The Cuyahoga River dam located in Brecksville needs to be removed, according to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the National Park Service.
The agencies will discuss their recommendation at a special public meeting Wednesday.
The city of Akron would provide $900,000 for the demolition of the dam under a penalty imposed by the federal government for the city’s overflowing sewers.
For more than seven years, the agencies have discussed options for what is officially known as the Canal Diversion Dam, just north of the Station Road bridge trailhead at towpath mile marker 17 in Brecksville.
The dam, located in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, has stopped the river from meeting Ohio’s water quality standards and has an adverse impact on fish and aquatic insects, the Ohio EPA said.
Last year, the agencies decided to speed up the decision-making process by forgoing a time-consuming and costly environmental impact statement for a quicker “environmental assessment.”
That assessment is now complete and will be the focus of the meeting, scheduled for 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Happy Days Lodge, 500 W. Streetsboro Road in Peninsula.
The agencies considered three options: Doing nothing, modifying the dam or removing the dam.
Removal “is the alternative that best meets the project purpose and need,” the EPA said in announcing the public meeting.
The state-owned Brecksville dam is 183 feet long and nearly 8 feet high. It funnels water into the nearby Ohio & Erie Canal.
While removing the dam would return the river to its natural flow, a pump would be designed and built to provide the desired amount of water for the preservation of the historic canal.
The public may review and comment on the proposal through Sept. 30 at http://parkplanning.nps.gov/brecksvilledam.
The first proposal to remove the dam came in 2002, and the current federal-state review began in 2009.
Dams in Kent, Munroe Falls and two in Cuyahoga Falls already have been removed or modified in recent years to improve Cuyahoga River water quality. There also is a plan taking shape to remove the 57-foot-high Gorge Dam between Akron and Cuyahoga Falls in the Gorge Metro Park.
Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her on Twitter at http://twitter.com/paulaschleis.