Opponents of a proposed 219-acre housing development near Lone Star Lake are trying to rally neighbors to their cause.

“We are opposed to the project. The more we find out about, the more we’re opposed to it,” said Karl Birns, who lives near the site.

Birns is active in Lone Star Neighbors, a newly formed group intent on warning the area’s residents of what opponents see as the project’s shortcomings and inherent dangers.

The group’s first meeting with area residents is set for 7 p.m. Thursday at the Fraternal Order of Police lodge, 1.6 miles west of the Lone Star community.

The meeting’s agenda includes a review of past, present and upcoming deliberations by county officials about the development.

Earlier this year, Michael Nuffer sought permission from the Douglas County Planning Commission to develop Sycamore Valley Lake Estates on land between Lone Star and Clinton lakes. As proposed, the neighborhood would have 23 homes on five-to-10 acre lots.

The plan included creating a 30-acre lake by damming an area that feeds Washington Creek below Lone Star Lake.

‘Death and destruction’

Lone Star Neighbors oppose the dam, calling it a danger to those living downstream, including those living in the Lone Star community.

“It’s our position that the hydrological analysis in support of the dam has some very serious flaws,” Birns said, noting that one of the project’s harshest critics is Bryan Young, an engineering professor at Kansas University who teaches courses on hydrology.

Young, who lives near the site of the proposed dam, will discuss his concerns at the meeting Thursday. Efforts to contact Young for comment Tuesday were unsuccessful.

Birns warned that if the dam ever broke, it would release a “wall of water” capable of destroying homes downstream.

“We’re not talking water in the basement,” he said. “We’re talking death and destruction.”

Divided neighbors

Nuffer dismissed Birns’ fears, noting that the dam would be comparable to the one already at Lone Star Lake.

“What they’re saying, really, is, ‘We don’t want neighbors,'” Nuffer said.

If built, Nuffer said, the dam would reduce flooding that has long plagued the Lone Star community.

“Most of the people who live in Lone Star have told me they’re in support of this,” Nuffer said. “It’s the people who are on higher ground and who aren’t being flooded who are against it.”

Scott Mesler, another Lone Star Neighbors organizer, disagreed.

“I know a lot of people in Lone Star, too,” he said. “The ones I’ve talked to are opposed to it. They don’t see any way it can make that much difference. When we get these 10-inch rains that cause Lone Start to flood now, it’s still going to flood. When the lake is full, it’s full.”

Also, Mesler noted that both Birns and Young lived downstream from the proposed dam. Mesler owns 200 acres of farmland next to the proposed Sycamore Valley Lake Estates site.

Earlier, the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission voted 9-to-0 against recommending Sycamore Valley Lake Estates.

“It’s not consistent with the area’s land use, it’s outside the urban growth area, and it’s not adjacent to an existing, platted subdivision,” said Jeff Tully, a county-city planner.

But last month, when the Planning Commission’s recommendation reached the Douglas County Commission, Nuffer asked the board to weigh the project’s flood-control merits.

The County Commission, in turn, sent the project back to the Planning Commission for discussion at its July 28 meeting.

“If the dam would truly serve the public’s interest, the County Commission wants us to look at it,” Tully said. “And that’s what we’re going to do.”