steroids scandal on the brink of disastergrand jury … · if major league baseball’s “dirty...

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CANAL POINT — Fortwo decades, reports fromgovernment engineers andoutside experts havereached largely the sameconclusion about the Her-bert Hoover Dike: The leveeringing Lake Okeechobee isa disaster waiting only forhigh water to happen.

Even after the U.S. ArmyCorps of Engineers com-pleted a $220 million-plusoverhaul to shore up itsmost vulnerable stretch thisyear, the dike remains on anational shortlist of unsafeClass 1 dams. It’s a categorydefined as either “almostcertain to fail under normaloperations” or at extremerisk of failure with high fa-talities and economic losses.

The Corps’ “tolerable fail-ure rate” for dams is onceevery 10,000 years. One 2011risk assessment estimatedthe dike’s probable failurerate at every 14 years.

“Right now, Herbert Hoo-ver is one of a handful of our

VULNERABLE: Steel wall holds back water from Lake Okeechobee as the Army Corps of Engineers workson the 80-year-old Herbert Hoover Dike. The dike remains on a national shortlist of unsafe Class 1 dams.

JOE RIMKUS JR./MIAMI HERALD STAFF

A project to shore up the levee around Lake Okeechobeehas made progress — but not enough to avert catastropheBY CURTIS [email protected]

On the brink of disaster

•TURN TO OKEECHOBEE, 16A

If Major League Baseball’s “dirty dozen” suspend-ed ballplayers thought their steroid problems werebehind them, they were wrong.

On Friday, the whistleblower whose recordslinked New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguezand 12 other ballplayers to a South Florida dopingclinic was summoned before a federal grand jury,two sources close to the case told the Miami Herald.

Porter Fischer, the clinic’s former marketing di-rector, was ordered to turn over the records thatshook Major League Baseball to its foundation —and now may lead to criminal drug charges againstthe clinic’s owner, Anthony Bosch, his partners, hissuppliers and, depending on their involvement, evenhis clients.

“It’s going to make a lot of people start sweatingnow,’’ said Miami lawyer David Weinstein, formerchief of narcotics for the U.S. Attorney’s Office inMiami.

“This was pretty much the players’ dirty little se-cret. Now someone else is looking at their dirty littlesecret.’’

Among Bosch’s alleged clients: more than 100 ath-letes, as well as police officers, lawyers, judges andhigh school students.

Federal investigators are zeroing in on the clinic’sentire distribution network, including looking into

STEROIDS SCANDAL

Grandjury digsinto MLB‘secrets’ ■ The MLB scandal intensified as a grandjury took possession of records showingballplayers’ — and others’ — steroid use.

BY JULIE K. [email protected]

•TURN TO MLB, 2A

The Beacon Council tapped as its new presidentand CEO a veteran of the economic-developmentfront who currently runs the technology arm of theAtlanta Chamber of Commerce.

Larry Williams, 49, was picked by the tax-fundedgroup’s board as the replacement forFrank Nero, the longtime head of theBeacon Council who was ousted ear-lier this year amid tension with Mi-ami-Dade’s elected officials. TheBeacon Council is an independentnonprofit that relies on Miami-Dadetaxes for the majority of its budget.Its mission is to recruit companies toMiami-Dade and promote economicgrowth in the county.

“Miami has a lot of great things going for it,” Wil-liams said in an interview at the group’s Brickell Ave-nue headquarters in Miami. “It seems to be doingwell.”

In picking Williams, Beacon Council leaders opt-ed for an executive with experience in the economic-development business, rather than a local candidatewell-versed in Miami-Dade politics. PortMiami

ECONOMY

Beacon Council endsguessing game, picksoutsider as new chief ■ Miami-Dade’s economic-developmentgroup opted against a local insider, insteadhiring North Carolina native Larry Williamsfrom the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce.

