[Saundra Duffy]

Can you say infrastructure?

[trad_anglican]

I live in Des Moines. The levee system that was put in place over the past 15 years held a tremendous amount of water in check. The one part that gave way was the part that hadn't been replaced because of a years long delay in getting a federal environmental impact study funded.

Cedar Rapids, which had the worst flooding, had also upgraded their levee system during the past 15 years. Sometimes, nature trumps what we can do to hold it back.

[Walmartian]

Can you say infrastructure?

Like some great big drains or something?

[JenB]

We here in Cedar Rapids had the infrastructure in place. Flood stage here is 12 feet. We’d seen 20 feet back in the 1920s. The infrastructure was prepared for 22 or 24 feet of water. That seemed like ample margine.

Last week, we crested at 30.5 feet. We flooded beyond our 500 year flood plain - and we’d never had a 100 year flood.

So shut up about what the state and local government should have done. They did their job. When the water came down, local officials and volunteers did theirs. In some places, it wasn’t enough, so now our job is clean up.

We don’t blame FEMA, Bush, the Fedaral, state, or local government, God, Halliburton, or anyone else. There was just a lot of rain.