Plans move forward for new rec center in flood plain

CEDAR RAPIDS - A City Hall committee that includes a majority of the City Council agreed unanimously Thursday to build a $3.5 million Northwest Recreation Center at a spot in the 100-year flood plain along Ellis Boulevard NW - with or without flood protection.

“I feel like this is the neighborhood that needs this,” council member Monica Vernon said. “This is the neighborhood where it (the recreation center) was originally sited.”

Colleague Scott Olson said the city can't wait years for a flood protection system to be built before it moves forward with the new rec center. What it can do, he said, is take steps to protect the facility by moving electrical and mechanical systems higher in the new building.

“I think we can manage the risk,” Olson said. “... I think we have to move on with our lives.”

Joe O'Hern, the city's flood recovery and reinvestment director, said the Federal Emergency Management Agency doesn't like spending public dollars in the 100-year flood plain, so the city will need to make its case with FEMA for why the new recreation center should go there. The committee's sentiment, though, was that the agency would agree.

If the site is approved, the building will need to be elevated one foot above the 100-year flood plain. Olson noted that satisfying the elevation requirement still would mean that the new building would take on several feet of water in a repeat of the Floods of 2008.

Chuck Wieneke, a former City Council member, reminded the current council Tuesday of the vulnerability of building the center in an area so prone to flooding. Wieneke has favored putting it on higher ground in Ellis Park.

Committee members, though, particularly like the spot at Ellis Boulevard and J Avenue NW site because it ties into the six-acre Time Check Park, which had contained a city recreation center before it took on 12 feet of water in the Floods of 2008.

The committee also believes that redeveloping the site will serve as a catalyst for commercial development along the boulevard, which is the principal traffic artery through the area.

Building the recreation center at Ellis and J would require the purchase of three or four vacant lots, though the city has already bought most of the land at the site through the post-flood buyout program.