Regional coalition will focus on flood recovery

CEDAR FALLS - Rob Hogg remembers how good people felt while working on sandbagging crews during the flood of 2008.

People from all walks of life lined the Cedar River in Waterloo, Cedar Falls, Cedar Rapids and other communities to save vital areas from flooding. Spirits were high and volunteers took away a sense of accomplishment and camaraderie.

Now, the state senator from Cedar Rapids said he wants to bring that “spirit of the sandbag” to flood prevention efforts.

Friday marked the first meeting of the Cedar River Watershed Coalition, a group formed to take steps to prevent damage from future floods.

The 60-plus crowd assembled at the Center for Energy and Environmental Education at the University of Northern Iowa was made up of a wide cross-section of those interested in the Cedar River. They came from as far north as Mitchell County, all the way down the Cedar River drainage and included officials from Des Moines and Rock Island, Ill. Among the crowd were county engineers, soil and water groups, environmental groups, federal officials and city council members.

“There's some urgency to what we're doing and a need to change our practices to avoid the future heartache and tragedy that people experienced in 2008,” Hogg said. “We may not be able to stop the rain from coming or the snow from melting, but we can keep that level of damage from ever happening again.”

The group will try to pull together the giant patchwork of groups that work on local river issues to create a focused effort on lessening the effects of floods.

“I think this collaborative approach is just what we need to deal with flooding issues,” said State Rep. Bob Kressig, D-Cedar Falls.

Those looking to cut down on future flooding will use a wide variety of tools. They could promote rain gardens for homeowners, take ag land in flood-prone areas out of production and work in any number of ways to slow the flow of water into rivers.

Hogg warned the total cost of all those improvements would be huge - $400 million to $500 million over the next decade or more.

For that reason, much of the early work of the group will be targeting good projects and seeking out grants and state or federal aid to help pay for them.

The group also will push for regulations to restrict development in the flood plain and prevent more damage in future floods.

People at Friday's meeting wanted to see more incentives for property owners to use better flood plain management techniques, as well as penalties for those that do not.

Hogg's drive for better planning along the Cedar River comes from a concern for his hometown, but he knows the work will benefit communities throughout Eastern Iowa.

“At some level, if people of the Cedar River watershed don't come together and say we need change, then change is not going to happen,” Hogg said.

By Jon Ericson, Waterloo Courier