A proposal by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to dredge a portion of the St. George River is raising alarm bells over its potential impact on the marine environment.
The issue was raised at the Monday night meeting of the St. George Select Board.
The plan by the Army Corps is to conduct what it calls maintenance dredging and remove about 80,000 cubic yards of material, primarily fine grain silty material, and low levels of sand along the 16-foot-wide federal channel and anchorage that starts off Lyman Morse’s shipyard and proceeds south in the river.
St. George Board Chair Jane Conrad said the concern is that stirring up this silt will smother flats and kill off things such as clams and other marine life.
Tammy Willey, who represents St. George on the Georges River Regional Shellfish Management Committee, said the dredging could have a major environmental and economic impact.
“There are more questions than answers,” Conrad said. “We all have a vested interest in the fishing and aquaculture industry.”
Danny Staples of Cushing, who chairs the five-town committee, agreed. He said an economic and environmental impact study needs to be done and presented to the towns before the decision to dredge is made.
He said there are 75 families whose livelihoods depend on harvesting shellfish from that section of the river. There is also concern that it could impact migrating smelts, alewives and even small lobsters that are in the river. Staples said Friendship lobstermen are concerned about the impact of dumping the dredged soils in waters where there is lobstering.
The shellfish committee consists of representatives from Thomaston, St. George, South Thomaston, Warren and Cushing.
The dredging is expected to occur in 2027.
Staples said in other rivers where dredging has occurred there have been significant loss of shellfish and that it took 7 to 10 years to recover.
In 2011, the Phippsburg Shellfish Committee notified the Army Corps about similar concerns and how there were significant adverse economic impacts from earlier dredging in the Kennebec River.
David Madore, deputy commissioner of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, said the DEP must issue a water quality certification for proposed dredging activity, and the Maine Coastal Program must issue a consistency determination under the Coastal Zone Management Act before dredging would occur. Madore said the Army Corps has not yet filed anything for those permits.
Questions were mailed Tuesday afternoon to the Army Corps.
Congress approved $175,000 for a study of the dredging in the fiscal year 2024 budget.
One of the benefits of the dredging is to allow larger boats to navigate the river and reach the Lyman Morse facility in Thomaston at more times than high tide.
In March 2026, Thomaston discussed potential municipal dredging and coordination with the Army Corps and said there would be a follow-up discussion with Lyman Morse.
Joshua Moore of Lyman Morse said the dredging is not exclusively for Lyman Morse but will benefit the entire Thomaston Harbor. He pointed out that at low tide, boats can bump the bottom at the 90-degree turn to enter the harbor.
He said he believes, but was not certain, the last dredging there was in the late 1970s.
This story appears through a media partnership with Midcoast Villager.