Iowa Agriculture Week is wrapping up, Friday’s theme was resilience. To bring this theme to life, the focus was on levee repairs after the past floods in 2011 and 2019.The Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig got his boots on the ground and made a few visits in the Shelby and Pottawattamie counties. He got the update from local officials on levee repair progress and talked about past successes and to look to the future.In 2011 and 2019 Pottawattamie County experienced devastating floods that knocked down the levees and called for them to be fixed. But what about the 2024 flood?Pottawattamie County Emergency Management Director Doug Reed said thanks to improvements, the 2024 flood wasn’t as bad as the others.Reed noticed that areas the county was expecting to see flooding weren’t impacted as badly as they thought. “We saw that they held, and they protected some of those areas,” Reed said.Reed hopes Secretary Naig will “keep fighting the fight” and make more investments to prevent future losses like the ones in 2011 and 2019.Farmer and trustee of Pigeon Drainage District Frank Moran is hoping for the same thing. While his farms won’t directly be impacted from flooding, he represents a district that does.“I represent a district that does get flooded, including the interstate. But when the interstate closes, the traffic on the old highway, that does affect me, severely,” Moran said.Secretary Naig’s main takeaway going forward is to be thinking proactively, not reactively and to learn from the past.“We try to highlight those for policymakers, the legislature,” Naig said. “There’s been great leadership by the governor and the legislature on investing in these things. We need to obviously keep that going.”NAVIGATE: Home | Weather | Local News | National | Sports | Newscasts on demand |
Iowa Agriculture Week is wrapping up, Friday’s theme was resilience. To bring this theme to life, the focus was on levee repairs after the past floods in 2011 and 2019.
The Iowa Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig got his boots on the ground and made a few visits in the Shelby and Pottawattamie counties. He got the update from local officials on levee repair progress and talked about past successes and to look to the future.
In 2011 and 2019 Pottawattamie County experienced devastating floods that knocked down the levees and called for them to be fixed. But what about the 2024 flood?
Pottawattamie County Emergency Management Director Doug Reed said thanks to improvements, the 2024 flood wasn’t as bad as the others.
Reed noticed that areas the county was expecting to see flooding weren’t impacted as badly as they thought. “We saw that they [levees] held, and they protected some of those areas,” Reed said.
Reed hopes Secretary Naig will “keep fighting the fight” and make more investments to prevent future losses like the ones in 2011 and 2019.
Farmer and trustee of Pigeon Drainage District Frank Moran is hoping for the same thing. While his farms won’t directly be impacted from flooding, he represents a district that does.
“I represent a district that does get flooded, including the interstate. But when the interstate closes, the traffic on the old highway, that does affect me, severely,” Moran said.
Secretary Naig’s main takeaway going forward is to be thinking proactively, not reactively and to learn from the past.
“We try to highlight those [concerns] for policymakers, the legislature,” Naig said. “There’s been great leadership by the governor and the legislature on investing in these things. We need to obviously keep that going.”
NAVIGATE: Home | Weather | Local News | National | Sports | Newscasts on demand |
