Water spurts through sandbags piled along the base of the one of the city’s levees during the flooding last July. After water overtopped the Pottawatomie Creek levee, city leaders are seeking federal funding to evaluate the height of the structure. (File photo)
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Looking At The Walls That Surround Us
One Year After Floodwaters Overtopped The Pottawatomie Creek Levee, City Leaders Seek Federal Funding To Evaluate Height Of Structure
By Dustin Kass, dustinKass@miconews.com
The floodwaters that devastated Osawatomie last summer, forcing the evacuation of 2,000 residents and destroying dozens of structures, flowed directly overtop the Pottawatomie Creek levee.
While city officials and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers representatives have expressed amazement that the levee performed as well as it did, showing only minor damage despite having waters flowing overtop it for nearly 13 hours, those same officials are now looking to explore the obvious follow-up question: Are the levees surrounding Osawatomie, and more specifically the Pottawatomie Creek levee, tall enough to prevent future flooding not associated with a 100-year flood?
It’s a question that won’t be answered easily. When there’s a “major overtopping” of a levee, the Corps of Engineers recommends to the city that money be obtained to commission a preliminary assessment of the structure, said John Grothaus, Corps chief of the planning section of the Kansas City district.
The funding for the assessment must be obtained through Congress, Grothaus said, with the next opportunity being its inclusion in the 2009 energy and water appropriations project list. Even when, and if, funds are obtained, he said the assessment, which includes a hydrology study, will take approximately one year to complete and that it is only the first step in the process.
Despite the extended time frame, city officials have expressed interest in having the assessment performed and plan to push for the needed federal funds. City Manager Bret Glendening said efforts for acquiring that funding may face some difficulties because of the levee issues currently being faced in other parts of the Midwest. He stressed, however, that the large costs associated with such a project make it unreasonable for the city to commission the assessment itself.
Mayor Phil Dudley has already been contacting area Congressional figures and other officials through letters and phone calls to “muster up political support” for the funding, he said. He’s optimistic that the flooding problems in the Midwest will only bolster Osawatomie’s effort to gain funding.
“Hopefully, (members of Congress) have seen the devastation that other states have had,” Dudley said, citing the current problems as well as the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. “It’s time they get serious about funding flood protection in our country.”
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While city officials and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers representatives have expressed amazement that the levee performed as well as it did, showing only minor damage despite having waters flowing overtop it for nearly 13 hours, those same officials are now looking to explore the obvious follow-up question: Are the levees surrounding Osawatomie, and more specifically the Pottawatomie Creek levee, tall enough to prevent future flooding not associated with a 100-year flood?
It’s a question that won’t be answered easily. When there’s a “major overtopping” of a levee, the Corps of Engineers recommends to the city that money be obtained to commission a preliminary assessment of the structure, said John Grothaus, Corps chief of the planning section of the Kansas City district.
The funding for the assessment must be obtained through Congress, Grothaus said, with the next opportunity being its inclusion in the 2009 energy and water appropriations project list. Even when, and if, funds are obtained, he said the assessment, which includes a hydrology study, will take approximately one year to complete and that it is only the first step in the process.
Despite the extended time frame, city officials have expressed interest in having the assessment performed and plan to push for the needed federal funds. City Manager Bret Glendening said efforts for acquiring that funding may face some difficulties because of the levee issues currently being faced in other parts of the Midwest. He stressed, however, that the large costs associated with such a project make it unreasonable for the city to commission the assessment itself.
Mayor Phil Dudley has already been contacting area Congressional figures and other officials through letters and phone calls to “muster up political support” for the funding, he said. He’s optimistic that the flooding problems in the Midwest will only bolster Osawatomie’s effort to gain funding.
“Hopefully, (members of Congress) have seen the devastation that other states have had,” Dudley said, citing the current problems as well as the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. “It’s time they get serious about funding flood protection in our country.”