Residents of Darien, Conn., met with town officials Wednesday to discuss the town's recurrent flooding issues. Storms in March and April hit Darien particularly hard, and many citizens are concerned fall rains will result in safety and cost issues.
First Selectmen Evonne Klein, planning and zoning director Jeremy Ginsberg, environmental protection commission (EPC) chairman Peter Hillman and other local leaders outlined steps toward addressing the problem.
"When we first met, we discussed that this is going to be a cooperative effort," said Klein of the town departments. "There's non one magic bullet, and this isn't going to happen overnight. We're all working together to develop a plan, and we all play a different role. We're all working together so we can develop a cohesive plan."
Hillman, whose board has taken on resonsibility of the flood erosion and control board, said his commission is working on the problem. "We're asking questions not just as EPC commissioners, but also asking questions from the perspective of flood and erosion," he said. Hillman also said that the board of selectmen is currently drafting flooding regulations but that his commission is still waiting for the second half of the regulations. "We want our staff to have the power to levy fines, to levy penalties on homeowners that know that there are obstructions in their watercourses but fail to take reasonable measures to cure these conditions."
Ginsberg said his department is working to educate residents on "their responsibility." That is knowing what they can do to prevent downstream problems and minimize their impact on other properties, whether this involves cleaning debris or removing items from properties before a storm. "It's an opportunity for us to do some outreach in the community, to send out letters and work with people to assist them in any way," he said.
Despite the progress Darien has made, Hillman said there remains one area where the town has not moved as far forward as he would have hoped. He said that one item of business identified at a meeting between planning and zoning and EPC officials in early may was that the department of public works needed to obtain a global information system (GIS) topographical map of the town to identify storm water, drainage, catch basin and runoff sites.
Short staffing and "heavy dockets" in the departments, however, have kept the map from becoming a reality, said Hillman. "Once we have a composite picture of what the current drainage solutions look like, we can identify the hot-button areas, the bad areas," he said. "Once we have that in place we can retain outside experts and have a town-wide drainage study that would carry this town out for 50 years, at least, through climate change and the other 1.5 percent of development that we have yet to cross."
Residents at the meeting still voiced concerns over the slow-moving flood prevention project. "Our frustration, fear and concern is that it's not quick enough," said one resident. "Everybody in this room that flooded in April, if we have a bad storm in September or October, we are going to flood again. The $10,000 that it cost me to fix the lower level of my home--it's going to be flooded again because there's no immediate actions that are going to negate the flooding happening again."
Emergency management director Marc McEwan said that that's where the small business administration becomes a valuable tool, that there is money available. "You can do your necessary repairs or mitigation efforts so that you don't live this again," he said. "There are a lot of ordinances that need to take effect."
"Anything that we do as a government, we have a process, and it takes a lot of time, unfortunately," Klein added. "We may have to conduct a study, but we need a rationale about why we want to do something. We know there are steps that we can take in terms of passing regulations. Nothing in government happens overnight, nothing, as hard as we try. But we are taking steps to get there. I would be far more frustrated if we were giving lip service and not taking any action to get this done."
Source: The Darien Times
