Community action group calls flood mitigation policies unfair
Posted Aug 13, 2013 7:14 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Punitive and problematic; that’s how some residents in Calgary’s river communities are regarding the province’s flood mitigation plans.
They’ve formed a new task force called the Calgary River Communities Action Group, in hopes of preserving the integrity of their neighbourhoods.
It’s the group’s belief many of the new policies are flawed, including the rules around rebuilding or repairing homes on the floodway and in the flood fringe.
Government officials announced a few weeks ago they would be placing notices on the land titles of the homes of those people who choose to use disaster recovery funding to fix their property.
The notice will then only be removed if the home owner has completed the necessary and required mitigation measures.
“Anything that sets you up for ineligibility for future disaster funding – we just think that’s fundamentally wrong and we don’t think that’s the direction the government should go in,” one founder, Emma May, tells The Calgary Herald.
A realtor by trade, May says flood maps are publicly available and rules around disclosure already exist.
Another of the group’s founders, Dr. Mike Bregazzi, says he fears this may discourage some from moving to their neighbourhoods.
“We’ll finish up with a checkerboard community for heaven’s sake,” he tells 660News. “I think there’s little doubt that would result in some properties being stigmatized, no question of it.”
The group also has concerns about what types of material are being used and whether or not officials are investing in upstream mitigation, saying that much of this work should be taking place upstream from the city.
They’ve already met with Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths as well as other provincial officials like Andre Corbould.
Corbould, the Assistant Deputy Minister for Alberta Flood Recovery, tells the newspaper it was a productive dialogue and they will consider a lot of the suggestions the group has put forward.
“Everyone who’s moved here, I don’t think they gave it much thought of the 2013 flood, maybe we all should have been a little more conscious of that,” Bregazzi adds. “What we want to do is preserve these communities that we live in and truly enjoy.”
The Calgary River Communities Action Group is made up of residents from several areas including Mission, Erlton, Sunnyside, Elbow Park and Rideau-Roxboro.
They now have more than 500 people who have subscribed to receive updates from their website.
