NATCHEZ — Adams County’s government has been dealing with erosion damage and soil stabilization projects for years. This year, however, all work is on hold.

That’s because, while the projects, which are part of the Emergency Watershed Protection Program, have been approved for nearly a year, the money hasn’t come in.

EWP projects are funded through Natural Resources Conservation Services grants, for which the county puts up a 20-percent match.

“We have sites in Adams County that have been approved for about a year through NRCS,” said Adams County Supervisor’s President Darryl Grennell.

“The engineers have designed the stabilization for these sites — all the work has been done in terms of design and et cetera, but no work has been done because the federal government has not allowed the money to trickle down.”

That’s why Grennell said he will make lobbying for the release of the funds a priority when he travels to Washington, D.C., in March.

Adams County is composed of loess soil, which — in terms of geological evolution — means that it was at one time blown in by wind. It is highly porous, which means it is also unstable and prone to erosion.

“It is highly susceptible to erosion, and there are a lot of roads that are susceptible to erosion,” Grennell said. “An entire road or an entire bridge can be blown out due to a storm event.”

EWP stabilization projects try to address those issues. An example of an EWP project completed in recent years is work done to stabilize a soil bank near Providence Park, Lazarus said.

“We have a great number (of EWP) projects we do every year — we always do some,” he said. “This is the first time I have seen it held up.”

The projects are scattered around the county, and — along with roads and bridges — are used to stabilize areas where homes might be threatened by erosion, Lazarus said.

One area where the EWP money could be used will be along Triplet Drive, which was damaged by high volumes of water during a rain event.

Once the EWP funds are used to stabilize the area, the county is responsible for maintaining the spot.