Monday, June 9, 2008 10:26 PM CDT
COLUMN: From raging river to 'On Golden Pond,' water is ample
By BILL LAIR, Managing editor
blair@jg-tc.com
I went out to Lake Charleston Monday morning to see what the spillway looked like.
But the road to the spillway was closed because of flooding so I turned around.
In a way, I’m glad the road was closed.
Just as we regularly need to be reminded not to drive through water on roads and to take cover when the weather sirens go off, we need to remember that the lake spillway can be a dangerous place at a time like this.
The area has received more than 5 inches of rain in the last week. The Embarras River, normally a calm, lazy and meandering body of water, races furiously over the spillway after days of heavy rain.
Combine that with temperatures hovering around 90 with humidity to match and the lake can be an attractive spot.
In conditions just like this week, people have drowned at the Lake Charleston spillway.
Four young men have drowned near the spillway since the early 1980s, the last two in 1996.
In conditions like just this, the water at the base of the spillway looks like it is boiling. One emergency response official in 1996 called the spillway’s churning waters “a drowning machine.”
Charleston officials placed a monument to the four drowning victims at the lake as a reminder to all of the dangers when hot weather follows days of heavy rain.
While the Embarras looks like a raging river these days, farm fields resemble lakes.
It will be interesting to see what effect the recent rains have on corn and soybean yields this year.
On a drive to Bloomington Sunday, I saw water in fields off-and-on for the entire distance. I do believe the fields along Interstate 57 in Douglas County had the most water, however.
Driving back in the early evening was like a scene from the movie “On Golden Pond.” The sun was low in the western sky and there was so much water in the fields that the sun was bouncing off the water and into the car.
It was blinding to glance to the west. Driving south, the reflection of the sun off the field water was bright in the corner of my eyes. It was as though there were lakes, not farm fields, all along I-57 from Champaign to Mattoon.
Last week’s Community Leaders Breakfast was outstanding.
The information about the economy from Professor J. Fred Giertz of the University of Illinois was interesting.
And the rapid-response poll from the attendees also was fun.
But the breakfast also was unique in one way.
Last week’s breakfast was the first Community Leaders Breakfast in several years in which the word “FutureGen” was not mentioned once by any of the speakers.
No one is saying much about FutureGen these days, although those connected with the proposed project are trying to keep it alive.
The FutureGen Alliance’s agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy expires this weekend.
The Alliance has been working with DOE to try to get the agreement extended until next spring, after a new administration is in the White House.
Let’s hope that within the next year we will be able to discuss FutureGen’s progress at another Community Leaders Breakfast. We’ll see what happens.
Congratulations to U.S. Rep. John Shimkus.
The Republican from Collinsville has retired from the Army Reserves, ending his 30-plus years relationship with the Army.
Shimkus represents Shelby, Effingham and Jasper counties in East-Central Illinois. His 19th Congressional District extends south to the Ohio River and west to the Mississippi.
Shimkus was one of the early proponents of the FutureGen project, even when science determined that the project would not fit in southern Illinois.
Shimkus is a West Point graduate, and was a second lieutenant in the Army from 1980 to 1985. He then joined the reserves as a captain. He eventually became a lieutenant colonel.
Shimkus said he is retiring due to the commitments required of a U.S. congressman.
If the leaders of state government can ever agree on a budget and a construction bill, East-Central Illinois can move forward with several projects.
State Rep. Chapin Rose last week said the proposed capital bill includes funding for work on Eastern Illinois University’s coal plant and for the human services building at Lake Land College.
According to Rose, if the current construction plan is approved, it will include funds to extend County Road 1000N from the new I-57 exit to Illinois Route 130 north of Charleston. The bill also includes $1.5 million for equipping the Doudna Fine Arts Center, about to be completed at EIU.
While Rose generally is critical of Gov. Rod Blagojevich, he said wants to “give credit where credit is due” on the governor’s office’s work on the FutureGen project.
Rose said Blagojevich’s staff did a great job in working on the FutureGen project, which as we all know, was awarded to Mattoon by the FutureGen Alliance only to have the U.S. Department of Energy pull its support.
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