OKTIBBEHA COUNTY – With federal grant funding once again available and engineers nearing their final recommendations, work on the long-awaited Oktibbeha County Dam project could begin by mid-2026.
Oktibbeha County Supervisors Board President Marvell Howard, who lives behind the levee, said residents within his district have been waiting patiently for visible progress on the dam since the lake was drained in 2020.
“A lot of people (are) just wondering when the … levee will be rehabbed and the lake will be returned to its normal water pool,” Howard told The Dispatch. “… It’s been a long time. It’s been a slow process, but we’re still working through it, and hopefully by spring of next year, if not early summer, we’ll see some work starting to take place.”
The dam, built in 1965, has long struggled with inadequate spillways, eroding slopes and repeated slope failures. Those issues nearly resulted in a full breach of the dam in 2020, forcing a mass evacuation. To relieve pressure, the county drained the lake that year, a move that sparked a civil lawsuit with a local water park.
In the years since, the county and engineers with WSP USA have outlined three options: repair the dam to to a moderate-hazard lake height for about $5.4 million, repair it to a high-hazard lake height for about $11.2 million or decommission the lake entirely for about $8.1 million.
The county, working with the National Resources Conservation Service and the Mississippi Soil and Water Conservation Commission, applied for an NRCS Watershed Rehabilitation Program grant in 2022 to fund the dam’s repairs. However, funding from the agency was paused earlier this year amid a federal review of the agency.
County Administrator Wayne Carpenter said that review has now concluded and that funds will be released once engineers finalize their recommendation and NRCS approves its draft plan.
“I’m hoping the recommendation is imminent because that’s what everybody’s been sitting around waiting on, and then of course, the money being held up didn’t motivate anybody to actually move quickly,” Carpenter said.
Carpenter said news of the funding’s release came just in time, following the October sale of OCH Regional Medical Center.
“This project has always been an extremely high priority for the board,” Carpenter told The Dispatch. “With the top down review and with the engineers completing their study, it’s just kind of been a wait and see phase, and it was probably fortunate because we were really tied up selling the hospital. … It might have been a divine thing that … we finished up selling the hospital, just in time to shift focus on to the dam.”
WSP USA deferred to NRCS for comments on the status of design plans. NRCS did not respond to The Dispatch’s requests for comment by press time.
Despite hopes for progress, the unclear construction timeline continues to complicate ongoing litigation between the county and Wet N Wild, the Starkville water park located on the drained lake.
Starkville attorney Charles Winfield filed the suit in 2020 on behalf of the park and its owners, Richard and Mary Stansbury, alleging the county failed to maintain the levee in violation of its lease agreement.
“The main issue from the litigation side of it is the timing, when can some of this be dealt with or done,” Roberson told The Dispatch. “… The coach has put damages on how long the dam is going to be out, and there’s a question mark from our stand point (and) their standpoint, of when that may be finished.”
Roberson said the uncertainty has hindered efforts to reach a settlement, with Stansbury allegedly claiming “millions that he’s owed.”
Grant strategy session
Supervisors also reviewed broader funding needs during a Thursday morning strategy session with UHY Advisors, a consulting firm the county is working with to map out future grant applications.
The meeting highlighted several priority areas, including countywide flooding issues, a shortage of affordable housing, sewer needs and potential capital projects such as a new county jail.
UHY Advisors Managing Director Jack Reagan said he believes the county has “numerous” opportunities for outside funding.
“There’s still numerous grant opportunities out there,” Reagan told The Dispatch following the meeting. “… A lot of governments just apply for grants to get the grants and don’t fit them into an overall short term and long term strategy. That’s what we’re trying to help them focus on. … They know where their priorities lie.”
Reagan said he and Claire Collins, consulting senior manager for UHY Advisors, will compile a mix of state, local and federal grant options the county can pursue to address its needs. Those options should be presented to the board by the end of this year, he said.
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