OP-ED: Is This a Fairy Tale? Or Just a Really Bad Dream? The $100 Million River Fantasy

By Tom Wilbur

Once upon a time, in a small Kansas town in the middle of a drought that had stretched across decades, a group of city leaders awakened one morning with a magnificent idea. They would build a river.

Not just any river. A nearly $100 million river that would magically revitalize their community, attract visitors, stimulate economic development, and transform their little city into something extraordinary. There was just one small problem. They didn't have the water.

But why should something as insignificant as water stand in the way of building a river? And so the fairy tale began.

First, the leaders decided to bring water from outside the city's flood-control levees back inside the very area those levees had been constructed to protect. Apparently, they convinced themselves that reintroducing water into a historically flood-prone corridor would present no meaningful additional danger. Or requirements for flood insurance.

Never mind that those flood-control structures were built for a reason.

Surely, someone has studied the implications. Where is the independent engineering analysis that gives taxpayers confidence?

Next, the city placed this enormous undertaking under the direction of two women who, to my knowledge, have never managed a river restoration project of this magnitude. It's about qualifications, experience, and accountability. Let’s call them Jane and Martha.

Would you place someone who had never built a hospital in charge of constructing a $100 million medical center? Would you hire an inexperienced contractor to build a skyscraper?

Yet somehow, Salina's leadership believes this arrangement makes perfect sense.

Then came the allocations and spending.

Approximately $8 million has reportedly gone toward engineering, design, and planning. Millions of dollars spent, and the waterways themselves have yet to experience the transformation taxpayers were promised. Thise wonderful consulting fees. But don't worry. The drawings must be magnificent.

And then there's the matter of actually getting water into this beautiful new river. The plan involves raising portions of the riverbed to accommodate a relatively modest flow of water. Imagine spending nearly $100 million to construct a river that must be engineered around the reality that there simply isn't enough natural water to sustain the vision.

The proposed supplemental water would come from Kanopolis Lake, a reservoir that has experienced its own struggles with drought and declining water levels. Is the extra water required even available anymore?

Depending on the volume required, purchasing, transporting, and maintaining that water could potentially cost taxpayers $1 million or more. We should be buying drinking water for our citizens, not canoes.

That figure needs to be established through documented water contracts, engineering estimates, and operating projections. But where are those answers? And what happens during another prolonged drought when the lake itself is struggling? Perhaps the fairy godmother has a backup reservoir.

But wait. There's more. An estimated $27 million would reportedly be devoted to replacing or modifying existing infrastructure, including bridges, so recreational watercraft could pass underneath. Think about that.

We have aging water mains, deteriorating infrastructure, and concerns about fire hydrants delivering adequate water pressure. Yet we're contemplating spending tens of millions of dollars to make room for canoes. We voted against it. And the fairy tale kept going.

Apparently, getting a canoe under a bridge is more urgent than getting dependable drinking water into someone's home.

Then there are the property and homeowners along the 6.5 mile stretch of drainage ditch.

Approximately 42 property owners adjacent to the proposed corridor could see the privacy of their backyards dramatically altered by public walking paths. People who purchased their homes expecting a measure of peace and privacy may find themselves looking out at strangers strolling behind their property. Is that fair?

Were their concerns given the same consideration as the dreams of the project's supporters? And what about the environment?

The project will involve removing enormous quantities of accumulated silt and sediment from the river corridor and transporting material to Lakewood Park.

What will that mean for the park's ecosystem? Has the sediment been adequately tested? What protections will be in place for wildlife, vegetation, drainage, and nearby residents there? A project promoted as environmental restoration should be held to the highest environmental standards.

And after the ribbon cutting, after the speeches, after the politicians congratulate themselves, the bills won't stop.

There will be water acquisition and pumping costs. Maintenance. Insurance. Security. Public safety. Sediment management. Infrastructure repairs. And the inevitable expense of maintaining an artificial recreational waterway during future droughts. Those costs won't disappear with a wave of a magic wand.

They'll become an annual obligation for generations of Salina taxpayers.

Meanwhile, our community faces very real problems that don't require imagination to understand.

We have aging water infrastructure. Concerns about water quality. Groundwater contamination that has persisted for decades. Budget pressures. And a growing list of essential services competing for limited public dollars.

But our leaders remain captivated by a river. They just took $5 million from our General Obligation Fund for it, last year.

Perhaps the most troubling part of this fairy tale is that Salina's voters rejected an earlier river proposal in 2010. Yet the dream never died.

It simply grew more expensive.

I am not opposed to improving our community. I am not opposed to parks, trails, recreation, or restoring natural beauty. And I certainly understand the appeal of a revitalized Smoky Hill River.

But there is a difference between having a vision and having a financially responsible, environmentally sound, publicly supported plan to achieve it.

A dream without financial discipline can become a taxpayer's nightmare.

Before another dollar is committed, Salinans deserve independently verified answers about flood protection, water availability, long-term operating expenses, environmental consequences, homeowner impacts, and the actual economic return on this investment.

The cost figures and project assumptions I've raised deserve verification against the latest engineering documents and city contracts. If city leaders have answers, they should make them even more readily available. Because this isn't a fairy tale. This is Salina, Kansas.

The money is real. The risks are real. And the consequences could last for generations. In fairy tales, someone eventually awakens from the spell. My question is simple: When will Salina's leadership wake up?

The River Renewal folks are trying to ramp this up so we can’t shut it down. Your voice is as important as mine.

TW