Flood Destruction in 1993 - Essay Example

I. Introduction It is natural for waters to rise and fall, and one of the elements of that natural ebbing and flowing is floods during springtime. Throughout the US Midwest Flood of 1993 or also referred to as the Great Flood of 1993, the rise and fall of the waters were heavier than normal. As the heavy amount of waters rushed forward and pictures of the devastating flood filled the television screens, public interest and its representatives rushed forward as well. Money flowed out of the public treasuries to pay for the damages caused to the victims and to reward the laudable flood fighters and rescuers (Sharp et al., 1997). When the disaster subsided, meetings and hearings were convened, new policies were drafted, and the administration of Clinton assigned a task force. Key decision makers and legislators required documents, reports, assessments and development programs. A small portion of the population affected by the catastrophic flooding, whether they are on the floodplain or in the Beltway, hope for genuine reform, though, for different rationales: the flood-control strategy as well as the interagency flood management spends too much money, persuades behavior that worsens the predicament, and gives out some luscious boons to a privileged few, which consequently cultivated recurrent environmental crises (Sharp et al., 1997). As soon as the waters ebbed, interests in and attempts for reconstruction have receded as well. The gravely desired reforms in the system will, as the past has showed us, stayed mainly unmade. Afterward, with the following great flood, the same succession of hand-pressing, downpour of sympathy and financial assistance, and the consequent grief about costs, illogicalities, and injustices will be repeated. It is quite terrible. In fact, the solutions are not costly or even technologically complicated. They decided, though, to resolve a number of steamy issues, to deal with the execution rigidly and fairly, and, most importantly, more political moral fiber than is normally observed when flood-management decisions are usually made while the flooding devastates the lives of the people within its reach. II. The 1993 Flood Destruction In President Clinton’s State of the Union Address in 1994, he referred to the US Midwest Flood of 1993 as a‘500-year flood,’ which consequently led numerous people to think that such a catastrophe, could only occur once every 500 years. However, that is logically invalid. Such a hurricane could possibly happen the following spring. Our watercourses are speckled with “United States Geological Survey (USGS) stream flow gauging stations (154 in the region of the Midwest flood alone) that have recorded the heights of flood waters for much of the century” (National Wildlife, 1997, 57). Analyzing a record of a particular gage, scientists can identify the possibility that a specific height or level would be reached by surging waters passing that site. Those possibilities are more generally called ‘frequency’ occurrences. Hence, if there is merely one percent chance that a specific flood phase will happen in any given year, the actual occurrence will be named a 100-year flood. The supposed 500-year flood has actually a probability of 0.2 percent in any given year, whereas a 2 percent probability is referred to as the 50-year flood, and so forth. Such terms are confusing since the individual once seriously affected by a ‘100-year flood’ now and then believes, inaccurately, that s/he is safe from any more flooding for the subsequent 99 years (Bowman, 1996, 105). The US Midwest Flood of 1993 was recorded as a 500-year flood at a number of gauging locations. Yet it was merely a 100-year flood at several more, and streams were far below 100-year volume at several of the USGS locations in the affected area (Philippi, 1994, 71). Hood waters didn’t even reach the heights of the 50-year flood at four of the six stations on the Mississippi River itself. Obviously, there is a lot of room left in the basin, given the unpredictability of rainfall and weather patterns, for plenty of ‘great floods’ in the future (Philippi, 1994, 71). The Great Flood of 1993 was brought about by a combination of occurrences. These comprised: unusually heavy summer rains; soils that were saturated by spring snowmelt and could not absorb the additional moisture; and bad timing that joined the largest flows from one part of the basin with heavy flows from other parts (Philippi, 1994, 71). However, the pattern was abnormal in 1993, yet nothing regarding it was exceptional. There are numerous disparities that could happen that it is certain that something related will occur again. The 1993 flood brought about havoc, as a flood consistently does: A federal task force report put estimated flood losses at $12 billion; the National Weather Service’s best guess was $16 billion. It was generally agreed that the majority of the damage was agricultural and that a good portion of those crops were destroyed (or their planting was prevented) by soggy soil conditions rather than by ‘overbank’ flooding (Philippi, 1994, 72). On the other hand, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) approximated that roughly half of the total wrecked homes were destroyed by a combination of overbank flooding and another occurrence, such as leakage through walls and fissures because of the high water volumes (Haeuber & Michener, 1998). Regardless of the source, multitudes of people were affected and became miserable and the federal citizens paid taxes. The ‘flood relief bill’ ratified in 1993 tendered billions of dollars in assistance to the victims of the flood. The largest portion of the funds went to disaster relief, given out by FEMA to local government units and volunteers and by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to affected farmers as disaster reliefs and financially supported federal crop insurance. The rest of the funds were also given out to agencies such as the National Flood Insurance Program. Other federal sources of disaster aid over the following year have increased the contribution of taxpayers to billions of dollars, a great deal of money, especially because it is free from the pay-as-you-go congressional mandate and hence contributes immensely to the federal debt (Sharp et al., 1997, 117). III. The Interagency Disaster Management of the US Midwest Floods of 1993 Immediately after the flood, politicians surged to show sympathy, express kindness and generosity to flood victims. However, the moment the nightly tragedy of human misery had slowly disappeared from television screens, those individual criticisms and disapprovals of flood disaster management policy that has been inactive during summers began to float up. These grumbles were articulated in congressional hearings and in an outbreak of defectively formulated legislative plans. They as well carried out few significant legislative reforms, the creation of a task force by the administration of Clinton, and the launching of a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers research of the basin at upper Mississippi where the flooding had taken place (Sharp et al., 1997). The report of the Interagency Floodplain Management Review Committee founded by the task force was made public in 1994. The report, which is entitled ‘Sharing the Challenge: Floodplain Management into the 21st Century” or more commonly known as the ‘Galloway Report’ contain resolutions, proposals and suggested actions, majority of which have good points. However, it has not been formally endorsed or implemented by anyone; hence thus far it stands for nothing more than the energies and time of the team members from involved agencies. Several of those agencies, though, have acted in response to the recommendations of the report: working groups have been created, legislation initiated and programs planned. Government professionals who are aware of the activities that should be carried out will wrestle on, yet their capability to initiate significant changes is inadequate (Philippi, 1994, 73). In the meantime, for the Corps research, it was carried out until 1995. The detractors of the agency expect that since the Corps constructs the levees, it will view constructions as the answer to every problem, yet the scope of the research is much more wide-ranging. The research is referred to as an ‘assessment’ for the reason that it will explain how the water volumes and destructions of 1993 would have been changed if various projects and policies had been laid out and implemented (Philippi, 1994, 73). Even though the research is not intended to recommend solutions to the problems, it could present a new perspective at looking at the problems. Congress passed two major bills of ‘buyout’ legislation immediately after the flood; one increased the fraction of its funds that FEMA may expend to get rid of structures built in the floodplain; the other instituted an Emergency Wetland Reserve Program that permits USDA to acquire farmland behind damaged embankments that are economically unwise to repair. Congress apportioned millions of dollars to the first project and another millions to the second, that is, two scoops in the disaster-relief container (Sharp et al., 1997). Another two congressional decisions were made to raise the property owners’ assumption of risk. Amendments to the program of flood insurance will encourage more individuals to pay for flood insurance and obtain disaster aid. Moreover, surcharges can be obliged on properties that are repeatedly flooded. Modifications in the Federal Crop Insurance Program will as well strip farmers of disaster assistance except if they buy low-priced crop insurance. Still, the government will purchase the premium in behalf of the farmer (Sharp et al., 1997). A number of these initial actions toward reform were significant, and everyone would guide interagency flood management program policy to the right direction. However, 1994 was quite dry and the energy engendered by the flood has dawdled. Once the next great flood hits, the lessons will then have to be learned again. There are lessons that have to be valued. Floods cause excessive damage, and regardless of the actions we take, the damages keep on increasing. Apparently, the Great Flood of 1993 was the most damaging and costly in our history. The Weather Service’s best-guess historical record, beginning in 1903, shows that although flood damages vary dramatically from year to year, the 30-year averages of damages, in equalized dollars, are steadily increasing. Annual damages in the first 30 years of record averaged $1.4 billion per year; in the second 30 years, $2.4 billion per year; and in the 30 years ending in 1993, $3.4 billion per year, about a 250 percent increase (Philippi, 1994, 74). The weather has not significantly