Weather Wise:Now that it's dry-part 1

In the past 30 years Lewis and Clark County has experienced two devastating spring-time floods, one in 1981 and one this past spring. While flooding concerns tend to fade into the background once the waters recede, that's not the case this time around. In part one of a special series, a look back at Helena's flood history and what's being done this time, now that it's dry.

The Helena valley is a natural flood plain. Residents Archie Harper and Ray Reed remember it well.

"Back about 30 years ago, we had a major flood event out here in the valley. 1981," says Harper, who has lived on Lynn road for twenty years.

"I was here for the first flood, what i call the '81 flood. But not for the ones before that, there was a flood in '63, there was a flood in 72, there was a flood in '76," says Read, resident of Rhonda Road.
 
People remember it, because comparatively the 1981 flood was huge.

County Commissioner Derek Brown put the numbers into perspective.

"1981 was a big flood. It was in terms of cubic feet per second about 3,000 cubic feet per second. And this last flood was about 600 or 700," says Commissioner Brown.

And after each flood quick fixes around the county were made: culverts repaired and roads patched.

"But what they didn't do, is they didn't really come up with a plan on how to deal with the future," says Read.
 
The 1981 flood was big enough to spur a few mitigation plans into existence.
But as soon as it was dry, flooding was no longer the priority.

"And back then, the local government got together some plans to do something about that, a study…those plans kind of died in committee those years. and so this round, several of us got together and said, we don't want to have a return of nothing happening on these problems," says Harper.

This year, residents, county officials, and private engineers are all working together to stop history from repeating itself.  The first step was a public meeting, inviting those residents most effected by the flooding.

The reason we have the meeting is we're looking for their help. You know, we're not there to tell them what we can do, or what we haven’t done or what… we're looking to figure out how we  can work together as a community."
 
Next week, see the action that has already been taken on projects that residents and government officials have worked together to create. And now, you're a little more Weather Wise.

Story by Ellen Bacca, Beartooth NBC.

Sponsored by Collision Pro of Helena.
Copyright ©2012 Beartooth Communications Company. All Rights Reserved.

Story by Ellen Bacca, Beartooth NBC.
Sponsored by Collision Pro of Helena
Copyright ©2012 Beartooth Communications Company. All Rights Reserved.