Governor Whitemer and the department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy have announced efforts to help Michigan residents threatened by high lake levels.
With Great Lakes lake levels well above long-term averages the state is taking action to help protect homes along the shoreline.
Nick Assendelft is with EGLE. He said the department will expedite applications for permits to help create protection structures for threatened homes.
“We’re going to essentially put them at the front of the line and be able to look at their application and hopefully within a couple of days be able to review and process them,” he said. “So it could be anything from temporary solutions, rip wrap, larger boulders, a sea wall, or even moving their home back from the edge of the water.”
Assendelft said applications normally take anywhere from 60-90 days.
Assendelft said resources will be moved from other programs with permit approvals - reducing the time to get a permit to just days.
“We recognize this is a critical situation that’s going to be with us for a while so we want to make sure we continue to work at it and continue to be partners with property owners and landowners to try and resolve the problems they are having,” he said.
The Army Corps of Engineers is now predicting high water levels are likely to continue into next year.
Shoreline protection permits have been on the rise. In 2014 there were 264 issued. In the last fiscal year the state issued 730.