Corps center at Rolling Fork will see 8-month delay
Published 11:59 am Friday, October 22, 2010
Construction of a $6 million interpretive and educational center in Rolling Fork by the U.S. Corps of Engineers has been delayed about eight months due to findings during the excavation process, a project manager said Thursday.
Philip Hollis, a Corps’ Vicksburg District senior project manager, said a contract could be awarded sometime in mid-August, and construction on the 33-acre site off U.S. 61 North will begin a month or so later. A June 2012 opening date of the nearly 4,000-square-foot center is expected.
“The complexity of the process has created several unavoidable schedule changes,” Hollis said. “I think we’ve overcome our potential problems.”
Chris Koeppel, a Corps environmental section team leader and archeologist, said he and his team, which includes the archaeology firm Panamerican Consultants, found what they believe to be a Native American burial ground.
“We knew this was a sensitive site, but we didn’t know how sensitive it was,” he said. “What we found was a complex site.”
The preserved remains, stone tools, pottery and a post date to the 1300s, he said.
“If there was a village here, then they would have buried their dead around here,” Koeppel said. “The Corps does not want to disturb the burial ground.”
He said the Corps has met with Choctaw and Chickasaw representatives to decide where construction may begin.
The Corps purchased the land off U.S. 61, near the iconic Red Barn, from the Bernard Deaton family, who had owned it for about 100 years. The Red Barn was included in the purchase, and will be a part of the museum dedicated to Delta history, culture and wildlife.
The Corps is also working on an interpretive center in downtown Vicksburg. The dry-docked MV Mississippi at Washington and Jackson streets will be the centerpiece of the $16 million project, which has seen several delays and is expected to open in late 2011.