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Dare County commissioner Steve House, who serves as chairman of the Oregon Inlet Task Force, county manager Bobby Outten, and the county’s consulting engineers met with representatives from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Wilmington on Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024 to discuss how to ensure that future dredging by the county’s contractor is in compliance with dredging permits, according to a media release from Dare County.

The meeting was held in response to concerns raised by the Army Corps about data contained in reports from the National Dredging Quality Management Program indicating that past work by the county’s contractor was conducted outside the authorized widths and depths of the navigation channels. The Army Corps suspended the county’s dredging permits last week, but has assured county officials that dredging by the contractor can resume in the coming days, once the
Army Corps updates the permits to reflect Wedneday’s discussions.

At the meeting, county officials and Army Corps representatives agreed to the following measures:

• The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will provide data that was previously not available to the county or the contractor so that all parties are working from and can reference the same information.
• The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will provide clarification for some of the ambiguities in the permits.
• Dare County staff and engineering consultants will review the newly available dredging data to ensure compliance by the county’s dredging contractor.

“We are committed to ensuring that our contractor’s dredging efforts are in compliance with the county’s permits,” said Outten. “We very much appreciate the efforts of the Corps of Engineers to resolve this issue. Now that we will all have access to and can work from the same data, this will help ensure the contractor follows all permitting terms,” he added.

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