$1.5M Awarded To Dredge Gunpowder River, Taylor Creek

HARFORD COUNTY, MD — Officials announced Monday that Harford County has been awarded $1.5 million from Maryland’s fiscal year 2027 Waterway Improvement Fund for the maintenance dredging of the Gunpowder River and Taylor Creek in Joppatowne.

The project - designed to improve public boating access and public safety - is expected to start this winter.

“Harford’s waterways are among our most cherished natural resources,” Harford County Executive Bob Cassilly said. “Safeguarding this public asset is an essential investment in our quality of life.”

To expedite the project, the Cassilly administration provided $121,639 in county funding to jumpstart the required engineering and permitting processes. The state’s $1.5 million will fully cover the cost of dredging, officials noted.

In related news regarding the Gunpowder River, in May, the developer and builders of Ridgely’s Reserve, a 121- acre housing development in Joppa, agreed to pay $4.1 million to settle a lawsuit that said they polluted the Gunpowder River and one of its tributaries after "failing to control muddy runoff from their construction site." Witnesses reported the basin would turn shades of orange and brown.

Texas-based homebuilder D.R. Horton, its development subsidiary Forestar Real Estate Group and Kinsley Construction, a contractor based in York, Pennsylvania, admitted no wrongdoing, according to reports.

But the settlement announced May 19 requires them to pay a $2 million civil penalty and provide $2.1 million for “community-driven” remediation projects to restore aquatic habitat in the Gunpowder and a tributary, Foster Branch.

In a two-year timeframe, state and local inspections documented numerous pollution violations, including failing silt fences and bare, unstabilized soil that allowed rainfall to wash tons of fine dirt into Foster Branch and downstream. Aerial surveys showed marked declines in submerged aquatic vegetation in the Gunpowder during that timeframe, according to the Bay Journal.