changed over the years yet it has in the upper Mississippi River basin. Definitely the quality of the entire basin has transformed. Agricultural and urban developments worsen floods through shrinking soaking up surfaces and speeding up overflow. In the pre-Colonial era, massive areas of wetlands and numerous beaver dams regulated water cycle and movement and contained the water longer in the higher watershed, discharging it to the large rivers slowly. And it is claimed, with a number of evidence, that the embankments that shut in the waters of the rivers of the Midwest in constricted conduits actually hoist the water levels and bring about greater flooding downstream (Bowman, 1996). Yet even though current economic developments in the basin have definitely increased the incidences of flooding, it has as well conveyed abundant economic gains. By its very character, the upper Mississippi floodplain, leveled by the ebb and flow of the waters from the river and abundant with fertile deposits from numerous downpours, makes perfect patch for Midwestern crops such as soybeans and corns. Flood management projects have converted the basin into a financially productive site. This piece of land is sheltered by embankments or levees, constructed initially by countless drainage localities in the recent century and the advent of this new one, and soon after by the Corps, whose effort was directed by a sequence of costly and extensive congressional decisions (National Wildlife Federation, Higher Ground, 1998). The assumption underlying these attempts has consistently been that flood destructions may and would be mitigated, yet that is not how it functioned; however, as claimed by the Corps, the wreckages thwarted by the constructions growing as well. The Corps approximated that its projects in 1993 had put off billions in damages (Bowman, 1996). So, does that imply that devoid of those projects wreckages would have summed up additional billions? Well, not exactly the case. Devoid of the levee constructions the destructions would have been significantly less since no economic expansion would have occurred on the site. The actual problem is the extent damageable developments have progressed, and the primary explanation they increase is due to the fact that we construct fortifications in the first place. The system is plain and simple. For instance, imagine a patch of land that floods every time 5-year-frequency river peaks take place. Of course, no one with the right mind will dare to farm there and hence those floods generate zero damages. The property owners then meet and decide to contract the Corps to construct a levee to protect the patch of land from a 100-year-flood. Farmers then plant, sowing seeds, sprinkling fertilizers and pesticides. They make storage containers and set up dryers and assemble to construct roads and dig drainage channels. In the initial years, flood peaks reach just the 50-year flood height and everything that new farm earnings become put off damages. And then the 100-year-flood surges. The levee overflows, the pumping station submerges, drainage channels erode, storage containers break and equipment crumbles. Every investment turns into thousands even millions of dollars of wreckages. The compromise was flood damage for higher farm yields; when the latter is expanded, the former is intensified as well. The same development is frequently carried out in urban areas. Putting up a dam or basin leads to some patches of land that was previously wet becoming parched, and someone erects a residential area or builds a park. It is not major landed property but it is normally inexpensive, and the individuals who move in can perhaps manage the loss when a great flood surpasses the capacity of the protection. And since the levee met the standards of level of protection of the National Flood Insurance Program, the landed properties are viewed and used as if they were free from flood damages (Haeuber & Michener, 1998). New development programs for floodplains are very costly to the taxpayer and have to be restricted. The federal government initiated the National Flood Insurance Program in 1968 to mitigate the difficulty of floodplain development. Federally funded flood insurance was given to landowners of floodplains but exclusively where domestic zoning rules controlled new development. The plan was to furnish local governments inducements to control new constructions in flood sites and to lend a hand to people living there. Unluckily, the legislated methods for demanding insurance are ineffective, governmentally inept, and not easy to execute. Its function in disaster-damage mitigation is unimportant (Sharp et al., 1997). During the 1993 flood, merely a small percentage of the adequate residential structures were insured by National Food Insurance Program, and a significant percentage of the adequate estate was insured by the Federal Crop Insurance Program. Even though the scheme for residential structures has been struggling for economic self-sufficiency, a considerable fraction of the policies remains financially supported, with taxpayers paying sizably for those granted by crop-insurance policyholders. In all the insurance schemes, the individuals who reap the greatest benefits are those who are in greatest risks (Sharp et al., 1997). It has been estimated that 2 percent of the flood-insurance policies, typically repeat victims, account for 25 