Ansonia, Seymour Residents Attend Kinneytown Dam Removal Q&A

ANSONIA – Representatives from the Naugatuck Valley Council of Governments (NVCOG) and Save The Sound met with residents of Ansonia and Seymour on Aug. 28 to answer questions about the planned removal of the Kinneytown Dam.

About 80 people attended the meeting – about half in-person and half via Zoom – at the Ansonia Senior Center on 65 Main St. Residents asked about the status of the dams following last month’s floods, the eventual fate of Coe Pond, and various other matters.

The Kinneytown Dam, out of operation since 2013, is in Seymour, just north of the border with Ansonia. The complex also includes a canal that feeds into Coe Pond downstream. An embankment dam, the Coe Pond Dam, runs along the length of the canal.

Flood Risks And Coe Pond Dam

In March, NVCOG warned that the Coe Pond Dam was at imminent risk of breaching, a warning that was repeated during the Aug. 28 meeting. 

However, one resident pointed out that the dam did not breach during the recent floods that devastated swathes of Seymour and Oxford.

“Regarding Coe Pond Dam and the safety risk, safety hazard that’s been talked about, what is the imminent danger if it held up during the recent storm?” the resident asked.

Paul Woodworth, a senior project manager at Save The Sound, said that the dam held up largely as a matter of luck, and that the dam remains a risk.

“If that storm cell that had landed in Derby (Aug. 18) had actually landed over in our neighborhood, we would be having a different discussion about what to do with Coe Pond, because it probably would have breached,” Woodworth said.

Woodworth said wind is another risk, and that high winds could knock down trees along the embankment and lead to overtopping.

Laura Wildman, an engineer at Save The Sound, noted that some rail damage did occur during the floods, including a washout next to the dam that continues to leave the Metro-North Waterbury Branch shut down.

In press conferences, state officials have said that the Kinneytown and Coe Pond dams were not severely impacted by the floods. Most recently, the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) Commissioner Katie Dykes said on Aug. 26 that federal inspections determined that no repairs were needed on the dams.

An engineering report published by NVCOG in March recommended lowering the water level in Coe Pond by about three feet to mitigate flood risks along the dam. Aaron Budris, Environmental Planning Director at NVCOG, said that an engineer is currently developing a plan to do just that.

What’s Happening To Coe Pond?

In a grant application from 2022, NVCOG said that ​“the hydraulically dredged spoils (from the dam) would be sluiced down the existing canal that parallels the river’s eastern riverbank into Coe Pond, where it will be stabilized, capped, and used to create open space.”

Some residents who live near Coe Pond have objected to that plan. At the meeting, Woodworth said that the plan isn’t final. He said more information is needed before they know what’s happening to Coe Pond, and what’s happening to the 750,000 cubic yards of sediment backed up at Kinneytown Dam.

“What we do in the long term with Coe Pond, whether it’s completely drained or just lowered and kept lower, remains to be determined,” Woodworth said. ​“We have to collect a lot more information before we really size up what Coe Pond is going to look like after Kinneytown Dam comes down.”

NVCOG Executive Director Rick Dunne previously told The Valley Indy that the Coe Pond fill-in was one of a number of possible solutions for the sediment buildup.

Representatives in the meeting pointed to another possible solution for the sediment problem: simply allowing it to flush downstream into the Long Island Sound. They said that, if tests determine that the sediment is clean enough, the state could grant them permission to wash it downstream in stages.

However, Woodworth described the state as ​“not really enthusiastic about that idea,” and said their plans still require more data to come back from sediment analysis on the site. He said he expects the findings from that analysis to be made public in the coming weeks.

Dunne has previously told The Valley Indy that contaminated sediments would be moved offsite to a licensed disposal facility, in accordance with legal regulations, and that it would not end up in anyone’s backyard.

Restoring Fish Passage

In a presentation at the meeting, Budris showed images of the fish bypass at Tingue Dam in Seymour, about two miles upstream from Kinneytown Dam. That bypass opened in 2014 – but migratory fish aren’t able to get to it, Budris said.

That’s because the fish bypass at Kinneytown, which is supposed to allow migrating fish to swim upstream past the dam and into Seymour, hasn’t worked since it was opened in 1999. 

Budris said he became aware of the issue during the Tingue Dam bypass’ grand opening, when environmental activist Kevin Zak pulled him aside and told him that the new bypass might not work, because the fish were getting stuck downstream.

“He was adamant that there was something wrong there, and that fish weren’t even able to get here to take advantage of this new infrastructure,” Budris said.

Wildman, who developed the conceptual design for the bypass at Tingue, said that once Kinneytown comes down, fish will be able to migrate up through Seymour and past Tingue.

One resident asked what will happen to the fish that currently live in Coe Pond. Woodworth said that it depends on what happens to Coe Pond itself.

If Coe Pond is drained entirely, Woodworth said that fish would be relocated as necessary. If the water level is simply lowered, he said it’s possible that the same species could continue living there.

He added that, without the dam, that stretch of the Naugatuck River will have a more natural assortment of fishes.

“Once we’ve restored it to a free-flowing condition, it will revert back to more of a cold water, free-flowing fishery, so a slightly different species assemblage, if you’re into this fishing community,” Woodworth said. ​“So you’ll probably see fewer sunfish and bass, and more migratory fish.”

What’s Next?

The next step is for NVCOG and Save The Sound to process data they recently received from sediment analysis, which is expected to happen over the coming weeks. That data will factor into what ends up happening to the sediment back-up at Kinneytown.

The groups said they plan to host community meetings every other month, where residents will be free to raise questions and discuss the project’s progress and direction. The next one is tentatively set to be in late October in Seymour.