Vinton Spared Major Flood

The flood that was predicted for Vinton, thankfully, never came. The National Weather Service had predicted a record level of over 20 feet, but the river crested on Sunday at 17.3 feet. Even now the river has receded to around 14 feet.

We had several people come out to fill and place sandbags. We went through 260 tons of sand and about 10,000 sandbags. We also had many people and businesses comtribute food and drink for the volunteers.

To see a KCRG-TV newstory on preparing for the possible flood, copy and paste this link into your borwser: www.kcrg.com/news/local/18313374.html

Flood Warnings

Friday morning, we were alerted that the Cedar River could reach record flood levels. This put our flood reaction plan into action. We started hauling sand from a nearby quarry, obtained a couple of mechanical stitchers from nearbv seed companies and put the call out for volunteers. We spent about 5-6 hours on Friday and 7 hours on Saturday filling and placing sandbags around the fire station, riverfront homes and a sewer lift station.

The National Weather Service has lowered the crest level to below 19 feet. This is good news since they did have the crest over 20 feet. That would have been a record and nobody knew for certain what would happen then. Now it is to a level just lower than where the crest was during the floods of 1993.

We had many residents come out to fill sandbags. Not the least of all were 50 high school kids on Friday. The picture above is of some of the volunteers working yesterday. It is great to know that we live in a city where these volunteers who came to help despite the fact that the water wasn't going to affect them.

House Fire, Heroic Actions

I should have posted this blog earlier than now, but this past week has been extremely busy. Still its no excuse considering the heoric actions taken by one of our police officers early this past Monday morning. Officer Roger Roseberry was responding to a fire about 4:30 AM. A resident was trapped on the second floor of the house. After a couple attempts at coaxing the man to jump to safety, Officer Roseberry found a ladder to help the man down. Officer Roseberry also assisted two other residents in fleeing from the first floor.

A dramatic video of what the fire looked liked from the police car video can be seeing by visiting: Vinton Headlines.

Trails Committee Update

Last evening, members of the Vinton Trails Committee met with representatives of two engineering firms to discuss the development of an overall master trails plan for the city. The master plan is necessary to apply for various grants to fund the construction of the trails.

This is an exciting step because the development of the trails system in the city is something that has been in the works for the past two years. Also, cities are looking to add more amenities such as trails, to attract more residents and promote a healthy lifestyle. We also expect that the AmeriCorps students will want to use the trails since they will not have their own vehicles to drive around the city.

If you want to have some input on the development of the trails system in the city, let us know. We want to develop a system that is truly accepted by the residents and will be used a lot.

Second Avenue Repairs

The streets of Vinton have been hard hit by winter storms. The street department is out working hard to repair them. One of the hardest hit was the city's main brick street which is 2nd Avenue. A section of 2nd Avenue was renovated last year. That section between 7th and 9th Street is doing well.

On the other hand, the block between 9th and 10th Streets have seen areas where the brick sections have heaved up and down. The heaving is caused by something known as a frost boil. I am no expert, but our street superintendent explains that it is where water from frost collects and does not drain properly. Because there is a pocket of water in a location, the street gives way at that spot.

This morning the street sweeper sunk a section about a foot down. The street department is currently removing bricks, they will then place some rock back down and replace the bricks on the street. Until this is done, 2nd Avenue between 9th and 10th Street will be closed indefinately.

For more information, please call Vinton City Hall at 472-4707.