As flooding worsens, Lincolnshire asks residents about how it affects them
With flooding from the Des Plaines River a worsening problem, Lincolnshire officials have launched a community survey designed to gauge the impact of natural disasters on residents.
The survey is available on the village's website, lincolnshireil.gov, or at surveymonkey.com/r/BK3QTXV. It should take less than five minutes to complete. The deadline is Jan. 24.
The results will help officials update the town's natural hazard mitigation plan. The Federal Emergency Management Agency requires communities to develop and adopt such plans to be eligible for hazard-related grant funds.
Lincolnshire teamed with Lake County and other municipalities to develop a county plan in 2012. The village got its own plan in 2014.
FEMA requires all mitigation plans to be updated and readopted every five years.
The primary focus of Lincolnshire's plan is flooding.
The Des Plaines River, which flows south from southern Wisconsin through Lake County into Cook County and beyond, occasionally overruns its banks in the suburbs after heavy rains or snow melts. Such floods have become more common and more severe in Lincolnshire in recent years.
According to data going back to the 1940s, four of Lincolnshire's 10 worst river-related floods have occurred in the last three years, village officials have said.
In September, guests and workers at the Lincolnshire Marriott Resort had to flee the property for the second time in as many years after the nearby river overflowed its banks. Lincolnshire Drive and other residential streets near the river flooded then, too.
Lincolnshire's budget for 2020 funds several flood-relief projects, including the completion of a drainage study that began this year, various stormwater system improvements and sewer outflow improvements along Lincolnshire Drive.
The 11-question survey asks respondents if they or co-workers have been affected by flooding, wind, snow or other natural hazards within the last 10 years. Respondents also are asked to describe the extent of that impact and to identify the natural hazards that worry them.
Additionally, the survey asks people how prepared they are for natural disasters and what steps they've taken to prepare their homes or business for natural disasters, among other questions.