Almost no dam problems at Tulare County's seven sites

In a system with more than 1,400 dams, California has 42 that are in need of repairs.

State officials consider these 42 dams deficient and as a result, the state’s Division of Safety of Dams (DSOD) directed their owners, which include cities, counties, utilities, and water districts, to operate at a lower than maximum storage level.

None of these dams are in Tulare County.

The DSOD has listed all seven dams in Tulare County under state jurisdiction as “satisfactory” – its top grade. These dams are Bravo Lake Reservoir, Crystal Lake, Elk Bayou, Lady Franklin Lake, Larson Dam, Sand Creek, and Upper Monarch Lake.

The DSOD’s satisfactory ranking means that, “no existing or potential dam safety deficiencies are recognized” and that “acceptable performance is expected” under all loading conditions, which includes seismic and hydrologic.

“We normally associate actively 'failing' dams to be related to an ongoing weather event or the outcome of a weather event where the physical structure is at risk,” explained Gene Pawlik, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) supervisory public affairs specialist. “We are not tracking any actively failing dams in Tulare County.”

This evaluation is fortunate for county residents because if any dam problems occurred in the county, they could be serious. According to the USACE National Inventory of Dams, six dams in Tulare County have unfavorable downstream hazard classifications – but that only matters if they fail during, for example, a severe weather event.

Downstream hazard refers to the potential impacts to life and property should a dam fail while operating with a full reservoir, and is not related to the structural condition of the dam itself, said Jason Ince, a California Department of Water Resources spokesperson.

In Tulare County:

• Terminus Dam, Richard L. Schafer Dam, and Bravo Lake Reservoir, whose main purpose is flood control and water supply, are classified as having a high hazard potential, which means any dam failure is “expected to cause loss of at least one human life.”
• Larson Dam, Frazier Dike at Richard L. Schafer Dam, and Hotel Dike at Terminus Dam, which the USACE includes on their list of county dams, have a “significant” hazard potential. This rating indicates that a failure would cause “no probable loss of human life, but can cause economic loss, environmental damage, impacts to critical facilities, or other significant impacts.”
• Upper Monarch Lake, Lady Franklin Lake, Crystal Lake, and Elk Bayou are considered to have low hazard potentials. According to the USACE, this classification would result in “no probable loss of human life, and low economic and environmental losses. Losses are expected to be principally limited to the owner’s property.”

The USACE also has an “extremely high hazard” classification, but no county dams are in that category.

This article originally appeared on Visalia Times-Delta: Almost no dam problems at Tulare County's seven sites