BY DOUGLAS [email protected]

WILLIAMS

•TURN TO BEACON, 17A

BOGOTA — Ecuador iskilling an ambitious conser-vation program intended toleave more than 800 millionbarrels of oil beneath a pris-tine swath of the Amazon.But on Friday it was clearthat the Yasuní-ITT Initia-tive, as it’s known, won’t dieeasily.

A coalition of environ-

mental and indigenousgroups is vowing to keep thegovernment and oil compa-nies out of the area, which isrich in animal species andisolated tribes.

“The government doesn’thave the right to dissolve theYasuní-ITT Initiative be-cause this doesn’t belong tothem,” said Esperanza Marti-

ECUADOR

Move to halt park-oil protection faces fightPULLING THEPLUG: In aspeechThursday,Ecuador’sPresidentRafaelCorrea saidhe hasabandonedtheYasuní-ITTInitiative.

DOLORES OCHOA/AP

■ As Ecuador said it was ending a program to keepcrude oil underground, a coalition of indigenousand environmental groups vowed to save it.

BY JIM [email protected]

•TURN TO YASUNÍ, 2A

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Page: Asection_13 Pub. date: Saturday, August 17 Last user: cci Edition: 1st Section, zone: Asection, Herald Last change at: 22:49:53 August 16

MiamiHerald.com | MIAMI HERALDH116A | SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 2013 FROM THE FRONT PAGE

A breach of the HerbertHoover Dike would almostcertainly rank as a catastro-phe — but the scope andscale of loss would varywidely depending on whereand when it burst and howmuch water was in LakeOkeechobee.

If the worst did happen,the U.S. Army Corps of En-gineers, regional emergencymanagers and local leadershope they have taken stepsto — at the very least — min-imize the death toll.

“I would like to hope andpray that it’s not as much alife safety issue anymore,’’said longtime Palm BeachCounty Administrator Rob-ert Weisman.

After Hurricane Katrinaoverwhelmed the protectivelevees surrounding New Or-leans and killed some 1,800people in 2005, South Flori-da emergency managers forthe first time drew up massevacuation plans for townsthat suffered deadly flood-ing from Lake Okeechobeeduring hurricanes in 1926and 1928. The Corps, mean-while, says it has strength-ened the dike’s most vulner-

able 21-mile stretch.But at high water levels,

the dike remains a high-riskhazard for potentially devas-tating flooding. A major fail-ure could send torrentsthrough lakeside towns andmuddy water to the subur-ban outskirts of Palm BeachCounty.

‘SO MANY VARIABLES’

Corps spokesman JohnCampbell said it’s difficultto predict what might hap-pen. “There are just so manyvariables,’’ he said. “A lake at17 feet is going to be very dif-ferent than a lake at 20 feet.Certainly, the higher thelake level, the more thatwould actually be felt.’’

A hurricane battering em-bankments or pushing thelake over the levee could al-so multiply the threats.

A Corps-funded simula-tion of breaches presentedat a 2011 national dam safetyconference mapped outhuge swaths of lakeside landvulnerable to flooding. Thesimulation underlined whathistory has already shown.The biggest threats and im-pacts would come along thesouthern bank, where thedike protects 40,000 resi-

dents living along the lake’smost populated stretchfrom Clewiston to Pahokee.

In an extreme worst-casefailure, the simulation ex-tended flood waters morethan 20 miles, spreadingsouth and east across an ex-panse dominated by sugarfarms. The deepest poolswould collect in areas thathave subsided by severalfeet after decades of farmingon eroding peat soils thatwere once Evergladesmarsh. Much of the area isstill farmed but homes andapartments also have beenbuilt in some of the lowest-lying areas near the lake.

The modeling suggestselevated roads, railroadtracks and levees wouldhelp contain much of thewater as it neared westernPalm Beach County’ssuburbs.

The presentation includ-ed maps only for a breach at25 feet. That’s far above thehistoric high of 18.8 feet andthe 21-foot level where engi-neers predict the existing le-vee would fail.

