The Chadakoin River is getting a lot of attention.

Last year, Twan Leenders, Chautauqua Watershed Conservancy director of conservation, asked for and received emergency funding for both river improvements and to treat a tree of heaven infestation on the river’s banks. Last week, the council approved $327,925 to complete debris removal from the river and, perhaps more importantly, a riverbank stabilization project in the downtown area. He highlighted a section of the bank below the train station, as well as two sections of the bank on both sides of the Chadakoin River between the Warner Dam and the North Main Street Bridge.

The banks are eroding not due to negligence, per se, but the typical use of the Warner Dam to keep the river at a specific height. The water has undercut some of the banks by several feet. Some of the riverbanks are at risk of collapsing and some of the trees on the Chadakoin’s banks are at risk of collapsing.

More than $600,000 will have been spent on the Chadakoin River by the time the year is over. That money, in our view, will have been well spent. Leenders and his team did outstanding work last yaer and we have no reason to believe the work they perform this year will be any different. We have no doubt there will be more work needed in the future to overcome years of neglect along the Chadakoin River. But this investment must have a payoff. Multiple strategic plans have talked about the value of the Chadakoin River and the Chadakoin Riverwalk. Those plans are right — the river had a lot of potential as a gathering place, for concerts, for kayaking and boating and all manner of activities. Now, it’s time to put those plans into action and make better use of this long-discussed and long-underused asset in our downtown.