The Army Corps of Engineers will be offering an update on the ongoing situation with the Wix-Howard Cemetery during a town hall meeting at 6 p.m. on Monday at the Harlan County Courthouse.

Harlan County Judge-Executive Dan Mosley said the meeting is being held in the Fiscal Court courtroom and is open to the public.

“We’re going to have a town hall meeting on Monday with the United States Army Corps of Engineers,“ Mosley said. “The meeting is to get an update regarding the Wix-Howard Cemetery slide project, as well as an update on where the Corps is on correcting the ponding area that used to be the old river bed in Loyall.”

According to previous reports, the Wix-Howard Cemetery is located between Loyall and Rio Vista near the location of a previous Corps of Engineers project which cut through a mountain. The cemetery had begun to slide into the Cumberland River. The cemetery is on the National Registry of Historic Cemeteries, with an abundance of history attached.

“The cemetery slide project has been underway now for a little over a year,” Mosley said. “They’ve already relocated some graves, and will be relocating some additional graves. This meeting will give the public an update on where the Corps is on this project and what will have to happen in the future.”

Mosley said the meeting will also include an update on the Corps of Engineers’ status regarding the design process for correcting the two-decades plus ponding issue.

“They asked the county to implement a new maintenance plan on the ponding area, which we did,” Mosley explained. “We’ll be showcasing what we did to try to get the channel to work correctly. Basically, what we implemented helped the situation with generating clean water into the area, but it has not helped to create enough flow out of the channel to drain it. We’ll be giving a presentation on the plan we implemented in order to better maintain the ponding area.”

Mosley encouraged Loyall residents to attend the town hall meeting.

“We are looking forward to the update,” Mosley said. “The Corps of Engineers has been working closely with us over the last couple of years on this, both to address the cemetery and the ponding. I’m excited to hear what progress they’ve made in both areas.”