Jun 19, 2008

The Douglas County Emergency Management Agency (EMA) released an update this week of the progress being made in assessing damage to county roads by this spring’s heavy rains. County EMA co-director Teresa Tost first expressed appreciation to local residents for their patience, and for support of the county commissioners and road crews. “This has been a crazy year for weather that has hit our county. We wanted to give all the citizens an update: we have a great project officer from FEMA working with District 1 and 2 commissioners, along with the supervisor from the road crew. District 1 Commissioner Richard Mitchell and county employee Joe Herrell have been going out with FEMA Project Officer Hal Stadle Jr. and driving the roads that were reported to the EMA office as having had damage from either a low water crossing washed out, approaches to crossing gone, road washed away or very soft spots in the roads. For the last several months Mitchell and Herrell have spent a lot of time working with the project officer on what damage was done and what it would take to get them back to pre-disaster condition. Mitchell and Herrell have now completed driving the roads and working with the project officer for District 1. Stadle will finish writing up the projects and will bring them to EMA Office for Tost to sign; the forms will then be sent to FEMA and SEMA (federal and state Emergency Management agencies). Once received by the government agencies, the project information will be put in the computer and project worksheets will be sent out showing what is being done on each road. While the local officials are waiting on these project worksheets, the road crew will be working on these roads to get them complete. Tost will give work crews copies of what is to be done on each road along with crossing work. Starting next week (June 24) Stadle will start working on the Douglas County District 2 area with Commissioner Danny Dry. They will start with roads that are closed due to damage to low water crossings and bridges. Some of these have to be inspected by an engineer and have permits issued to do the work to repair the damage; the same process that was followed after the flooding in 2003-2005. “We want to make sure that the low water crossings and bridges are safe for the citizens of Douglas County to travel on, and this takes time,” Tost said. “Safety is on the top of our list for the citizens of Douglas County.” This takes time as they are not only working on the roads and crossings but also must keep records of all the work they have completed at this time, and what still needs to be completed. The project officer, along with Dry and employees Donald Downs and Ronnie Thompson, will be driving roads and looking at the damage that has been recorded at the EMA office. As they drive these roads, they list how much material and labor will be needed to get the road back in the pre-disaster condition. There are more than 230 county roads with damage in Douglas County, not counting low water crossings and bridges. Evaluation of this damage is a slow process because commissioners want to make sure they get the roads back to pre-disaster conditions. “We will keep the citizens updated as we make progress in the repairs,” Tost said. “Let’s hope the weather will work with us and we can get concrete work completed and the roads back to pre-disaster condition.”