When the Mill Street dam in Sanford was last the subject of a state inspection, in 2003, an engineer noted the structure was beginning to show wear.

“Of concern was the movement, settlement and material deterioration of the L(eft) toe … concrete dike wall,” said the report, obtained by the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting. “The spillway showed signs of concrete deterioration, minor cracking and some leakage. The sluice gate was not tested nor was the outlet pipe inspected. No deterioration of recent repairs were noted.”

Since that time, it is likely that the dam has fallen further into disrepair. However, state inspectors – as well as the people who live, work and own property below the dam – can only guess at its integrity at the moment. As with many of the state’s dams, an inspection of the Mill Street site is overdue, by six years.

According to a report by the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting., the structural condition of nearly 90 percent of Maine’s 93 high-hazard or significant-hazard dams cannot be determined, because the records are either unavailable or out of date.

The failure of these dams would cause property or environmental damage at best, loss of life at worst. And, according to a report issued by engineering consultants in 2008, most of the sites are reaching the end of their design life.

“These dams,” the report stated, “all show signs of weathering and movement to various degrees” and their “continual deterioration should be cause for concern.”

The lack of inspections is largely a financial matter. The Maine Emergency Management Agency has until very recently only employed one inspector for the state’s 800 or so dams. A task force in 2007 proposed charging dam owners a fee to help fund the inspections, but the idea died in the Legislature, which has not given dam safety much consideration, according to the center’s report.

That is likely because dam deterioration is in many ways an invisible problem that stays outside of the public consciousness. It is easy to drive by a dam every day and remain secure in its structural integrity. Without public pressure to address the problem – and without a disastrous incident to bring the issue to the forefront – state government can easily move on to other issues, of which there are many.

The center’s report, however, shows that the Legislature should act soon, to head off a disaster. A fee system to help fund additional inspectors is a reasonable approach. Legislators should meet with emergency officials and dam owners to figure out a fee scale that would not unduly harm the owners, and to discuss how to correctly approach the significant task of catching up on inspections.

The procedures followed by the emergency management agency also warrant review. Budgetary constraints explain why inspections are lagging, but there is no excuse for poor record keeping. The agency also seems to lack the will to pressure dam owners to fix the sites in the cases where inspections have found deficiencies.

In reviewing the issue of dam safety, lawmakers and state officials should heed the warnings of state Sen. Stan Gerzofsky, D-Brunswick, who co-chaired the 2007 dam task force.

“Some day something’s going to happen,” he said, “and people’s eyes are going to open up.”

Ben Bragdon is the managing editor of Current Publishing. He can be reached at bbragdon@keepmecurrent.com or followed on Twitter.