from the President's Corner

Joe Sansoni

Last month I wrote about the years-long failures and delays in the permitting processes that have prevented the cleaning and maintenance of our flood control waterways. I predicted that by the time that article went to press there would likely have been much more flooding, considering the large amounts of predicted rainstorms heading our way at the time. In an amazing and ironic twist, just a few days after I wrote my article, Bear Creek suffered a major break in the bank along my home property and orchard. Of course, I knew all along that our property could potentially become ground zero for a major breach. I had a feeling that it was going to give out somewhere…if not at our place then somewhere else. There were a multitude of places along both sides of Bear Creek as well as Black Rascal Creek that were being quickly eroded away by the highspeed currents and more specifically the resulting eddy currents of swirling water that are created by uncleared trees, vegetation, and trapped floating debris along the insides of the creek banks. The rapid currents themselves do not wash out the creek banks when they have been adequately cleared and maintained.

I’m sure that one of the first things that will get said by those who are ultimately responsible for the failures to get the creeks cleaned will be "Well, we've never seen THIS much water at once before. This was unprecedented.”

It’s an obvious first response coming from anyone who is trying desperately to claw themselves out from under the weight of a guilty conscience and away from negative public scrutiny. BUT!...those of us who live and work along those waterways – who truly know every bend, run, tree, soil profile of the earth beneath the banks, and even more importantly, the history of the creeks – know different. We’ve seen floods before. We’ve seen what happens and how the water and currents flow throughout all possible scenarios, throughout many different stages of conditions. A very basic indicator that I use as a gauge on my own property is the level of the water to the Franklin Rd bridge where the creek crosses the road. This past month, when the water over-topped and washed out the bank downstream, the water level was just above the bottom of the bridge. It’s been that high before…at least 3 times in my own lifetime. So why did it overflow downstream this time and none of the other times? Because there was never near the amount of uncleared vegetation. In fact, in past flood stage conditions, I know from personal experience that when the water was at the very same height at the bridge, with cleaned creek banks it would actually be 2-3’ lower in the very place it washed out. That’s how much the lack of maintenance and cleaning affects the capacities. And that’s just in one 1/2-3/4 mile run! Apply that to the entire creek system, and Bear Creek absolutely would have held up just fine with no breaches, and likely only minor over-topping in the City of Merced where the gradient of the creek flattens out drastically. Even the published flood stage numbers get thrown off. According to the engineered data, flood stage for Bear Creek is considered to occur at a water level of 23’ at McKee Bridge. In my past observations of high-water years when the creeks had been cleaned, with 23’ at McKee Bridge, there would be around 3-4’ of freeboard along the creek downstream at my place. This year, it over-topped at my place when it hit 25’ at McKee Bridge. Ultimately, it topped out at just over 26’, but that was after the bank had already broken downstream. With a cleaned creek it should’ve still had about a foot of freeboard. Effectively, the uncleared vegetation and sand bars had diminished the flood stage to a “corrected for conditions” level of about 20’ at McKee relative to the location where it breached. Even the downtown Merced flooding would have been significantly less severe if they had simply been cleaning the creeks all along. Would there still have been some flooding? Yes, there would have been. Some. In a few problematic areas. But not to the degree we saw, and certainly not with large parts and many homes of the McSwain area including McSwain School underwater or nearly underwater. The really great irony in all this is that for several years already myself, my father Ezio, Joe Scoto, and other property owners along the creeks have been warning our county and state officials that we were going to be in big trouble if we faced a severe rainfall year with uncleaned creeks. Ezio in fact has been the longest and loudest sounder of the alarm regarding this issue for decades. For good reason…he watched this happen (in a different location) as a 16-year-old kid the last time it broke in 1955, and helped work to repair the catastrophic damages then, just as we are facing again now. Throughout his entire life farming along these creeks he has often called officials on the carpet for failing to prioritize this issue. Hopefully someone in a position of influence and authority is listening this time and will set policy in motion to never allow it to happen again.

Apologies for two straight months on the same topic, folks! I’m working on different material for March’s topic but felt compelled to write a follow up to the very thing I predicted was about to happen in my January column. Remember to call the office and reserve your tickets or a table for our upcoming annual meeting on March 24th!