Mistrust abounds along Kitchen Creek

Last week’s statement by Kitchen Creek golf course that it would remove one small rock dam and cap the wells it drilled last summer hasn’t done much to ease the mistrust with its neighbours.
In fact, it seems to have raised more doubts.
Several residents along Kitchen Creek who attended a public meeting two weeks ago at the Crozier Hall want to know if the golf course plans to permanently cap those wells–or just cover them up with a casing.
Leonard Haver, whose well became filled with black silt after the golf course drilled its wells, said he has his doubts the golf course would want to leave the groundwater alone.
“Because of all the things they’ve done through the years,” he explained. “It’s always been the sneaky way of doing it. They’ve never come to us and asked us if we minded them [drilling the wells.]”
“They never did say permanently,” charged another man, whose well also was affected but asked to remain anonymous. “They just said at this time the have no intent [to use them]. What does that mean?
“If the dig this [off-line pond] and it turns out empty, they’re going to fill it, ain’t they?” he added. “They’re going to fill it somehow.”
Both this man and Haver’s wells eventually recovered. Bill Hammond’s well also went dry after the golf course did its drilling but unlike the other two, his didn’t recover.
Hammond noted on the course’s original application for extra irrigation water that it was hoping to take up to 79,200 imperial gallons of water a day from the wells and the creek.
And while the golf course has announced it will stay away from the creek and instead try to capture flood water in an off-line pond, Hammond said he would feel more secure if the wells were permanently closed off first.
“An off-line pond should have been the right way to do it but still we don’t want well water to do what the high water can’t give them,” he stressed.
“Another bone of contention is they never went around to see what people had for wells before they started this great big white elephant,” he argued.
“You hate to think about it [but] summer’s coming and we could be out of water again,” Hammond added. “We all live in fear that when the course starts up, we could all go through this again.”
Peter Spuzak, who lives just downstream of the golf course on Kehl Road, also has his suspicion about the wells.
“If they’re going to cap the wells, how much concrete are they going to pour down them?” he wondered. “Who’s going to monitor this? If this is going to be left on the honour system, that’s not monitoring.
“I think the people are still kind of skeptical,” he admitted. “To me, I would think if they want to get the water they want, the creek and wells would have to both come into play.”
Spuzak said his concerns lie mostly with the effect the golf course is having on the nature of the creek. He wants the creek returned to its “natural state” before the creation of an off-line pond is discussed.
“I’d like to see the fish that migrate up that creek have the ability to do that forever and flow through that creek as comfortably as they ever have,” Spuzak said.
“If we don’t protect that, we’ll just end up with a dead creek.
“We’ve got to live in this world for a long time, and to turn around and use something for a few years because someone’s on a board doesn’t cut it with me,” he stressed.