While federal engineersopenly discuss dike defi-ciencies the Corps remainsreluctant to provide details,maps or modeling of the po-tential consequences of afailure, citing security con-

cerns heightened since the9/11 terrorist attack.

“We try and balance therisk of making sure the pub-lic is informed, and keepingthe public safe with opera-tional security of not allow-ing others to know what ourvulnerabilities are,” saidLaureen Borochaner, engi-neering division chief of theCorps’ Jacksonville office,which monitors and main-tains the dike.

After receiving questionsfrom the Miami Heraldabout the 2011 presentation,the Corps removed it fromthe website of the Associa-tion of State Dam Safety Of-ficials. The Corps last weekalso rejected requests to re-view dike inspection re-ports and in 2006 refused tomake flood maps public af-ter a critical 2006 state-com-mission study of the dike.

The Corps, Borochanerstressed, does share floodmaps with emergencymanagers

She also cautioned thatsimulations can be misinter-preted. The 2011 presenta-tion, for instance, was de-signed to compare comput-er models, she said, not mapthe path of an actual breach.

Still, she acknowledgedthe simulation gave “generalinformation about areas that

could be inundated.”While anything or anyone

directly in the path of bil-lions of gallons of roaringwater would be in danger,Vince Bonvento, director ofpublic safety for Palm BeachCounty, said that with a vastarea to absorb runoff, hedoesn’t anticipate lakesidetowns would experience thedeadly flooding of Katrina.

‘WADING IN WATER’

“What happened in NewOrleans, that’s not going tohappen with a breach of thedike out there,’’ Bonventosaid. “People obviouslywould be wading around inwater but not to the pointwhere their houses wouldbe covered.”

The worst scenarios hehas been informed about, hesaid, would bring “minimalflooding’’ as far as 20 MileBend, a landmark corner ofState Road 80 halfway be-tween Lake Okeechobeeand West Palm Beach.

Emergency managers andthe Corps also say they’renow better prepared for adisaster.

Federal engineers will is-sue watches and warningsabout dike conditions to lo-cal leaders and emergencymanagers with the goal ofproviding lead time before a

looming failure. But ulti-mately, said Campbell, localemergency managers mustmake any call to evacuate.

Bonvento said he consid-ers the chances of a dike fail-ure “slim.” Still, with the lakehovering near 16 feet, a Cate-gory 2 or stronger hurricanetracking from the east orwest toward Lake Okeecho-bee would concern him. Hesaid he’d be inclined to or-der lakeside communities toget out. “I think we wouldstill err on the side of cau-tion,” he said.

Evacuations are commonin coastal South Florida buta mass evacuation aroundLake Okeechobee would beunprecedented, calling forschool buses to ferry resi-dents who can’t providetheir own transportation.

“From an emergencymanagement perspective, itputs a lot more pressure onus to have to decide on evac-uating the Glades cities,’’said county administratorWeisman. He hopes anybreach would come in anisolated area and with plen-ty of warning. “If it hap-pened during a storm, itwould be a horrible situa-tion because getting the re-sources together and tryingto get people out of therewould be a nightmare.’’

LAKE OKEECHOBEE | DISASTER SIMULATION

How dike breach could flood vast swaths ■ A burst in the dike would test mass evacuationplans for towns around Lake Okeechobee.

BY CURTIS [email protected]

The dike has sprung leaksin the past, with the most se-rious erupting when lakelevels topped 18 feet in 1995and 1998, opening numerousassorted leaks dubbed“seeps,” “boils,” and“heaves” depending on se-verity and type. There haveeven been sinkholes. In2005, Hurricane Wilma alsochewed out a massive chunknear the Pahokee airport.

The Corps has made re-peated emergency repairs,always managing to preventa serious breach.

But with the dike in con-tinuing decline, Vick said,sandbags aren’t the solution.

“It’s like you had the littleDutch boy trying to cover140 miles of dike with hisfingers,” Vick said.

