Iowa City neighborhood homes caught between river, planned levee

IOWA CITY - Carol Seydel prefers her home on Taft Speedway Street stay in her family, but in a couple of years her home and eight more left on the street could be caught between the Iowa River and a 10-foot-high levee.

Residents of the area are upset, but city officials say they have kept property owners informed as flood-protection plans for the area have advanced over the last few years.

Seydel, 82, spent her childhood summers at her home at 125 Taft Speedway St. She and her husband, Lyle, continued using it in that manner until making it their primary residence last year despite it taking on 4 feet of water in the June 2008 flood.

“I call this my century farm,” Seydel, 82, said. “It's not a farm, but it's been in my family more than 100 years.”

Details for a levee remain in flux.

Before one is built, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has ordered the city to further study the effects the levee would have on the homes.

The city has offered buyouts to the owners of 125 properties along the Iowa River on the north side of town that were damaged in 2008. It expects to acquire about 85 in all. But only four of the 13 properties on Taft Speedway have been purchased, with the remaining people saying they love living by the river.

The city eventually decided to create an earthen levee by elevating Taft Speedway Street and No Name Road to protect the area to the north, and last fall HUD awarded the city an $8 million grant for the $10 million project.

Taft Speedway residents argued their homes were not taken into consideration because the city's grant application didn't mention them. City officials have said they attached a petition signed by 10 Taft Speedway residents objecting to the levee.

The residents oppose being on the “wet” side of a levee. They also have practical concerns, like the steep drives needed to go over a 10-foot-high levee, and aesthetic ones.

Outside study

After receiving inquiries about the project from Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley's office, HUD asked the city to have an outside contractor study how the people remaining on Taft Speedway would be affected by a levee and whether an alternative project would be better, HUD spokeswoman Dale Gray said.

The study will consider the impact of a levee on the homes, including property values, accessibility, insurance coverage and relocation of utilities. Alternatives to a levee also are to be researched.

A firm will be picked soon to conduct the study and the final report is expected in September, said David Purdy, the city's flood recovery specialist. The project will move forward if the study determines it remains the best flood-protection measure, unless the City Council changes its mind, he said.

Grassley spokeswoman Jill Kozeny said the senator also heard from many Iowa City residents who want the levee to protect their homes.

Those would include residents of Idyllwild, a 92-unit condominium association north of Taft Speedway. Idyllwild homeowners were not eligible for buyouts because Idyllwild was classified as one property that was mostly outside the flood plain.

Idyllwild resident Robert Fellows said he and his wife, Karlen, would have accepted a buyout if offered one. They spent more than $60,000 of their own money rehabilitating their home at 125 Pentire Circle after the 2008 flood.

He said the levee would give them confidence in the future of the neighborhood, as well as protect a nearby church and road.

“I would not want to go through again what we went through in the 11 months that followed the flood,” Fellows said.

Buyout issue

Buyouts are a sore point for many Taft Speedway residents. They say that when buyouts were first offered, it was not clear that a levee would be built.

In November 2008, the City Council told staff to inform buyout-eligible residents that if they stayed put, their homes could end up between some sort of barrier and the river. A letter sent to them mentioned the possibility of “temporary or permanent flood barriers.”

Joel Wilcox, who lives at 119 Taft Speedway St. with his wife and two children, has strenuously maintained that all that was clear was that the city might consider various options. In the meantime, many people not interested in buyouts were rebuilding.

In summer 2009, the city said it would seek money for a levee. The HUD grant came in fall 2010.

Wilcox, 58, elevated his home 8 feet after the 1993 flood and got off relatively easy in 2008. He said he couldn't say whether he would have accepted a buyout a year or two ago if he'd known a levee would be built because he never thought the levee would be seriously considered.

City's priority

Council member Regenia Bailey, who was mayor during the flood, said the city was clear early on that a levee was one of the possibilities for Taft Speedway.

The city's priority has been to use buyouts to remove people from flood-prone areas. After that, she said, the city must try to protect as many people as possible.

“That's the nature of making decisions on behalf of a community,” she said. “You have to consider the broader scope.”