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WILKES-BARRE — From his backyard Joe Gibbons could almost reach out and touch the branches of the trees growing in Mill Creek.
They’ve been getting closer, stretching across the creek channel and raising concerns for Gibbons and other residents on Coon Street debris could lodge in the growing tree trunks to create a dam and flood their Miners Mills neighborhood.
“If something gets caught in there we’re screwed,” Gibbons said Tuesday.
The creek is contained within stone walls built during the Depression, similar to Solomon Creek that is the focus of a multi-million dollar reconstruction project.
Gibbons treaded familiar ground on the cleanup that’s stopped short of the patch of dirt and rocks in the creek bed behind his house.
“They were in here about six months ago,” Gibbons said as he pointed to the cleared channel downstream.
The 68-year-old retiree speculated the trees haven’t been cut because of his criticism of the city’s Director of Operations Butch Frati job performance.
“I don’t know what else it could be,” Gibbons said.
But Frati dismissed the claim, calling it “ridiculous.”
Crews have cleared the creek in the past and will be back in there, Frati said. “That is scheduled for August,” he said.
The trees Gibbons identified as a flooding concern “don’t impede anything,” Frati added.
In the past, Frati said high water made it unsafe to put employees or contractors in the creek. Some sections can’t handle heavy equipment because the bottom is unstable, he said.
The creek cleanup was on the list of projects District E city councilman Mike Merritt sent to Frati. Merritt said Frati responded and told him it was scheduled for next month.
Merritt said maybe the work could be done earlier as the weather was expected to be good into early next week.
“It needs to be addressed or it’s going to be a much larger problem,” Merritt said.
