Costs enter thoughts as Ohio River slowly drops

As the Ohio River began to slowly recede in some southern Illinois towns Thursday local officials started thinking about the costly cleanup that lies ahead, even as they reminded residents of towns like Metropolis that the flooded streets and homes could remain off limits for days or longer.

Meanwhile, in all-but-deserted Cairo streets remained dry and the flood wall was still holding as the river dropped by fractions of an inch, but local officials said they couldn’t begin to tell town residents when they can come home.

The National Weather Service issued open-ended flood warnings for much of southern Illinois because runoff from rain that’s fallen over the past few weeks continues to flow.

In the Shawneetown area of Gallatin County, where the Ohio reached its crest early Thursday, water remained high in a number of communities, sitting on top of roads that in many cases will need serious work when they finally dry out — perhaps in a week or 10 days, said Lt. Tracy Felty, a lieutenant from neighboring Saline County working in both jurisdictions.

“That means a lot of these county roads are going to be under water for another week or a week and a half,” he said, adding that he’d just driven down one road that had dried out only to find its surface stripped away by water. “There are areas that 8 inches of pavement is gone.”

He added that diesel-powered pumps used to move water out of critical locations in many towns were running nonstop for days, at $4 a gallon or more.

“There’s a lot of those little communities that are pumping 24-7 right now,” he said. “They’re going to have to pay the bill here pretty soon.”

Even with evacuated residents of towns like Cairo and Metropolis and smaller communities like Junction and Old Shawneetown still in shelters or holed up with friends and families, thoughts were turning to the fallout after the waters recede.

With waters still high, the Illinois Emergency Management Agency is just starting to think about the detailed damage assessments and disaster declarations that will be required for southern Illinois residents, businesses and local governments to receive federal aid, IEMA spokeswoman Patti Thompson said.

Local governments can expect that, if damage reaches required cost thresholds — $3.27 per capita in each affected county — money will be available to reimburse up to 75 percent of the cost of road and bridge repair and fixing other critical infrastructure, she said. For example, Gallatin County, with 5,900 residents, would have to sustain about $19,300 worth of damage.

Individuals and businesses that qualify may be able to get help in the form of low-interest loans or, for some homeowners and renters, grants.

“Depending on how the water goes down here, we’ll get in there as quickly as we can and try to do those kinds of assessments,” hopefully starting within a couple of weeks, she said.

In Metropolis, where about 700 people still can’t get to their homes, local governments are losing money the government won’t reimburse, from Harrah’s Metropolis Casino, Mayor Bill McDaniel said. The floating casino has been closed since April 25 and remains closed indefinitely, according to Harrah’s website.

“We received about $18,000 a day from the casino,” said McDaniel, among those who can’t get to his home because of high water.

In Cairo, where floodwaters dropped rapidly early this week when a levee further south on the Mississippi River was breeched by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the sun was out Thursday and the town was quiet, police Chief Gary Hankins said.

Most of the town’s 2,800 residents left when the mayor ordered an evacuation, fearing the pressure from the high water in the Ohio River would burst the local flood wall and levees.

Now, with the wall and levees so far holding, they’re starting to ask when they can come back, Hankins said.

“Oh yeah,” he said, adding that he doesn’t have an answer for them. “At this point we do not know.