MARK WAITE / PVT A Rinker Materials cement truck passes one of the gravel pits that would be near a planned flood control diversion project east of Highway 160. Advertisement

Two weeks after Nye County officials received a report that outlined a major $315 million flood control project for the entire valley, gravel pit owners were being asked Wednesday if their sites could be used as a flood retention basin.

The plan is to build a channel to divert flood waters from Wheeler Wash into Nye County Commissioner Butch Borasky's pit, then another channel from there to another pit downhill near Highway 160, used by the Nevada Department of Transportation. Borasky owns an excavation company.

Nye County Public Works Director Samson Yao said the proposal would accommodate perhaps a "two year flood." That's a much smaller scale than most flood control plans which talk about containing a 100-year flood.

"The more we have outlets, the more we will flood the people. So we have to strike some kind of balance. That's why we looked at these gravel pits and said if we discharge as much as we can into gravel pits, we won't be inundating the streets and roads," Yao said.

A trench would be cut to channel the water into the pits. Nye County would have to ask for a right-of-way from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

Rick Zaninovich, BLM natural resource specialist, said more sand and gravel operations could be steered toward an 80-acre area to the southwest of the Wulfenstein pit and the Cenex operations. Wulfenstein is a major paving contractor in Pahrump while Cenex is a global company with 58 quarries and 399 ready-mix plants in the U.S. alone.

Borasky said he talked to Juan Palma, outgoing BLM Las Vegas Field Office manager, about acquiring those 80 acres for mining operations.

"For every 10,000 gallons we can put back into the ground, it's going to get back into the aquifer and it's going to be drinking water in the future, and it's that much less (road foreman) Dave (Fanning) and his guys have to clean mud off the roads," Borasky said.

Environmental consultant Mary Ellen Giampaoli said Nye County also has problems with air quality related to dust control whenever there's a major rain event, when road crews have to clean the dirt off the roads.

Giampaoli said it would probably be a couple years before a large-scale flood control system could be constructed.

"The intent is to do the minimum we can as far as disturbances to construction," Yao said.

The reason for the alternative chosen, and the more westerly diversion, was due to the fact gravel pit operators didn't want their business to be affected by using the pits as retention ponds, and because the BLM wanted to avoid crossing a desert tortoise fence that parallels Gravel Pit Road, Yao said.

Borasky said he didn't think temporarily flooding his pit would affect his business a great deal. But pointing to the two other representatives of gravel pit operators in the room, he added, "These two gentlemen over here haul hundreds of thousand of yards to my one."

Borasky Excavating's contract calls for withdrawal of up to 24,000 cubic yards of sand and gravel. By contrast, larger companies like Rinker Materials have a current contract that allows up to 356,000 tons of sand and gravel, at a price of 37 cents per ton, or $131,720. Rinker Materials has been recently acquired by Cemex.

Diamond Construction Co. has a contract for up to 200,000 cubic yards, at a cost of 57 cents per ton, or $114,000.

Patrick Putnam, BLM assistant field manager for renewable resources, said the environmental assessment would have to address the mesquite boughs at the end of Thousandaire Boulevard, where the excess water may drain.

William Farmer, representing gravel pit operator Cemex, asked, "I'm just curious -- if this is only going to handle the two-year storm, is it going to alleviate the boulders out in the middle of the road by the Mobil station, the winery flood? That's still going to happen in a heavier storm."

Borasky told Cemex representative Patrick Putnam that, while this project is more suited for perhaps a half-inch rain, the channel could reduce the flows of a major flood. Borasky noted in his 11 years in Pahrump, there have been what he said were called "300-year storms."

Ultimately the $300 million flood control study, if approved, would include 14 large flood retention basins east of Highway 160.

"Whatever we can do up there is going to have a tremendous impact on cutting down the flow coming through the winery. It's going to cut it by a third, a half," Borasky said.

Putnam said the BLM might be able to expedite the environmental assessment when it goes to a three-tier management system in October.