percent of the claims. In the agricultural disaster programs, one-half of one percent of the recipients received a startling 9 percent of the money, with each recipient paid between $100,000 and $250,000 (Philippi, 1994, 74). The lack of sufficient participation in insurance programs is readily clarified. Even with the financial assistances, farmers and property owners think premiums are unreasonably priced and coverage extremely restricted. Nevertheless, they would perhaps view it in a different way given that the alternative was no disaster aids. Yet as long as the government is eager to give out disaster aids for everybody, there is very little motivation to purchase insurance. The flood management program results into significant environmental destruction. As flood streams have been hampered and contained by structural mechanisms, the precious aquatic flora and fauna that once inhabited our waterways have been wiped out. The massive areas of cropland sheltered by agricultural embankments at present in the Midwest correspond to vanished wetland locales. Any section that is prone to flooding returned to normal states through the removal of harmful activities would breed environmental gains. Wetlands supply the environment and breeding grounds for an abundant diversity of vegetation and animal groups. They purify the water, sifting out impurities and filtering out residues. In periods of great floods, they supply expansive storage quarters wherein the waters will slowly recede from into the river straits. These benefits, traditionally known, have been mislaid with the damage of a million of acres of Midwestern marshlands in the past two centuries (National Wildlife, 1997). With the appreciation of the importance of marshlands, the main concerns of our nation have altered. Laws have prevented new damages. Wetland conservation regulations are at present so rigid that they can stop someone from cultivating a patch of land to make a house more useful or develop farming activities. A report of the National Research Council in 1992 proposed a policy that would in due course restore the millions of acres mislaid nationwide (Sharp et al., 1997). However, no federal plan is concentrated on wetland rejuvenation. Wetlands Reserve Program of the USDA offers assistances to the farmers yet leads into little real wetland rejuvenation (Sharp et al., 1997). We have not even thought of initiating a significant effort to bring back the massive acres of the floras and faunas where they are favored the most: alongside our waterways. We choose instead to support development so insignificant that it demands continual assistance from the taxpayers. It is illogical and insensible in all its aspects. IV. Reforming the Interagency Disaster Management Merely understanding the reasons explaining the failure of our flood-management policies will be insufficient to initiate real reforms. We should as well address the political concerns and policy contradictions that strengthen our defective policies. There are specific issues that should be dealt with. First is the farm policy. The disaster assistance programs and the crop insurance for farmers are nothing but a component of the entire farm agenda, which has struggled against the price-lowering implications of farm excesses for a great deal of the last century in an effort to safeguard and preserve our agricultural economy and to sustain the noneconomic ideals such as cultures in the rural areas (Ginexi, 2002). Farm programs hence financially supported developments projects that would fail to endure in the marketplace, which is they give incentives to farmers for discarding massive areas of cropland when there is an upsurge in surpluses. The same farmers who were given disaster compensation and crop insurance from the Great Flood of 1993 would as well have obtained aid if a famine had diminished produce or if circumstances had been productive that high produce decreased prices remarkably. Regardless, the unwarranted charity of the disaster assistance programs and crop insurance are merely fraction of the intricacies of the overall problem in farm policy. Second is the ‘takings’ concern. If farmers did not harbor any loathing for the environmentalists before the Great Flood of 1993, they perhaps do by now, along with a cause. Rough discussion about allowing their profit-productive property to go back to the natural habitat for the ecosystems add offense to the material, physical and emotional harm to farmers endured in the dry period of 1993 (Bowman, 1996). A step that lessens damages through eradicating cropland situated in the floodplain implies upsetting the lives of the people and seizing land. It will not be accomplished with no politically and costly controversial struggle. Even though a farmer may not decide to sacrifice economic worth for natural habitat, in situations where the worth obtains from reducing funding, he may be eager to trade cost-effectively. No feasible step will be attained unless all parties are permitted to become involve in floodplain-utilization negotiations. And lastly, the disaster assistance policy; as long as disaster assistance of all forms is not managed fairly, flood-management policy reform will be unlikely. In regions where the likelihoods of natural disaster are identified to be above average, faulty decisions must not be recompensed by disaster assistance unless that relief is related to