07/15/2004 Env Bd Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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INTRODUCTION Mr. Ed Vaughan, a local land developer, is exploring a plan to build residential housing on a 10 -acre parcel near the City of Centerville, Anoka County, Minnesota. It is located in the SW '/ of the NW '/ of the NW '/, of Section 27, T31N R22W (Figures 1 and 2). The property is a small island, surrounded by marsh, located approximately 700 feet south of Wards Lake and 500 feet east of a peninsula of land which has already been developed with single family housing. It is privately owned but in anticipation of federal permitting requirements, Mr. Vaughan contracted with Loucks Associates to conduct a Phase I cultural resources survey of the property. Loucks archaeologists Teresa Halloran and David Mather carried out the survey in November 2000. Survey Objectives and Area of Potential Effect Phase I survey objectives address the following: 1) defming the Area of Potential Effect (APE), 2) identifying archaeological sites within the APE, 3) assessing the impact of development activities on those sites and if necessary, 4) and providing site management strategies to minimize the projects impact on all identified cultural resources. The APE was defined as the entire island, which is approximately 10 acres in size. INVESTIGATION PROCEDURES The project area was surveyed through a combination of documentary archival research, surface reconnaissance, and subsurface testing. A background review of records, literature and archaeological research relevant to the prehistory and early history of the project area was conducted prior to fieldwork. Field reconnaissance was then initiated to locate known cultural resources and any as yet unidentified cultural resources within the APE. The fieldwork component included pedestrian surface reconnaissance and sub - surface shovel testing. Pedestrian visual reconnaissance was conducted in all locations that exhibited sufficient surface visibility although snow cover obscured most of the ground. Shovel tests were typically 35 -40 centimeters (cm) in diameter, and were excavated to culturally sterile subsoil. Sterile subsoil is defined as subsolum or C horizon and ranged in depth from 40cm to 80cm. All material removed from shovel tests was screened through 1/4 inch hardware cloth. Soil descriptions were recorded for each test, and the test pit holes were immediately back - filled. Shovel tests were not placed in areas with excessively steep slopes ( >15 %), in mud or areas covered with standing water, or in areas that had obviously been totally altered by previous ground - disturbing activities. RESULTS OF INVESTIGATION Historic and Thematic Contexts The National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 mandates each State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) to provide frameworks for cultural resource studies. These frameworks establish connections between patterns of state history and resources encountered. They are organized by historic and thematic contexts. Historic contexts are generally defined through temporal and geographic boundaries while thematic contexts refer to general property types. Such contexts are intended to incorporate new data resulting from ongoing cultural resource investigations; they are essentially works in progress. The Minnesota Precontact Period contexts considered most relevant to the project area are the Paleoindian (9500BC - 6000BC), Archaic (6000BC - 500BC), and Woodland (500BC - AD1650) Traditions. For the Contact Period (1650 - 1837), the most relevant contexts include the Native American Eastern Dakota and Ojibwe and the Euro- American French, British, and Initial United States Presence. Post Contact Period contexts Early Agriculture and River Settlement (1840 - 1870) and Railroads and Agricultural Development (1870 — 1940).