SATURATION FRUSTRATION

Several Speak Out About Flood Damage in LG

A packed house showed up to the La Grange City Council meeting Monday night, May 24. Many of those in attendance were there to speak and hear about drainage issues in town at a moment when floodwaters were threatening their homes for the second time in a week.

Five citizens spoke during the public comment period while rain poured outside the Council doors.

La Grange Citizen Sam Tucker, who lives on Rose Mayer Loop, was the first to speak.

“I want to start the conversation; I’m sure a lots of people are having issues with all the rain we had,” Tucker said. “I’ve lived there about four years and watched houses flood a couple of times. Now the streets peel up. We have an issue with drainage in the subdivision. I don’t know what the process is or where to start, but something has got to be done over there.”

Tucker said he saw a stream of water during the storm last week that was four feet tall rushing between houses. The torrent was so strong, Tucker said, that the force of water picked up bull rock and threw it into the street. He said several neighbors have built retaining walls to keep water from coming in their homes.

“I don’t think we should be dealing with that if we live in the City and pay taxes,” Tucker said.

After Tucker spoke, City Manager Shawn Raborn said the City will investigate the drainage problems.

“I’m going to go over it and schedule a special meeting or a section of a meeting to just go over drainage,” Raborn said. “A number (of the issues) may be different. Your issue may be different than someone on the south side of town. But we’re going to look at it and see if there’s a commonality or look at the individual situations. But I agree, your situation, it was like a war zone.”

Kyla Crumbly, who lives in the 300 block of N. Monroe, spoke next.

“Last week I experienced a full-blown flash flood of my property with up to 23 inches of water surrounding my home, entering my root cellar, crawl space, garage and storage area,” Crumbly said.

Crumbly said the street drain near her house could not handle the amount of rain that fell last week. She said the flood picked up debris and damaged her iron fence in the front yard and a six foot privacy fence in her backyard. After the storm, she said neighbors began piling up debris in front of their homes, but the next scheduled City brush pickup day was 60 days away. With heavy rain falling outside City Hall as she spoke, Crumbly said she feared a repeat would happen.

Raborn said City crews would pick up the new piles of brush from last week’s storm.

The next speaker, Dustin Greenwood, who lives in the 300 block of North Jackson near Beefhead Ditch, said his family filled up a 30 yard dumpster with household belongings that were destroyed by the flood.

“I had raging floodwaters about waist-high rushing through my property,” Greenwood said. “It flooded my storm cellar. I had two to three inches of water through the lower level of my house.”

Raborn said the City would investigate whether changes to the landscape upstream along Beefhead Ditch could have affected drainage.

“We’re going to look at maps and the watershed to see if there’s anything we can do to alleviate it,” Raborn said.

Dusty Littrell, who lives near the La Grange Cemetery at the corner of Lester and Walnut streets, said water draining from the cemetery last week flooded a neighbor’s home for the fourth time in five years.

“There’s a ditch in front of my house, and it cannot hold the volume of water we’ve been dealing with,” Littrell said. “That ditch is not doing what it is intended to do. Once the water reaches the street, it flows down toward Lynnwood pretty quick. Once it hits the street, its gone in about 30 minutes. But the ditch itself is taking on all the water from the cemetery, and it cant hold that volume of water.”

Littrell said he took videos and photos during the flash flooding. He offered to share them with City planners so they can see how the water was flowing.

Courtney Janish, who lives in the 200 block of Rose Mayer Loop, said she and her husband helped neighbors shovel big loads of bull rock from their yards after the flood.

“I know its not your fault, how much rain we got, but what can we do about it?” Janish asked.

Janish asked whether the City could use Hurricane Harvey relief money to pay for drainage improvements. The City did apply for Hurricane Harvey funding to improve drainage around town, Raborn said. The proposed project involves $10.5 million in improvements to the drainage along Franklin Street, at the end of North Main and a channel along Brown Street down to the Colorado River. Raborn said the federal government has allocated money toward the project. So far, however, the money has not been distributed.

Raborn said the proposed drainage project may alleviate some but not all of the drainage problems raised by the citizens who spoke on Monday.

“Some of the issues raised at the meeting were problems in different areas,” Raborn said. “We had houses get water in them that have never got water in them before, even during Hurricane Harvey.”

The City has applied for Hurricane Harvey funding for two other projects – 1) a $10.5 million water and sewer project to tie lines on the west side of the town to rest of town, and 2) a $1.8 million economic development project to run a wastewater line to the west side of town along State Highway 71. So far, the City has received funding only for the wastewater project, which is aimed at boosting economic growth along SH 71 West. Raborn said that project is in the design phase.