Flood control

Now, with this storm hitting the B.C. coast, it adds to the disappointment of several B.C. mayors whose communities are prone to flooding.

Yeah, as Taya Fast reports, Ottawa's new budget earmarked just $20 million for flood mitigation in B.C., hundreds of millions short of what they say is needed.

From Princeton to Merritt to Abbotsford, repeated atmospheric river events have devastated these communities in recent years.

I feel like people are listening, but nobody's paying attention.

The federal budget earmarks $20 million in the coming year for flood mitigation work, specifically in B.C.

But local leaders say that's nowhere near enough.

It's a drop in the bucket for what we actually need in this province.

We need hundreds of millions, if not over a billion dollars in flood mitigation.

Puro kayo impeachment.

Flood control naman.

Okay, flood control naman.

Since everybody suddenly wants to talk about flood control, sige, let's talk about Davao.

Because according to Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla, his office is now investigating flood control projects in Davao City.

And Remulla used a very interesting word.

He described Davao as the epicenter of flood control before the Marcos administration because of the enormous amount of flood control money that went there.

Now, bago tayo magwala, Remulla did not say that Davao was already proven to be the epicenter of corruption.

well if you've got no sandbags

Well, apparently their work is challenging the assumptions of, you know, established assumptions about flood protection.

So he said tape was not, what's it, was not a suitable, you know, permanent sort of situation, but like, you know.

Yeah, but nothing is.

Right.

Now, what do you think, or what can we do to solve some of the issues that that we currently have with some of our infrastructure, primarily our flood control or lack of flood control.

It doesn't take a whole lot around here, a few sprinkles here and there, and you basically have an ocean, not only on city streets, but on county streets.

In fact, a few years ago, there was a couple of rainstorms that literally flooded a whole lot of people somewhere up in Lafayette or somewhere and they were flooded for like weeks.

What can we do to improve some of the issues that they currently have with flood control, especially in the rural areas of the county?

So, yeah, I'm a big, I've been in meetings talking about that and, and meeting with the drainage districts because they're the ones that handle the, the, a lot of the drainage.

Now, the county is in charge of all your roadside ditches.

yeah

bit of natural flood management going on there yeah yeah yeah

it's well worth it and another place in west dorset which as far as we're concerned is the best place to live yeah

it's the

Just what's your views of how that's affected what you do in your roles and how has it affected not only the fauna but also flora and wildlife in general?

That's a big question to start with.

I think for me, working alongside farms and farmers, the extreme flooding and the increased regularity of that, and then obviously the last two years we've had droughts, it's leading us to make kind of different decisions about long-term planning for projects that we can do to benefit wildlife and the environment on farms, much more of a focus on soils and soil health, wildlife corridors that can withstand those droughts in the summer and obviously more of a natural flood management focus as

well I think it's not the summer that has just gone in isolation it's the fact that that followed a winter that was very wet followed a summer that was very dry and it's the combination of these things that's starting to have impacts and how we manage those it's good for some things, butterflies did quite well last year but You know, really, it's not great for making a living out of the landscape.

there are amenities that you can use every day for pleasure, leisure, and quality of life.

But when you really need them for water management and flood protection and surge protection and storm protection, they're there.

Multi-purposed quality of life enhancers.

And I know you do it and I do too, just this weekend, walking and running along the low battery.

That is really wide open to the elements.

There's not much there to protect it.

Through a few projects we're doing from check valves to cleaning our system to putting the flood protection along Lockwood at the low level and then ultimately building the low battery seawall, that will give it more protection than it's ever had and much needed.

So while we're on aesthetics, let's talk about a topic that you occasionally hear about, as do I.

Thank you for taking our questions.

All around New Mexico, communities are living alongside watersheds, arroyos, acequias, earth dams, and other flood control infrastructure that is out of date, aging, deteriorating, in need of upgrades and extensive remediation.

I'm wondering what priority your administration would assign to this challenge and

how you would work with the legislature

to address this problem as swiftly as possible.

That is a great question.

And I will tell you, as president of the Municipal League and a former member of the Municipal League, one of the things that we worked with the legislature to do, and we got it passed, was to recognize flood control as a utility.

So the communities can actually start addressing flood control in their communities from really a bonding issue.

We worked on the river.

And so it was flood control, building river control mechanisms like levees.

And so I did that for basically four years.

And I really enjoyed that.