Army Corps to proceed with controversial navigation project

The Army Corps of Engineers has resumed its $1 billion navigation project on the Upper Mississippi River, after faulty data put the study on hold in March. Earlier this month, the Corps announced that its revised study of the Upper Mississippi would emphasize "environmentally sustainable use of the river" and address concerns from a National Research Council (NRC) report released in February. "The refocused study will emphasize the nation's need to sustain both a quality ecosystem and an effective navigation system," said Brig. Gen. Ed Arnold, commander of the Corps' Mississippi Valley Division. So far, the Corps' cost-benefit analysis of the project has cost roughly $50 million. Last November, the Army inspector general concluded that top Corps officials changed data in a cost-benefit analysis studying navigation improvements to the Mississippi and Illinois rivers. The investigation grew out of allegations made in February 2000 by Donald C. Sweeney, an economist with the Corps and the original technical manager of the waterway project. At the Army's request, the National Academy of Sciences evaluated the validity of the Corps' cost-benefit analysis. The Academy's report, released this February by the National Research Council, said the flawed results from the analysis should not be used in the project. The National Research Council also recommended that an independent group of experts, including environmental and social scientists, review the Corps' study on the navigation project. "Despite the Corps' representation of implementing [NRC] recommendations, from what we can see, they are not implementing a single one," said Jeff Ruch, Sweeney's lawyer and executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. "The Corps is proving itself once again to be a rogue agency, out of control and driven only by institutional self-interest," Ruch said. The Corps said it would continue to work with other agencies and the public on the Upper Mississippi project. The agency plans to release an interim report on the study next August that describes its plan for the project and includes recommendations for continued navigation and environmental planning. Ruch said investigators from the Defense Criminal Investigative Service interviewed Sweeney this past spring about possible criminal wrongdoing in connection with the Upper Mississippi project. But Susan Hansen, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon, said the Defense Department is not pursuing a criminal investigation. The Army inspector general's investigation found no evidence of criminal violation by the Corps officials involved.