dredging to happen in problem areas, Martin said.
U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen said earmarks for federal funding of dredging efforts in the channel went dry in 2010. He said he and business leaders, port officials, tribal leaders and state senators worked together to convince the corps that the channel is important infrastructure for the local economy.
American Construction Co. Inc. of Tacoma was awarded the project with a bid of $1.9 million. The corps will oversee the project.
Kevin Culbert, project manager for American Construction, said the project will continue approximately five months, and the channel will not be closed during that time.
