Park Service seeks input on long-term Effigy Mounds plan

The National Park Service will begin seeking public comments next week on a long-term plan for the care and preservation of Effigy Mounds National Monument.

The 400-page Draft Cultural Landscape Report and Environmental Assessment for Effigy Mounds National Monument, available this Thursday, will provide a blueprint for managing the 206 prehistoric Indian mounds on the 2,526-acre scenic Mississippi River bluffland north of Marquette.

Completion of the document will precede and support development of a separate plan to address unlawfully constructed features such as elevated boardwalks, according to Superintendent Jim Nepstad.

The public is encouraged to download and comment on the document during the public review period, which runs from Thursday through March 25.

The report documents the park's landscape, its origins, its evolution over time, its cultural features and its current condition. It also proposes recommendations for managing the landscape to ensure the long-term preservation of its resources.

'It provides park staff with both the how and the why when it comes to management practices involving the mounds and their surrounding landscape,” Nepstad said.

It will lay the groundwork, he said, for a separate planning process to address the nearly 80 structures, including elevated boardwalks, decks and a machine storage shed, that were built from 1999 through 2009 without first securing clearances under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, which requires federal agencies to consider the effect of projects on 'significant historic properties.”

Effigy Mounds and the National Park Service admitted the mismanagement after two National Park Service critics - members of the Friends of Effigy Mounds and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility - obtained a 723-page transcript of a Park Service internal investigation that documented failures to comply with protection laws.

The projects, completed at a combined cost of $3.4 million, constituted 'the largest official mass desecration of Indian prehistoric burial sites in the annals of the National Park Service,” according to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

Underway since 2013, the planning effort has included coordination with 20 American Indian tribes, Iowa's State Historic Preservation Office and the Office of the State Archaeologist.

'Now we're hoping the public will give it a look and let us know how it might be further improved or strengthened,” Nepstad said.

The environmental assessment portion of the document weighs different treatment alternatives against the park's current practices. One alternative takes a mound-centered preservation approach, while the other takes a broader landscape rehabilitation approach.

Park staff will host a pair of open houses to discuss the draft plan, answer questions and receive input. The first meeting will be from 1 to 3 p.m. March 7 at Marquette City Hall, 88 North St. The second will be from 5 to 7 p.m. March 9 at the Effigy Mounds National Monument Visitor Center, 3 miles north of Marquette on Highway 76.

The document will be available for download, starting Thursday, at parkplanning.nps.gov/efmoclr.

Comments may be submitted electronically from the project home page at parkplanning.nps.gov/efmoclrpage or mailed to Effigy Mounds National Monument, 151 Highway 76, Harpers Ferry, IA 52146.