Governor Kim Reynolds and the administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency surveyed flood damage in Rock Valley, Spencer, and Cherokee on Thursday. They saw homes with foundations caved in by high water levels on the Little Sioux River.
Five counties are approved for individual assistance from FEMA under a Presidential Disaster Declaration, while nine counties qualify for federal help to rebuild flooded infrastructure. Cherokee County is not one of them, but Reynolds says that could change as more information is turned in.
“We have to meet a certain threshold and we have to understand the scope of what the damage is,” Reynolds says. “That really takes FEMA, that takes us, that takes the local people really getting on the ground and identifying the properties, the level of damage that’s occurred.”
In addition to Adair County, the governor says 28 more counties are approved for public assistance under the earlier Major Federal Disaster Declaration for floods and storms in late May.
Cherokee Emergency Management Director Justin Pritts escorted the governor and the FEMA director on Thursday’s tour, showing them the destruction caused by the swollen Little Sioux. “We have dealt with flooding in the past, but this thing is by far the worst one we’ve ever had,” Pritts says. “We were five feet over our record.”
Pritts says the water reached levels never seen before in Cherokee. “For me to walk around the community that I grew up in and talk to people that I’ve known my entire life, it’s gut-wrenching,” Pritts says. “I don’t have I don’t have a better term.”
Pritts estimates about 70 homes have been destroyed and double that amount saw some amount of water in their basements.
Mark Casey’s home was right in the path of the highest water in town history. Casey says he’s lived through a half-dozen floods during his lifetime in Cherokee. “So, we’re hoping FEMA will buy us out,” Casey says, “They’re going to come in here and declare a national disaster area.”
The first presidential declaration for the May storms covers 29 counties: Adair, Adams, Buena Vista, Butler, Calhoun, Cedar, Cherokee, Clay, Dallas, Franklin, Hamilton, Hancock, Harrison, Humboldt, Jasper, Iowa, Jackson, Kossuth, Marshall, Mitchell, Montgomery, Muscatine, Polk, Pottawattamie, Poweshiek, Shelby, Story, Tama and Wright.
The second presidential declaration for the June flooding covers five: Clay, Emmet, Lyon, Plymouth, and Sioux counties.