The 2006 report Vick co-authored, which was com-missioned by the SouthFlorida Water ManagementDistrict, put a harsh spot-light on dangers from thedike. But it was hardly thefirst warning. In crafting thereport, the state’s expertsdrew on decades of damagereports and studies docu-menting increasing con-cerns from the Corps andengineering consultants.

More sophisticated riskanalysis done since has notonly largely validated thestate report, he said, but alsoidentified additional weakpoints, like the culverts.

The southern stretchfrom Moore Haven to CanalPoint is considered at high-est risk but the most recentassessments, said the Corps’Halpin, “pretty much con-firm that we have a series ofdeficiencies all the wayaround the project.’’

After the alarming 2006state report, the Corpsmoved to beef up the struc-ture and reduce pressure on

highest priority projects andin fact the project that theCorps is investing most in-tensely in,’’ said Eric Halpin,the Corps’ special assistantfor dam and levee safety inWashington, D.C.

Last week, with dryweather and maxed-outdumping down two coastalrivers, the Corps slowly be-gan reversing the rain-swol-len lake’s monthlong climb,at least temporarily easingconcerns about the aging,leaky levee. But with SouthFlorida entering the peak ofhurricane season, a lot offingers will be crossed overthe next few months. Thelake can rise far faster thanthe Corps can lower it. Lastyear, for example, TropicalStorm Isaac’s runoff drovethe lake up three feet in afew weeks.

“There is still a long wayto go in the wet season,’’ cau-tioned Lt. Col. Thomas Gre-co, the Corps’ deputy dis-trict commander.

‘SEEP’ SITES

Water levels, hoveringjust below 16 feet, remainnear all-time highs for mid-August and an inspectionlast week found slightlymore water leaking fromtwo past “seep” sites. Theminor leaks are nothing toworry about yet, Greco said— the combined volume ofthree gallons a minute is noteven a drop in Lake O’sbucket.

But they indicate whatcould come with more rain.At 16.5 feet, inspections shiftfrom weekly to daily. Fromthere, every added inch onthe lake increases pressureon the dike along with risksof more serious leaks oreven a major breach.

The Herbert HooverDike, much of it built in the1930s after two hurricanesoverwhelmed a crude leveeand drowned some 3,300people in lakeside towns, isa massive structure. It’s 143miles long and as broad as afootball field at its base. At25 to 30 feet high, it standstaller than most buildings inits shadow.

But an ongoing $44 mil-lion Corps project to over-haul two culverts along thesoutheastern shoreline il-lustrates the biggest under-lying problem: The dike thatprotects surrounding com-munities from a lake rough-ly twice the size of BiscayneBay is a mammoth but dete-

riorating antique thatdoesn’t come close to mod-ern engineering standards.

“The Herbert HooverDike is a huge reservoir thatbenefits South Florida butit’s also a gun pointed atSouth Florida,’’ said StevenVick, a Colorado-based damsafety consultant and co-au-thor of a 2006 report com-missioned by that state thatbranded the dike “a graveand imminent danger’’ witha one-in-six chance of fail-ing in any given year.

The headwall of a newculvert, which allows waterto flow from the lake to sur-rounding farms, looks like ahulking fortress, a mass ofconcrete and steel severalstories tall and 500 feetwide. Comparing it to oldculverts is like putting a vin-tage Army jeep next to amodern M-1 Abrams tank.

The Corps is designingthe new culverts to the high-er standards of a moderndam, capable of enduringthe immense pressure of a26-foot lake level. That’smore than seven feet higherthan the lake has ever beenand well beyond the 21-footlevel considered almost cer-tain to burst unrepaired por-tions of the existing levee.

The Corps is in the pro-cess of replacing half the 32culverts around the lake thatare now viewed as the great-est risk to the dike’s stability,a project expected to takeuntil at least 2018.

But they are far from theonly weak points. The mas-sive embankments them-selves hide a weakness: de-cades of internal erosion.

The dike was built frommaterial dredged up alongLake Okeechobee’s shore-line — a varying mix of sand,shell, rock, muck and peat. Itwas built to provide season-al flood protection but overtime, it’s been turned into aholding tank for flood wa-ters and reservoir for sugarfarms.

