Sunday, September 27, 2009
News, In this Issue..., Atlanta

The flood of 2009

Emergency agency says 80 percent of Georgians unprepared

By Mark Woolsey
 
    Hang on to your hip-waders. It’s possible—although not likely—that we could see some sort of second round of the Flood of 2009.

    So says the National Weather Service’s Brian Lynn, though he adds, “It’s not going to be what we saw last week,” when a stalled system sat over the area for several days and dropped buckets of rain.

    As The Sunday Paper goes to press, he says the system in play for the Sept. 25-27 weekend is a cold front and upper-level trough of low pressure moving through. Moving is a key word here. This system will do its thing and then head out of the picture, he says.

     What amounts could we see?

     Rainfall totals could reach one-half inch to an inch in metro Atlanta, with up to two inches in the North Georgia mountains.

     “Up in the mountains, there could be some significant flooding, depending on the time period where it occurs,” says Lynn. Even in metro Atlanta, he says, if we got the half-inch to an inch very quickly, or rainfall totals stacked up higher than expected, it’s possible some problems could ensue, but probably not significant flooding.

      Meantime, damage assessment and the scramble to provide aid are underway. The need was great: Preliminary damage estimates last week ran to $250 million, and were sure to go higher as residents reported additional cases of homes reduced to smelly, jumbled wrecks and cars set adrift and ruined by the raging waters.

       By some estimates, some 14,000 claims had been filed as of Sept. 25. Sadly, most of those are not covered, because flood insurance must be specifically purchased; it’s not part of a standard homeowners policy.

       “Some 25 to 35 percent of all flood claims occur in non-flood-plain areas,” says David Colmans, executive director of the Georgia Insurance Information Service, an insurance industry association. “People have to understand that it’s worth the money to get insurance if there’s any possibility that you’re going to get flooded.”

     For the flood-bedraggled and uninsured, hope comes in the form of a pending presidential emergency declaration.

    Bert Brantley, spokesman for Gov. Sonny Perdue, says the emergency declaration Perdue has requested is different from a disaster declaration. Teams are normally sent out to assess damage for the latter.

    “But in this case,” says Brantley, “it’s going to take a while for the water to recede enough for the disaster teams to assess the damage. The emergency declaration is essentially when the feds say, ‘We know the assessment is going to be bad enough that we’re going to go ahead and approve the aid.’”

      When the declaration gets approved, officials say, it could open the door to various programs covering disaster housing, grants to replace personal property and help with other expenses, as well as low-interest Small Business Administration disaster loans to help replace destroyed businesses. The programs target uninsured losses.

    In addition, Georgia Congressman John Lewis has written IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman asking for quick assistance for flood victims. Once a presidential emergency is declared, Lewis wants the taxman to postpone some tax filing and payment deadlines, and to waive certain deposit penalties for taxpayers who live or have businesses in flooded areas.

   Certainly, businesses as well as homes have been impacted, in addition to governmental facilities. The City of Atlanta’s R.M. Clayton Water Reclamation Center was damaged, resulting in the dumping of untreated sewage into the Chattahoochee River. Thanks to city crews working round the clock, 70 percent of the plant’s function was restored early Sept. 24, ending the toxic purging, but the plant still faces tens of millions of dollars in repairs.

   As of press time, Georgia Emergency Management Agency officials were planning to be on high alert for the Sept. 25-27 weekend, just in case. And they’re urging residents to take some preparations against the possibility of renewed flooding.

    Among wise purchases, Lisa Janak, spokeswoman for the agency, recommends a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather radio. As for other supplies and gear, she advises residents to go to www.ready.ga.gov and submit their profile. What they’ll get is a checklist of how much and what kinds of food and supplies they will need. They can also find a list of shelters at www.gema.state.ga.us.

“We’ve found that 80 percent of Georgians are not prepared for a disaster,” says Janak. “The night of the flash floods, we were getting calls at 2:30 in the morning from people asking where they could go and where they could take their pets.” SP

News Editor Stephanie Ramage contributed reporting to this story.