FOLEY – Efforts to improve drainage in the Beulah community while protecting the environment of Wolf Bay are moving forward with the help of new state funding.

The Foley City Council has accepted a grant from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management to support continued upgrades to the Beulah Heights Regional Stormwater Facility in southeast Foley.

Mayor Ralph Hellmich said the work builds on a 480-acre city project that began in 2008 to address longstanding drainage issues in the area.

“The water was going directly into Wolf Creek and degrading it, because there was no retention,” Hellmich said. “This put that water into a retention basin and that worked really well.”

The current phase of the project will expand those improvements, allowing the city to enhance both drainage capacity and water quality across the region.

“When you get this system in place, you can start going upstream and replacing pipes,” Hellmich said. “That won’t do any good without the improvements. It’s really a regional program to fix the Beulah Heights area.”

Foley Sustainability and Natural Resources Director Leslie Gahagan said the upgrades will help reduce flooding and better protect the city’s stormwater infrastructure.

“This project is to retrofit it to fit more in low impact development, to increase the capacity so that stormwater in that area will now have a place to go,” Gahagan said. “The stormwater will be filtered for pollutants before it discharges to Wolf Creek.”

In addition to the ADEM grant, the city has also received support from the Mobile Bay National Estuary Program, which is helping cover project costs.

“This is a really good project, and we’ve received funding already for this project from another source of money, so this is a second source that will help close the gaps,” Gahagan said.

The project will also include a new system designed to capture sediment before it settles into the retention pond. In the past, Foley Public Works crews had to remove accumulated material using heavy equipment to keep the system functioning.

“That wasn’t very feasible,” Gahagan said. “This allows us to maintain it in perpetuity.”