Governor Schwarzenegger stopped by the 2nd Assembly/4th Senate District with Senator Aanestad and myself on hand, as well as the City Council members of Colusa, 3 Colusa Supervisors, the Sheriff, and other local officials today to survey the progress on levee repairs. Back in April, he declared the emergency that set aside the usual red tape and years of surveys and studies that typically delay levee repairs and maintenance. Colusa County, along the Sacramento river about 50 miles northwest of Sacramento, contains 6 of the growing number [now at 103] of critical levee erosion sights that need immediate repair. This sight at Moon Bend [not known to be a hangout spot of your Democrat Attorney General nominee, Jerry Brown] is nearing completion of its repairs, over 1/4 of a linear mile.
[Here is local network television coverage of the event — if you watch to the end, you can see FR’s Doug LaMalfa standing behind the Governor… – Flash]
The target date of November 1st for completion of the 29 known sights as of April, is on target, with additional others under way and targeted for Nov 30 completion. As the flood waters receded from this years heavy rains and with lesser releases from Shasta Dam, as well as Oroville Dam on the Feather River just to the east of our ranch, many more critical erosion sights were revealed. The US Army Corps of Engineers working with California Dept of Water Resources, identified these additional areas needing critical repair to ensure no levees blow in upcoming high river flows.
Colonel Ron Light of the Army Corps in our briefing beforehand assured us that the repairs will continue on as many sights as possible until winter weather forbids it. With long range forecasts so far indicating a strong possibility of a normal rainfall season, not an extraordinarily high one, I expect they’ll succeed in shoring up many of the sights not known in the original April plan. Provisions are being made to also have already stockpiled rock and materials at staging areas near likely problem sights necessary to make emergency repairs if needed once normal repairs have been halted due to winter weather.
These immediate actions are a result of the $190 million made available by the Governor’s emergency declaration and a portion of the additional $500M "pay as you go"appropriation we voted for in the legislature to augment those emergency funds. The Governor is directing the State to take the lead on the issue by using state dollars to be repaid by the feds for federal areas of responsibility since they don’t have the money appropriated at this time for these projects they own.
All in all, good execution of a plan to have to play catch up from years of neglect from waiting for studies and permits and scarce dollars, made more scarce by unreasonable environmental mitigation requirements on existing levee structures.
This is a triumph of common sense over slothful bureaucracy. The average citzen that lives in the area near a levee doesn’t give a hoot over who owns the levee or what jurisdiction it is when it needs to be repaired, especially in a critical erosion zone. Repairing them now, in the sunshine, when the water is low and not waiting for an "imminent danger" declaration when you must then pay people double overtime to risk themselves driving heavy equipment down soggy levees in the middle of a rainy night, makes so much sense for taxpayers and residents at risk that it’s kind of hard to believe it’s happening in California. Putting people ahead of bugs and shrubs can happen.
This Governor gets it. Decisive leadership on making needed flood control infrastructure happen. Another reason why the Recall was a good idea and why citizens of this area supported the recall by the highest percentage in the state.