By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
A groundbreaking ceremony in southwestern Iowa is also a celebration as a levee overtopped two years ago is rebuilt; this time a bit higher.
Officials with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Omaha office will join with city leaders from Hamburg to break ground tomorrow morning on a rebuild that will raise the levee protecting Hamburg, Iowa another eight feet.
Project Manager Andrew Winslow says the Missouri River flood of 2019 hit Hamburg hard.
“It was a horrible situation, the way they got flooded in the spring of 2019, right? A lot of businesses, private homes, city facilities were damaged,” Winslow tells St. Joseph Post.
The Corps is only allowed to rebuild a levee to its pre-flood condition. It had awarded a contract in the fall of 2019 to rebuild the levee that the Missouri River overtopped. City officials weren’t satisfied, especially Mayor Cathy Crain.
Winslow recalls speaking with Crain during the pre-bid site walk. The contract called for the levee to be rebuilt to its original height of 911 above mean sea level. Crain told Winslow she hadn’t given up on raising the levee to 919.
“The city was tenacious,” Winslow says.
Winslow says Hamburg city officials secured enough federal and state money to pay for raising the levee the extra eight feet, perhaps the first time the Corps has been allowed to raise a flood-damaged levee.
“And that was all based on the diligent efforts of the city,” according to Winslow.
Winslow says Crain pleaded the city’s case to federal officials, arguing simply rebuilding the levee wasn’t enough.
“I’m losing businesses out of Hamburg and I’m having trouble attracting businesses, because this is like the third time in 10 years we’ve gotten flooded,” Winslow says Crain argued to federal officials.
Winslow says Hamburg secured enough federal and state funding to raise the height of the levee eight feet. He says the new, improved levee will cost $7 million and take six months to complete.
