Experts: Levees did well this winter; improvements still needed
Local experts say the levee systems protecting Yuba-Sutter residents excelled throughout the events of the past several months, but there are plenty of improvements needed to prepare for next winter.
“This year, while there is a lot of water up in the snowpack and a lot of water still coming down into the system, this was a modest event, in terms of hydrologic events and the peak flows through the system,” Mike Inamine, executive direc-
The Department of Water Resources invited downstream levee maintaining agencies and county emergency operators to a meeting in Oroville on Monday to discuss ways of improving operations and planning for future emergency situations.
Andrew Stresser, general manager of Levee District 1 in Sutter County, said it was a debriefing on events in February tor of the Sutter Butte Flood Control Agency, said during a levee meeting May 17. “It was nothing like 1997 (the year of the last major flooding event).”
Inamine said high-water events in 1997 and 2006 give SBFCA a good comparison as to how the flood control system performed this year.
Given the circumstances and the nearly $300 million in work over the past few years that SBFCA has done to improve levees along the west bank of the Feather and March involving the Lake Oroville spillway and emergency response actions.
“DWR discussed different areas that they can work toward to prevent future emergency situations,” Stresser said. “Obviously, there were some things that need to be improved on, and they were discussed and noted. We also discussed different actions that were successful.”
Joe Henderson, general manager of Reclamation District 1001 in south Sutter County, said the meeting was well attend- River, Inamine said the upgraded infrastructure came through with flying colors.
“I think the levees that were improved by SBFCA fared incredibly well,” said Andrew Stresser, general manager of Levee District 1 – the agency responsible for maintaining west bank levees along the Feather River near Yuba City. “We didn’t see any major deficiencies or any critical areas that would have caused imminent threats, which is huge because ed, with levee managers, representatives from local county Office of Emergency Services and a representative from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
“The bulk of the meeting was about how DWR and others can, in the future, handle the situation better,” Henderson said.
Henderson said one main takeaway from the meeting was the need for better communication.