Put more emphasis on flood control
Is there anyone in the suburbs who isn't ready for spring weather to arrive?
Well, maybe.
People living near the overflowing Chain O' Lakes and the Fox and Des Plaines rivers aren't relishing going back to slinging sandbags -- a job that closed out summer 2007, paused for winter's unusually fierce onslaught and resumed last week when those April showers and all that melting snow brought the river and the lakes out of their banks.
"Mother Nature really needs to lighten up on us," Fox Lake Mayor Cindy Irwin said, fearing a repeat of severe flooding last August and September that damaged more than 400 homes along the Fox and the Chain after weeks of heavy rain.
Mother Nature isn't the only one that needs a change of heart.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency and its state counterpart also need a new approach.
Fox Lake, Antioch and Gurnee, along the Des Plaines River, learned just in time for the spring flood season that they won't get federal or state reimbursement for last year's cleanup costs, estimated at $1.1 million throughout Lake County.
They also were left high and dry in 2004, when another major flood damaged property and strained governmental budgets along the county's waterways.
The latest news is a blow to local mayors and county officials, who criticized federal and state governments for "dropping the ball" on aid. (FEMA subsequently pledged to cover some of Lake County's cleanup costs from the Feb. 5-6 blizzard.)
We agree that funds to cover flood cleanup seemed warranted, but there's no time for animosity.
Instead, federal and state agencies need to work with local and county officials to push for permanent flood-control solutions -- and now. The pace of development in northern Lake County makes it more difficult by the day to identify the land that might be needed for anti-flood projects like reservoirs and levees, and it worsens flooding by covering up more moisture-absorbing land with impermeable concrete and tarmac.
Getting flood-control projects off the ground can be maddeningly slow -- more than 20 years for one extreme example along the Des Plaines River.
They're also expensive. Another Des Plaines River levee to be finished this year will cost $15 million. But that levee already saved an estimated 300 homes from damage during the late-summer floods.
It's a better deal to spend for flood control than for flood cleanup. Just think of the day when those flood-season piles of sand would be a thing of the past.
And Lake County towns wouldn't be left holding the bag.