Puyallup River Archives - Northwest Public Broadcasting

Decision upheld to remove a portion of Electron Dam on the Puyallup River

By Lauren Gallup August 22, 2024

View of Mount Rainier looking southeast up Puyallup River, Tacoma, July 10, 1899. The dam was built on the river in 1904. (Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons)

A portion of the Electron Dam on the Puyallup River has to be removed, according to a decision from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The federal appeals court upheld the decision by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington that a vertical metal wall portion of the dam, a temporary spillway, makes the dam a complete barrier to fish passage and Read More

New flood management plan considers more flooding types

By Lauren Gallup October 19, 2023

In Pierce County, levee setbacks have been completed along rivers, including the Puyallup. This picture shows the river running near the Orville Road Setback Revetment. Projects like these are included in the new flood hazard management plan. (Credit: Lauren Gallup / NWPB)

After about five years in the works, the Pierce County Council adopted a new Comprehensive Flood Hazard Management Plan that broadens the scope of what kinds of flooding the county will plan for – from coastal to urban flooding. Angela Angove is the floodplain and watershed services manager with Pierce County Planning and Public Works. She said different types of Read More

The immediate impact of levee setbacks in Pierce County

By Lauren Gallup October 12, 2023

The Orville Road Setback Revetment was completed in 2022, to set a levee back from the Puyallup River in Pierce County. (Credit: Lauren Gallup / NWPB)

In the foothills of Mt. Rainier runs the Carbon, the Puyallup and the White Rivers, meandering through towns and cities, along roadways and near homes, the paint strokes of the natural environment now surrounded by a human-built ecosystem. Once tightly restricted by levees, these rivers are beginning to again flow closer to how they would have, not adhering to the confines Read More

Rethinking levees to reduce flood risk

By Lauren Gallup September 29, 2023

The Calistoga Reach Levee Set Back in Pierce County is an engineered levee set back to help the river flow in a more natural way. The project was part of a larger Floodplains by Design grant. // Courtesy the Washington State Department of Ecology

Washington Rep. Steve Tharinger of the 24th district became intimately acquainted with levee setbacks when he discovered the levee protecting his house on the lower Dungeness River was not only not protecting his house, but harming the ecosystem too. “I sold my house and the five acres in a barn we had, so that we'd have more room to move that levee back and give the Read More

Electron Hydro dam could face largest fine for environmental crime in Washington history

By Lauren Gallup March 7, 2023

Artificial turf found in the Puyallup River on Nov. 11, 2020, after the materials flowed into the river from a construction project on the Electron Hydro dam in the summer of 2020. Photo courtesy of the Puyallup Tribe.

Electron Hydro dam and its chief operating officer could have to pay the largest fine and restitution for an environmental crime in Washington state history. COO Thom Fischer and the company, pleaded guilty to a gross misdemeanor permit violation for allowing the toxic contaminants crumb rubber and artificial turf to flow into the Puyallup River during a construction project. Read More