Good comment from "anonymous", but it needs some fact checking

Anonymous, that is a decision that could have been made a very long time ago. But NOW you enjoy sewer treatment from a $250,000,000 sewer plant that was built behind the levee. And for Columbia to grow, it plans to expand that plant. AND Heathwood Hall is built behind that levee. The owner of that levee is maintaining the levee and has 3,000 acres of property that could take the same advantage of the levee. It does no one any good to pretend that things aren’t already built behind there. And it does no one any good to pretend that the levee is not there or that it cannot be useful. Is it really greedy to want to use ones land and levee when other people are doing it? Or is it selfish to say you don’t want someone to use his land because you have a preference that he not do it?

Take a look at Hannibal, Missouri. It has a newer levee with the same characteristics of the proposed Vista Farms levee. Everything is fine there. Everything could be fine here too, if the levee gets fixed. I know you are anonymous, but will you stand up when the levee fails and say that’s your plan?

Midwest flooding is a wake up call for the Midlands

We hope everyone is reading the news about the Midwest flooding. Despite the folks (like this) who tell you such flooding is what we can avoid by ignoring Vista Farms, this is what will happen by ignoring Vista Farms. Almost all of the levees in the Midwest that are failing are agricultural levees that have been identified by the USACE as being deficient, and none are the levee that Vista Farms proposes. So, wake up! We, and the facts, are telling you that the Vista Farms levees, the ones that protect our sewer plant and Heathwood Hall School, are deficient, too. In Iowa and Missouri they ignored these deficiencies and look what happened. To date, the City of Columbia and Richland County have similarly ignored the inadequacy of the existing levee system. Incredibly, Columbia is still raising sewer rates to construct a new $35 million upgrade (at the latest “revised” estimate) to the Metro plant. In the Midwest, the recently built, certified levees are not failing (yet they can overtop if the flood exceeds a design standard that is less than Vista Farms’), but the old unrepaired levees are simply failing. So read what’s happening, but don’t think that this is proof we should do nothing; on the contrary it is proof we have to do something to protect our existing assets.

And while you’re at it: Look at all the not-flooded workplaces and infrastructure like the Quincy, IL water and sewer plants that are in serious jeopardy due to the flood. Like the Columbia Metro sewer plant, they believed they were somehow exempt or above the risks of flooding. So they sit there now, idle without access and/or without infrastructure support. How long would Columbia last without sewer? How much would it cost to fix? Or how much worse would the Congaree be with raw sewage dumped in it because the plant could not run?

Yes, floods are disasters. You can either prepare for them and be known as prepared, or you can suffer them and be known as victims who seek a lot of help from their friends. What do you call the people who know it can happen and do nothing?

The Basis of Our Meeting

The 2-slide show above is the basic proposition that many of the residents supported at our meeting: Move the levee back so there is more room for the water in places other than Riverland Park. Everyone knows that Riverland Park floods; we can't fix that no matter what we do; but we are wiling to do something to help and that seemed to resonate. Thank you to those supporters.

Riverland Park Meeting

Thank you for coming to the community meeting tonight. It was a good turnout and we hope we can build on that. Please call, write, or post questions here. If you post here, please let us know who you are; we will remove that from the post when it is published, but it will let us respond better.

It seems like we established some facts at the meeting that we can use to help plan the future: 1) the levees are big and they are here to stay; 2) if we do nothing else with the levees, the present flooding situation stays the same; and 3) there are some options to make conditions better in Riverland Park.

We hope we can work together quickly to make plans for our shared future. We will be neighbors for a very long time. Thank you again for coming.