Congressman Neal Tours Damage From Torrential July Rains
Congressman Neal listens to Town Administrator Carl McKinney catalog the flooding damage in Clarksburg, with Select Board Chair Robert Norcross.
U.S. Rep. Richie Neal arrived in North County late Monday afternoon to survey the damage in the city and neighboring Clarksburg. Both towns will be seeking funding through the Federal Emergency Management Agency if the four westernmost counties can be declared disaster areas.
"July has been a pretty wet month. And we have attempted to assess the damage that's been done to some of the communities in the First Congressional District," he said, after meeting with Mayor Jennifer Macksey at City Hall. "FEMA is a very responsive federal agency, but documentation is going to be everything, making sure that the review afterwards where the request had been made, stand up under the magnifying glass for critical analysis. ...
"The mayor has already laid out for me a strategy so we want to see some of the damage," he said. "I think her emphasis for me would probably be on the Public Works side of things, because that's where FEMA could have an immediate impact."
The National Weather Service says more than 10 inches has fallen over the Albany, N.Y., Capital Region between July 1 and July 24, making the month the wettest on record. The storms that hit over July 9-10 dropped almost 5 inches of rain overnight in North Adams.
More than a dozen streets were affected by deluge at an estimated cost of $4.6 million. Gov. Maura Healey had toured some of the damaged areas during trip to Western Mass days after the flooding.
At least a dozen communities declared emergencies two weeks ago and another torrential downpour on Friday flooded parts of Greenfield and collapsed roadways, including parts of Route 2.
The rain came beating down again on Monday as Neal visited two damaged areas with the mayor.
A catch basin at the bottom of Morgan Street failed, creating a sinkhole on heavily trafficked State Street.
"It came down so hard it blew out the back of the structure," said Highway Foreman Paul Markland, pointing to the swirling water in the basin. The estimated cost to repair the section is $425,000.
"We've been monitoring this but the problem is its such a heavily traveled area I'm worried about the safety of my staff," said the mayor. "But we really haven't been able to fix it because the rain hasn't stopped."
She also noted the collapsed wall above Morgan on Walnut Street that while not part of this damage, "the storms have made that issue much worse."
Neal also met with Michelle Groves, whose Church Street home was heavily damaged by the flooding. She believes changes made to the topography behind her house by the rain line intensified the amount of water flowing through — and washing out — the 4-foot deep gash in her yard. The deluge was so strong, it pulled the gas line off the house, flooded the street and sent debris into Morrison Berkshire parking lot across the street.
Volunteers with Team Rubicon, a veteran-led nonprofit agency that responds to disasters, had piled up furniture and other items on the front lawn that had been damaged from the water that poured through the house.
"This was happening at the same time State Street was so our two main arteries into the city were shut off," said Macksey. "Our hope is we're going to start filling it in once we've documented it all."
Groves said she's been using up vacation time and was worried that her job wouldn't be waiting for her when she came back.
In Clarksburg, the congressman saw the results of flooding in the bottom floor town offices — the carpeting had been pulled up and the sheetrock cut off nearly a foot above the floor. Over on Horrigan Road, the roadway was collapsed the north side over Beaver Creek. The broken branches and flooded areas on the south side the creek spoke to the power of the water flowing through culvert.
The situation was similar up on West Road, where a section of the narrow road had collapsed into the steep gorge below.
Town Administrator Carl McKinney said the total damage is estimated at $1.886 million — about the same as town's fiscal 2023 operating budget.
"We're right up against our levy limit," he said. "Ideally we'd like to replace the culvert [on Horrigan] but we have to realistic, I understand there are limits."
He and Select Board Chair Robert Norcross spoke to the difficulties of small towns in getting funding, noting it had taken six years just to get the one-lane bridge on Cross Road on the Transportation Improvement Program.
"What we find is we don't have enough political muscle," McKinney said. "They're creating haves and have-nots and we're on the have-not side and it's not a pleasant place to be."
The congressman, a former Springfield mayor, said they all had a vested interest in reminding the state about the overruns of the Big Dig and funding for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.
"The Infrastructure Bill that we wrote, it's a big deal for Massachusetts and we want to make sure that we're getting the proper allocation, I think this is clearly covered by FEMA," said Neal. "But in addition to that, this infrastuture bill is $1.2 trillion and now is the time to be taking a look at that. ... The federal government does the appropriations but the state decides how to spend it."
Tags: flooding,
