The city received a grant for the study from the Mississippi Development Authority to conduct the study. The goal is to finish studying the creek by Oct. 1, City Engineer David Gardner said. Once the study is complete, the board of aldermen will ask for federal money to help build the dams to widen the creek. If this happens, St. Catherine Creek will become a recreation area, Byrne said. It would also help control soil erosion and possibly provide an industrial area. &8220;We envision it to be a series of lakes that will start at the beginning (near springs that feed the creek) and go to the mouth of the river,&8221; Byrne said. &8220;It has so many possibilities.&8221; Broadening the creek would help stabilize the water level, preventing some erosion, Gardner said. The current fluctuation of water rising and falling &8220;plays havoc on the creek,&8221; he said, weakening the banks. The committee is aiming for an average of 20 feet deep throughout the creek, with some areas deeper and some shallower. People will be able to go fishing and canoeing, but &8220;you&8217;re not going to see any speedboats,&8221; Gardner said. The creek, while it will grow, will not encroach on any houses, Gardner said. &8220;We&8217;re not taking anything away,&8221; he said. &8220;We&8217;re giving them something. It&8217;s not going outside the boundaries of high flood.&8221; For now, the committee&8217;s plans are only temporary. &8220;We don&8217;t really know where the study is going to go,&8221; Byrne said. &8220;These are just dreams you&8217;re seeing. It&8217;s still a dream, but it&8217;s getting closer and closer.&8221; But widening a creek like St. Catherine could have environmental consequences, Robert Seyfarth, chief of the water quality certification branch of the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, said in a telephone conversation Thursday. Broadening the creek could make it shallower, Seyfarth said, possibly changing the water temperature. This could affect the ecosystem and organisms that live there. Changing the stream into a series of lakes, as envisioned, might also affect plants and animals living in the water, he said. &8220;Whatever fish or organisms that live in the stream that depend on a free-flowing stream would not survive well,&8221; Seyfarth said. &8220;Even though it&8217;s still a body of water, it would be different.&8221; Without details on what was planned for the stream, Seyfarth said he could not say for sure if widening St. Catherine Creek would hurt or help the environment. &8220;We would have to look at it to see if it&8217;s a change for the good or not,&8221; he said.