CLEARWATER — Pinellas County has won a $29.4 million federal grant, with no local match required, to stabilize and restore creeks damaged by Hurricane Milton.
The money, from the Emergency Watershed Protection Program administered by the Natural Resources Conservation Service, will pay for channel restoration at Joe’s Creek, Smith Bayou, South Creek and Curlew Creek.
“This is a huge grant,” County Administrator Barry Burton told commissioners.
But the work will be limited to public land. During commissioner comments, officials made clear that nothing can be done to private property along the banks — even as the grant spares the county tens of millions of dollars on the projects.
When Chairman Dave Eggers asked what happens to private parcels, Public Works Director Kelly Hammer Levy was blunt: “We can’t touch private property.”
The county is working only where it holds rights or easements, Levy said. “I know there are some areas where it’s private, and that’s on the private property owner to handle, but everywhere here we have rights, or we have an easement that allows us to do this work.”
Eggers pressed on whether problems elsewhere along the channels would go unaddressed. “I’m envisioning this channel, and we’re working on the areas that we can do,” he said. “The rest of it may or may not need work … but not necessarily under our purview.”
Asked whether the county monitors those private stretches at all, Levy said some are fenced off and inaccessible. Crews confirm water is moving by checking the channel upstream and downstream, she said. In some places the county has no rights whatsoever, she added, “not even a flow easement,” even in major drainage channels that are entirely private.
When a private stretch is blocked, the owner is responsible. Levy recalled a tree that fell across Alligator Creek and stopped the flow. “They were responsible for it, so it’s a challenge.”
Eggers asked what the county does in an emergency. Even then, Levy said, the policy is firm.
“The very firm county policy is that we don’t touch private property, even in a state of emergency, unless we have the rights in place,” she said. If the work is necessary and the owner agrees, the county can obtain a temporary construction easement or right of entry, “but we cannot go onto private property and clear anything without proper rights.”
Eggers called the restriction “strange,” given the public damage that blocked channels can cause, but said it was “a discussion for another day.”
The county qualified for the grant because the creeks were damaged by Milton, Levy said, with stabilization costs captured under the storm’s capital improvement projects.
Getting there took time. After the flooding, the county had to win both federal approval and federal money to restore the channels. Rather than going through FEMA, the program required the county to first seek funding through the conservation service.
“If they have funding available, then they will oversee that process, not FEMA,” Levy said. The agency pays 100% of construction costs plus oversight services, she said. “It’s taken a long time, but it’s a great benefit to the county.”
Conservation service staff walked each channel with county crews, she said, identifying every spot where erosion, lost vegetation or slumping had damaged the banks and scoping the repairs needed.
Funding will come initially from general fund reserves and be reimbursed under the grant agreement, Levy said. An amendment recognizing the grant revenue will come before commissioners later.
The damage is similar across the sites. At Joe’s Creek, eroded slopes and channel bottoms have destabilized the banks and caused sedimentation. The creek is a nearly 10-mile drainage basin in central Pinellas, running near Seminole along Boca Ciega Bay.
The grant also covers about 700 feet of Curlew Creek and 751 feet of Jerry Branch. Curlew Creek runs about 11 miles through Clearwater, Dunedin and unincorporated Pinellas before emptying into St. Joseph Sound near the Dunedin Causeway.
It will repair bank erosion and sediment along roughly 1,200 feet of Smith Bayou Channel, known as Bee Branch, and 620 feet of channel in the South Creek area. Smith Bayou’s 6-mile main channel winds through Clearwater, Dunedin and unincorporated areas before discharging into St. Joseph Sound. South Creek, in north-central Pinellas near Curlew, drains about 3.3 square miles into the Lake Tarpon watershed.
Left unresolved, Levy warned, the erosion could worsen, damaging infrastructure and causing upstream flooding.