California dam emergency sparks push for better flood protection

The Oroville Dam in Northern California is a 770-foot behemoth holding back Lake Oroville about 75 miles northwest of Sacramento. In February, real concerns formed that it would fail. After years of drought, California has been drenched by rain this winter, and storm rains threatened to flow over the top of the massive dam.

The immense rainfall and the heavy flows of water it caused damaged the dam’s main spillway, causing a 250-foot long, 170-foot wide and 50-foot deep hole to open up in the spillway. Operators then had to open an emergency spillway, the first time it had to be used since the dam opened in 1968, but it eroded at such an alarming rate that authorities ordered three counties downstream to evacuate. The dam itself was never in jeopardy.

Crews were able to get the situation stabilized by increasing the flow of water out of the damaged main spillway. Work is continuing on the emergency spillway because a failure could flood the valley below.

While the crisis at the state-operated dam has subsided, it has pushed lawmakers into action, including a nearby congressman, Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Calif.

McNerney introduced a bill in late February that would require the Federal Emergency Management Agency to create a pilot program that would require more cooperation between FEMA and local and state agencies, allowing the local officials to have more input in responding to a flood emergency. The bill also would allow FEMA to give grants to up to 10 municipalities to create flood emergency funds and create an organized command structure to respond to an emergency.

McNerney said FEMA often gets in the way of local officials trying to move quickly in the face of a flooding disaster. His bill would improve their ability to react, he said.

“In an emergency situation, local authorities need to be able to react quickly. They must be prepared to respond to a disaster scenario, should a levee break or become overwhelmed,” he said. “Preparation is critical in flood-prone regions, regardless of wet or dry years.

Critics of FEMA and its lack of local knowledge often point to the failures in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, when the federal agency didn’t engage enough with local authorities, leading to confusion that many people believe cost lives. Among the problems were confusing the name of a local hospital, which helped delay evacuating patients, and not acting fast enough to clear people from areas about to be inundated by floodwaters.

The agency’s centralized nature can block out local knowledge and expertise, and that can put people in danger, McNerney said.

“I want to make sure the local agencies on the ground, specifically those that best know their flood region, have the tools necessary to prepare, plan and respond effectively and quickly to limit potential damage and harm that can be caused by flooding and damaged levees.”

That kind of local control is necessary to prevent catastrophic failures, and the influence of local officials may have helped stop the situation at Oroville Dam from spiraling out of control, said John Laird, secretary of California’s Natural Resources Agency.

Laird, in testimony to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said the expertise of local and state officials developed by familiarity with the terrain was critical in Oroville.

As a top official in a state with more than 13,000 miles of levees, Laird said it’s important to let local officials operate in cooperation with federal officials, not under their thumb.

“California’s extraordinary response to this year’s storms was only possible due to local, state and federal cooperation,” he said, “and significant investments in the state’s water, flood control, safety and emergency response system.”

McNerney’s bill could be swept up in President Trump’s promised $1 trillion infrastructure spending package that he proposed during his address to Congress last month.

While Trump didn’t specifically mention improvements to dams and levees, the idea of improving those structures has a powerful backer in Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee.

Barrasso, who will be in charge of a major part of forming an infrastructure bill, said the emergency at the Oroville Dam was proof that the country’s dam and levee infrastructure is crumbling. While the state of roads and bridges is usually the focus of U.S. infrastructure issues, dams and levees deserve special attention, he said.

“The potential threat of dam failure is of serious concern to state officials and to the people living downstream of Oroville,” he said. “Any future severe weather event could make this situation even more critical, and it is raising questions about the readiness of our flood prevention infrastructure.

“Dams and levees across the country need to be modernized and maintained if we are to prevent future disasters.”

Barrasso supported McNerney’s plan to lessen federal regulations in order to allow better flood prevention.

Federal regulations can sometimes slow or prevent the building of levees that can stop flooding in his home state of Wyoming that is caused by massive ice flows coming down rivers. Sometimes a levee needs to be built where a tree stands or “a pile of dirt” is located, but a federal permit keeps towns and states from removing those items quickly. Congress needs to shrink the number of hoops municipalities need to jump through, he said.

“If removing a tree or a pile of dirt, which might only take days to accomplish, can make a difference in preventing a catastrophic flood, a town shouldn’t have to go through a lengthy bureaucratic process to remove those features, while the town floods yearly,” he said. “Bureaucratic red tape should be cut where people’s lives and property are on the line, which is always the case when we are talking about flooding.”

Barrasso added that improvements to levees and dams will be a part of any infrastructure bill that comes through Congress.

“I believe any infrastructure bill that this committee develops should consider the need to maintain and modernize these structures,” he said.