Iowa faces flooding

— In 2008, quite a few PALO folks around here balked when authorities told them they needed to flee their homes because floodwaters were coming. That’s less likely now, residents and officials said Saturday.

“There was a lot of resistance last time. People were like, ‘ Really? It’s not actually going to get that high, is it?’” Palo resident Kim Hutchins recalled.

But it did get that high, and then some. Cedar River water poured into homes, trashing belongings and leaving residents to scramble for high ground.

This time, when authorities starting ringing the alarm after last week’s upstream deluge, residents started piling their belongings into trucks and trailers and preparing to leave.

About 25 Palo homes were evacuated Saturday as thousands of eastern Iowa residents continued to brace for the rising floodwaters of the Cedar River. Sandbagging operations continued in Cedar Rapids, where evacuations are expected to begin at 8 p. m. CT Sunday.

Cedar Rapids officials are helping with sandbagging and evacuation efforts in Palo, and encouraged anyone who is not volunteering to avoid all affected areas.

"We’re just trying to be more proactive than we were in ' 08," said Palo Mayor Tom Yock, "trying to save as many homes as we can."

Hutchins’ Palo neighborhood is near the Cedar River, and it’s right next to a creek that feeds the river. She and several dozen neighbors were ordered to evacuate by late Saturday afternoon, and they weren’t disputing the need. As Hutchins packed up her kitchen, friends worked down in her basement to unhook her furnace and drag it up to her garage, where they planned to put it on concrete blocks. Her water heater was already up there, and much of her furniture was being piled onto trailers.

“They’ve been telling us it was coming for days. Last time, we had eight or 10 hours to get out,” said Hutchins, 53, who planned to go stay with her mother.

While her friends packed trailers, a National Guard Humvee drove by, with soldiers checking on security needs. It’s the first time since 2011 that the Iowa Guard has been called up for such duty.

In nearby Cedar Rapids, the residents of about 5,000 homes had been advised to evacuate before the floodwaters hit Monday night. Mayor Ron Corbett said in an interview that he hopes residents will heed the warning, especially after what they saw in 2008.

The evacuation is not mandatory, Cedar Rapids Fire Chief Mark English said, but is very strongly recommended. Officials, including the Iowa National Guard, will enforce an 8 p. m. Sunday to 7 a. m. Monday curfew in evacuated areas.

Corbett said the city is advising residents to evacuate if their homes are within an area that would be inundated if the river reaches 28 feet deep. By Saturday afternoon, the forecast crest had dropped a bit, from 25.3 feet to 24 feet. But it could depend on whether more rain falls upstream.

“You know how they say football’s a game of inches? Flood protection is definitely a game of inches,” he said.

That game of inches brought a sliver of good news elsewhere, too. Cedar Falls saw crest predictions drop more than a foot Saturday, and Waterloo saw a roughly 3- foot drop in predictions. As of 5 p. m. Saturday, the river was expected to crest at 99 feet Saturday evening in Cedar Falls, and 23.6 feet Sunday morning in Waterloo.

The stakes would be even higher in Cedar Rapids if authorities hadn’t led an effort to buy out the owners of 1,350 homes that flooded in 2008. About 45 acres of green space now line the river where many of those homes once stood. Corbett said that at the time, it was the second- biggest such buyout in U. S. history, after only the New Orleans buyouts after Hurricane Katrina.