The higher year-roundwater levels have exposedan aging levee to forces itwas never designed to en-dure, said dam expert Vick.

Water seeping throughcracks and crevices has cutdamaging channels insidecalled “piping.” As lake lev-els and water pressure in-crease, the piping can growinto caverns that can poten-tially undermine the dike. Ahurricane piling stormsurge against the dike candramatically worsen thestrain.

it, establishing a plan aimedat keeping the lake under15.5 feet. It’s a tricky balanc-ing act water managersdon’t always get right.

In January, the Corps fin-ished the first major work tobolster the dike, building atwo-foot-thick, 70-foot-deep concrete-like “cutoffwall’’ down the center of thedike along a 21-mile segmentfrom Port Mayaca to BelleGlade.

STRATEGIC STEPS

The Corps took othersteps as well, removing fo-liage that can weaken thedike, fortifying land-sidefeatures and stockpilingrock at strategic spots.

Before repairs, the Corpscalculated there was almostno chance of dike failurewith the lake below 15.5 feet,a 45 percent probability at 18feet and near-certainty at 21feet.

Laureen Borochaner, en-gineering division chief ofthe Corps’ Jacksonville dis-trict office, said the worksignificantly bolsters thedike’s most trouble-prone

segment though engineershave not yet put numbers tohow much repairs may havereduced risks.

But in 2011, the Corps,balking at the $10 million-a-mile price tag for the cutoffwall, announced a new stu-dy to draw up more afford-able repair options.

Borochaner said the newanalysis, to be completed in2015, will be the most com-prehensive ever of the dike’sflaws and potential fixes.Some options might includeshallower cut-off walls orerosion-fighting filters thatwould let water seepthrough but hold earthenmaterial in place.

In the meantime, saidCorps spokesman JohnCampbell, the Corps willcontinue replacing the high-risk culverts.

“It’s not like we’re not do-ing anything,” he said.

Still, the pace of repair hasdrawn criticism over theyears from area congressio-nal leaders, the Palm BeachCounty Commission, thesugar industry and others.Under current schedules,

the goal of bringing the ag-ing dike up to dam standardsremains a decade or moreaway.

Vick said that by typicalCorps standards, recentwork on the dike had been“done at the speed of light.”Repairs on the New Orleanslevees, he said, had been go-ing on for a half-century.

While the Corps’ sluggishbureaucracy played a role inletting the dike go neglectedfor so long, Vick said muchof the blame fell on Con-gress for failing to push forrepairs or pay for them.

The Corps, he said, “reallydeserves a lot of credit forturning the battleshiparound and getting the at-tention this deserved.”

In the small farmingtowns along Lake O, there isstill confidence in a dike thathas withstood nearly 80years of hurricanes and see-sawing water levels.

At the Sugar Cane GolfClub in Belle Glade, wherefairways run up against thedike, the rising lake has beena hot topic — but mainlyabout how it affects fishing.

“This is the bass capital ofthe world right here,” saidgeneral manager Phil Valen-cia. “That’s mostly whatpeople care about with wa-ter levels.’’

But more rain or a loom-ing storm could change theblasé attitude.

Willie Holmes, a retiredmechanic for the SugarCane Growers Cooperativewho lives in Belle Glade,said he has ridden out hurri-canes in the past. This time,said Holmes as he fished lastweek for crappie at SandCut, he’d be inclined toleave.

“If they don’t get that lakedown,’’ he said, “we could bein a world of trouble.’’

THE NEW CULVERT 11: The Corps is in the process of replacing half the 32 culverts around the lake that arenow viewed as the greatest risk to the dike’s stability, a project expected to take until at least 2018.

ONE STEP AT A TIME: Culvert 16 will also be replacedby the Army Corps of Engineers.

ENVIRONMENT

Despite repairs,lake’s dike stillposes a danger•OKEECHOBEE, FROM 1A