decisions that would alleviate future destructions. The nation cannot carry on in covering the damages of individuals who thoughtlessly continue to subsist on the flood-prone Mississippi banks or to put shoddy or substandard roofs on their houses or to construct or acquire buildings in Los Angeles that fail to meet the earthquake-safety requirements. So how are we going to do this? First, gradually trim down unplanned disaster relief programs, establish a methods experiment for dispensing it, and make use of the funds to alleviate damages and for wetland restorations. Even though the Galloway Report mentions little regarding the general levels of disaster aid, it puts forth several recommendations for reinforcing the federal capability to purchase and revive floodplain. It proposes that alleviation and buyout programs be instituted and subsidized separately of disaster statements, that land acquisitions and revival be organized by a head agency, that the means for land purchases be modernized, that a bionetwork supervision demonstration program be chosen within the basin of the upper Mississippi River, and that additional assessment be conducted of the effect of marshlands on river flooding (The Galloway Report, 1994). Second, integrate disaster subsidy into the yearly budget procedure. Unless we carry this out, even a steady drop in disaster aid will be easier said than done, for the reason that when the next great flood happens, all kinds of politicians will once again reason with the wind, infringe ideals of justice, upset program resolutions, and recompense the unworthy to genuinely show that they care. Third, make the flood and crop-insurance programs more rigid and firm, slowly make them fend for themselves, and transform them into the special source of assistance to affected people. The Galloway report (1994) proposes that FEMA lessen disaster assistance to those people who were not able to purchase flood insurance and recommends some small steps through which FEMA could increase involvement and cut down the flood-insurance program costs. It advises Congress to set limitations on public assistance funding to localities not covered by the flood insurance program, to lessen disaster relief for individuals who did not purchase flood insurance, to reinforce the compulsory conditions of the flood insurance program, and to amend the crop insurance program. And lastly, restrict new structural safety to major facilities and reevaluate the economic rationale for revamping present ones. The Galloway report as well proposes that the Office of Management and Budget ban the drawing on the upcoming damages in assessing cost and benefit relations and that the Corps examines mechanisms to mitigate negative effects with embankment over-toppings and conclude at suitable standards for assessing the costs of levee renovations. The Corps’ investigation of the upper Mississippi basin can be anticipated to address those concerns and others. V. Conclusion Although a considerable volume of flood-related studies has been conducted, additional and better information remain needed. It is apparently much more trouble free to resolve political inconsistencies and reform interagency disaster management when better information is provided. References Books Bowman, M. (1996). River Renewal: Restoring Rivers through Hydropower Dam Relicensing. Washington, DC: American Rivers. Erickson, P. A. (2001). Emergency Response Planning for Corporate and Municipal Managers. New York: Academic Press. Haddow, G. & Bullock, J. (2008). Introduction to Emergency Management. Oxford, UK: Elsevier Publishing. Sharp, N. W. et al. (1997). American Legislative Leaders in the Midwest, 1911-1994. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Journal Articles Arend, M. (1993). Strong Balance Sheets Ease Flood Effects. ABA Banking Journal , 48+. Ginexi, E. M. et al. (2002). Natural Disaster and Depression: A Prospective Investigation of Reactions to the 1993 Midwest Floods. American Journal of Community Psychology , 495. Haeuber, R. A. & Michener, W.K. (1998). Natural Flood Control. Issues in Science and Technology , 74+. Hunker, P. G. (1998). Warning: Be Ready for Lifes Disaster. The Washington Times , 1. Merrell, J. L. (1993). After the Deluge; Hearing God through the Flood. The Christian Century , 926+. NWF Plays Key Role in Program to Move Buildings out of Flood Plains. (1997). National Wildlife , 56+. Philippi, N. (1994). Plugging the Gaps in Flood-Control Policy. Issues in Science and Technology , 71+. Ropp, K. L. (1994). Quake, Flood Call for FDA Action. FDA Consumer , 9+. Government Reports Interagency Floodplain Management Review Committee (The Galloway Report), Sharing the Challenge: Floodplain Management in to the 21st Century. (1994). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. National Research Council, Restoration of Aquatic Ecosystems: Science, Technology and Public Policy. (1992). Washington, DC: National Academy Press. National Wildlife Federation, Higher Ground. (1998). Washington, DC: National Wildlife Federation. Online References The National Incident Management System (NIMS) (2004). United States Department of Homeland Security. Retrieved from http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?theme=14&content=3697 The National Response Framework (2006). United States Department of Homeland Security. Retrieved from http://www.fema.gov/emergency/nrf/ Read More