20120080 Ver 1_More Info Received_20120402

Strickland, Bev
From: Kulz, Eric
Sent: Monday, April 02, 2012 9:32 AM
To: Strickland, Bev; Mcmillan, Ian
Subject: FW: Underwood Site Letter (UNCLASSIFIED)
Attachments: NCEEP Addl Info Req Underwood 20120329.pdf
For file /laserfiche 20120080. 1 have printed for my file here.
E -mail correspondence to and from this address may be subject to the North Carolina Public Records Law and may be
disclosed to third parties
From: Tugwell, Todd SAW [ mailto :Todd.Tugwell(a)usace.army.mil]
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2012 3:29 PM
To: John Hutton
Cc: Pearce, Guy; Crumbley, Tyler SAW; McLendon, Scott C SAW; Matthews, Monte K SAW; Kulz, Eric; Smith, Danny
Subject: Underwood Site Letter (UNCLASSIFIED)
Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE
John, I reviewed the Underwood Mitigation Plan and have some questions /concerns that we need to address before we
can issue the permit. I've attached a letter which will go out today that explains each of the concerns. As you know, we
had some questions regarding the soils on the sites - these continue to be a concern to me, particularly where the soils
have been confirmed as Chewacla and are being shown as restoration. Some of the other points are minor and I think
easily corrected. I will try to work with you as best I can to try to quickly turn the approval around provided that we can
get some answers to the issues in the letter.
Thanks for your help with this.
Todd TugwelI
Special Projects Manager
Regulatory Division
Wilmington District
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
11405 Falls of Neuse Road
Wake Forest, NC 27587
(919) 846 -2564
We would appreciate your feedback on how we are performing our duties. Our automated Customer Service Survey is
located at: http:// pert .nwp.usace.army.mil /survey.html Thank you for taking the time to visit this site and complete the
survey

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
WILMINGTON DISTRICT, CORPS OF ENGINEERS
69 DARLINGTON AVENUE
WILMINGTON, NORTH CAROLINA 28 403 -1 343
REPLY TO
ATTENTION OF March 30, 2012
Regulatory Division
Action ID No. SAW - 2011 -01208
Mr. John Hutton
Wildlands Engineering, Inc.
1430 South Mint Street
Suite 104
Charlotte, NC 28203
Dear Mr. Hutton:
Reference is made to the preconstruction notification application received on February
13, 2012, for Department of the Army (DA) Nationwide Permit (NWP) 27 authorization for the
proposed construction of the Underwood Mitigation Site. Wildlands Engineering, Inc. is
developing the site on behalf of the North Carolina Ecosystem Enhancement Program ( NCEEP).
The project includes several parcels located north of Silk Hope Liberty Road, and east of Siler
City Snow Camp Road, north of Silk Hope, in Chatham County, North Carolina.
Your permit application listed impacts to streams and wetlands totaling 8,837 linear feet
of stream channel temporary impact. The permit application was submitted along with the
mitigation plan, which provides the details of the proposed mitigation project. On March 17,
2010, we visited the site with you and NCEEP to review the initial proposal. Based on that
review, we provided comments to NCEEP by letter to NCEEP dated April 15, 2010. While
some of the concerns identified in the letter were dealt with in the final submitted mitigation
plan, there are several outstanding issues with the mitigation plan that still need to be addressed.
Additionally, there were several other questions that came up during our review of the submitted
mitigation plan and preconstruction notification application. These concerns are listed below:
1. Jurisdictional Wetlands — Section 5.1 of the mitigation plan states that there are no wetlands
within the project easement, email correspondence with Mr. Monte Matthews of the Raleigh
Field Office who conducted the delineation, confirms that no jurisdictional wetlands were
identified on the project site, primarily due to high chroma soils. However the mitigation plan
includes wetland enhancement in area NRW2 (see Section 7.2.1.2), which can only be true if
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wetlands are present on the site. Based on results of the wetland determination and email
correspondence from Mr. Matthews, and the soil study that found this area to be underlain by
soils most closely matching Chewacla and Wehadkee series, this area should be considered as
creation rather than enhancement.
2. NRWI — The project includes a proposed area of wetland restoration called NRW1. In our
comments of April 15, 2010, we stated "One restoration area is proposed where there is currently
a pond, which may result in the requirement to excavate poor soils and backfill low areas. This
may not be considered restoration due to the extent of past manipulation in these areas." Based
on our review of the proposed plan, we continue to have concerns regarding treating the old pond
bed as restoration. Typically, the soil profile is greatly disturbed during the construction of
ponds, and during the lifespan of impoundments, sediment deposition results in further
disturbance. Also, the soil manipulation necessary to bring these areas back to the appropriate
grade will result in a disturbed soil profile. As a result, these areas should be identified in the
plan as wetland creation and not restoration, and the associated mitigation ratio should be
adjusted.
3. Chewacla Soils — Many of the areas where restoration was proposed were evaluated by a
licensed soil scientist and determined to most closely match the Chewacla and Wehadkee soil
series. This includes areas RW1, RW3, RW4, NRW1, and NRW2. We have long - standing
concerns regarding conducting wetland mitigation on these soil types, in particular when they are
considered as restoration. Frequently, we have found that these soil types are not jurisdictional
even in an undisturbed state, and to treat them as restoration would assume that they were
jurisdictional prior to their current state. This is particularly true within the proposed restoration
areas on this site because their hydrology does not appear to have been altered by ditches,
suggesting that these areas did not need further hydrologic modification to convert them to their
current use as pasture. This concern is further supported by the fact that several of these areas
are proposed to be lowered through grading operations in order to achieve the appropriate
hydroperiod, again suggesting that these areas would not otherwise be jurisdictional. The
information contained in the mitigation plan also indicates that these areas have inclusions of
Wehadkee soils, which were likely wetter than the surrounding Chewacla soils. In these areas, it
is more likely that wetlands previously existing, so restoration is a viable mitigation activity.
