The nonprofit group that spearheaded the effort to preserve and re-use the 1835 Albert Gallatin Jenkins plantation house at the Green Bottom Wildlife Management Area as an interpretive center has called on U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins, R-W.Va., to investigate spending practices by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in restoring the historic structure.
The aging structure stands vacant and unused after at least $3 million, and possibly as much as $4.5 million, has been pumped into the project.
"We desperately need your help," wrote Ned Jones, president of The Green Bottom Society, in letters to Manchin and Jenkins, the latter of whom is not a descendant of the plantation's owners. The letters included copies of the signatures of 1,450 petitioners who support the request. Although the letters were sent in October, Jones said he delayed making them public until last week, in response to media inquiries.
Jones, a Huntington real estate developer and a former state senator, said Thursday that the Corps of Engineers' handling of the project "could be a poster child for government waste and mismanagement.
"If it were not so tragic, it would be almost laughable to think that our government could spend over $4 million on a four-room house in Cabell County, where no house has sold for more than $1.4 million," he said. "In addition, the Corps' version of a $4 million house has no kitchen, no working bathroom, no drinkable water and the interior is a complete mess, with paint peeling off the walls and temporary floor jacks supporting the first floor. Imagine what $4 million should have created."
Most of the stabilization and restoration work on the building, once the home of Confederate Gen. Albert Gallatin Jenkins, took place between 2008 and 2012, when a "Preserve in Place" plan was activated by the Corps.
During that plan, contractors, among other things, re-pointed all brickwork and foundation stones with lime-based mortar identical to that used in the mid-19th century; removed all exterior paint; replaced the roof using composite shingles resembling the original wood shakes; reattached separated rafters and joists; and rebuilt chimneys. Contractors also replaced all windows with panes of English-blown glass similar to the original glass; replaced doors using period-appropriate hardware; and installed HVAC equipment, security alarms and humidity controls.
"All the work had to be done according to the very strict guidelines of the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act," which substantially increased the cost of the project, Aaron Smith, the Corps of Engineers' project manager for the Jenkins house restoration, said in a January interview.
While work performed from 2008 to 2012 cost about $3 million, Jones believes another $1 million to $1.5 million may have been spent by the Corps on the mansion before and after that period.
"The Corps will not reveal to the public how much was paid to contractors and third parties before 2008 or after March 7, 2012, or how much they charged to this project for their own services between 1988 and now," said Jones, who along with Green Bottom Society officer Karen Nance, filed Freedom of Information Act requests with the Corps to identify that sum.
Jones said Nance was told that in order to respond to her FOIA request, she would have to pay the Corps nearly $18,000 to cover the costs of retrieving the information, while he was informed he needed to pay $8,111.17 to process his request.
"We believe the public has a right to know how its tax dollars are being spent," Jones said. "By its actions, the Corps in essence denied the public its rights."
Jones said language inserted into the Water Resources Development Act of 2000 by former Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., "ensures the preservation and restoration of the structure known as the 'Jenkins House' and the reconstruction of associated buildings and landscape features of such structures located within the Lesage/Greenbottom Swamp in accordance with the standards of the Department of the Interior for the treatment of historic properties."
He questions whether it was legal for the Corps to halt renovation work and shutter the building before all restorations were complete.
The Corps of Engineers, however, maintains that when the "Preserve in Place" project was complete in 2012, less than $56,000 was available to spend on mitigation work for the Robert C. Byrd Lock and Dam project - the project that led to the Corps' involvement in the restoration of the Jenkins house, the expansion of the Lesage Swamp, located on former Jenkins Plantation property, and other developments.
In recent years, the Huntington District of the Corps of Engineers has annually sought, and has annually been denied, an $80,000 appropriation to plan the final phase of development for the historic structure.
While the Corps owns the Jenkins house, it lacks the authority to operate it as a museum, and hopes to lease the building to another entity to fulfill that role, or another agency that would keep the building preserved.
The state Division of Culture and History operated a small museum in the building prior to 2008 but is no longer interested in leasing it.
"So many people had such high hopes for it," Jones said.
At one time, he said, Culture and History had designed a reception center for the site that would have interpreted the Jenkins family and its plantation, the lives of the slaves who toiled there, the wildlife found in the wetlands and along the Ohio River adjacent to the former plantation, and the Fort Ancient American Indian culture that established a large village on the site centuries before the Jenkins family arrived on the scene.
"It has so many stories to tell," Jones said. "The site could be a great source for tourism and a wonderful educational experience."
Jones said Manchin and Jenkins "have been strong advocates for us, as was Congressman Rahall ... but the Corps is a giant bureaucracy and we are just some concerned citizens."
In addition to pursuing a political solution to moving the project forward, he said "we need to better inform the public about the great potential of this site for tourism and education."
The 4,400-acre plantation relied on the labor of as many as 100 slaves, who are believed to have built the bricks used to construct the two-story Jenkins home, located on a low bluff overlooking the Ohio River.
Albert Gallatin Jenkins was born on the property, studied at Marshall Academy in Huntington, Jefferson College in Pennsylvania and Harvard Law School. After returning to Cabell County to operate the plantation and practice law, Jenkins was elected to represent western Virginia in the U.S. Congress, where he served from 1857 to 1861, when he chose not to run for re-election to join the Confederate cause.
Jenkins saw combat during the Battle of Scary Creek in Putnam County in July 1861, as well as at Gettysburg, and at the 1864 Battle of Cloyd's Mountain in Virginia, during which he was fatally wounded.
Reach Rick Steelhammer at
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