Sen. Tom Carper chairs the federal Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Last June, he received something called the Gold de Fleury award for outstanding service from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The award was presented by Lt. Gen. Scott Spellmon of the Army Corps at a banquet that included speeches, applause and, no doubt, lots of press.
The Army Corps of Engineers oversees projects needing engineering or construction repairs they refer to as missions. One would think that a lieutenant general and Carper, the chairman of the federal oversight committee, could jointly build or fix just about anything, but they have failed.
The Indian River Inlet northside bulkhead and fishing area has been a dangerous mess for more than five years. For those of us who like to fish there, it represents everything wrong with our government. The money is allocated (and has been for several years), but not one shovel of dirt has been moved. I laughed out loud reading (in this paper) that some kind of virtual public meeting was set to take place Feb. 15, when we mere mortals could listen online to more excuses and more delays on fixing the inlet.
Virtual meetings and awards banquets don’t fix anything. A good Delaware construction company with concrete trucks and excavators is needed, not mission failures.
Carper and Spellmon: Enough BS, let’s get this thing fixed!
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