Please modify the plan to identify those areas where underlying soils do not indicate the former
presence of wetland and show these areas as creation, or provide supporting information to
indicate why restoration is appropriate in these areas.
4. Buffer Width — We are currently stressing the importance of a ensuring that projects meet the
minimum forested buffer width standard of 50 feet in the coastal plain and piedmont, and 30 feet
in the mountains, as required by the 2003 Stream Mitigation Guidelines. We anticipate that
additional guidance will soon be issued to establish a method to determine credit for non-
standard widths, with decreased credit resulting from narrow buffers and increase credit resulting
from wider buffers. At least one stream section (SF1A) does not appear to have the appropriate
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buffer width. Further, it appears that there are many other stream sections throughout the project
that appear to be just at 50 feet from the easement (measured to top of bank). Please be aware
that the as -built survey will be reviewed to determine if forested buffer widths meet the standard,
and that reductions (or additions) to credits may result for not meeting the standard width of 50
feet.
5. Wetland Hydrology Period — Section 9.3 of the mitigation plan discusses the performance
standards proposed for the site. This section states "the final performance criteria for wetland
hydrology will be a free groundwater surface within 12 inches of the ground surface for 6.5
percent of the growing season, which is measured on consecutive days under typical
precipitation conditions ". The stated minimum of 6.5% is too low a target for saturation during
the growing season, particularly in the areas that are designed to be riparian wetland types. One
potential concern with such a low hydroperiod is that the site may meet this target during the first
years of hydrology monitoring while the plants are small, but as the site matures, increased
evapotranspiration may substantially reduce the hydroperiod, causing the hydrology of the site to
be reduced below the threshold necessary to maintain wetlands. This is particularly true given
the concerns expressed in Comment 2 above. More importantly, the typical hydroperiod for
high- functioning piedmont bottomland forest, which is what the reference wetland is classified
as according to the plan, should be higher than 6.5 %. The plan indicates that the 6.5%
hydroperiod was determined through model simulations of post restoration conditions and
comparison to an immediately adjacent exiting wetland system (the reference wetland), yet in
Section 6. 1, the plan states that the gauge in the reference wetland "has not been installed for an
adequate period to assess hydrologic conditions and determine the appropriateness of this
reference location ". Please reassess your proposed hydrology performance standards. If
modeling suggests that the maximum post - construction hydroperiod will be 6.5 %, perhaps this
site is not suitable to be a wetland mitigation proj ect.
6. Stream Cross - Sections — Section 8.1 of the mitigation plan states that stream monitoring
along reach SF1 will include 2 permanent cross - sections. Stream SF1 is proposed to be 878 feet
in length with a design width at bankfull of 8.8 feet. Please note that the 2003 Stream Mitigation
Guidelines state that "permanent cross - sections should be established at an approximate
frequency of one per 20 (bankfull- width) lengths." In the case of reach SFI, 20 (bankfull- width)
lengths would be 176 feet (8.8' x 20), which should result in a minimum of 5 permanent cross -
sections (878'/176'). Please reevaluate the monitoring standards proposed for the stream reaches
within the project to ensure that they meet the standards present in the 2003 Stream Mitigation
Guidelines.
7. Vegetation Performance Standards — Section 9.2 of the mitigation plan addresses the
vegetation performance standards, and indicates that the final vegetative success criteria will be
the survival of 260 planted stems per acre in the riparian corridor along restored and enhanced
reaches and with the wetland restoration and creation areas at the end of the required monitoring
year (year five or seven). Please note that for the wetland areas, which must be monitored for
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seven years, the final survival rate (performance standard) should be 210 living, planted stems at
year seven, not 260. The interim standard for both wetland and stream buffers should remain at
320 living, planted stems at year three, and for wetlands the year five interim standard should be
260 living, planted stems.
Please keep in mind that Section 332.80)(2) of the Mitigation Rule states "if a DA permit
is required for an in -lien fee project, the permit should not be issued until all relevant provisions
of the mitigation plan have been substantively determined, to ensure that the DA permit
accurately reflects all relevant provisions of the approved mitigation plan ". Accordingly, the
concerns which have been identified in this correspondence must be addressed prior to our
verification that impacts associated with your mitigation project are authorized by NWP 27.
Thank you for working with us to address these issues. Please contact me if you have
any questions about this letter, or if there is any additional information you need. I can be
contacted at telephone [phone].
Sincerely,
TUGWELL.TODD.JASON.1048429293
2012.03.30 15:15:28 - 04'00'
Todd Tugwell
Special Projects Manager
Wilmington District Regulatory Division
Copies Furnished:
Mr. Guy Pearce
North Carolina Ecosystem Enhancement Program
1652 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, North Carolina 27699 -1652
Electronic Copies Furnished:
Mr. Danny Smith, NCDWQ
Mr. Eric Kulz, NCDWQ
CESAW- RG- A/Crumbley
CESAW -RG /McLendon
CESAW -RG -R /Matthews
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