Flood Protection

Floods have wrecked havoc with Kansas communities this past couple of weeks. The focus is now on aiding those whose homes and businesses have been damaged, and rightfully so. When the water recedes and the clean-up is done and things start to gravitate towards normality, the attention of state and local officials needs to re-focus on preventing future flood disasters. I will venture that the flood water that did the damage has attained that harmful level before. Any place that flood protection works are feasible, they should be constructed. Where they are not feasible, due to cost-benefit analysis, structures should be relocated to ground that will not be subject to flooding. In the later case, that includes residences, mobile home courts, and farm houses. Farm buildings and similar uses in flood-prone areas should be flood-proofed, a technique that is fully developed. To suffer flooding once is unfortunate. For property to remain exposed to the potential of flooding and suffer flooding a second time is inexcusable. Our resources should be directed to prevention, so the costs of restoration and lost opportunities can be avoided or minimized. The communities that were hit by flooding need to start work now while the need is evident to protect themselves from future calamities.