One year after Dutchtown was flooded, residents unsure about how to protect it in future

KIT DOYLE ~ kdoyle@semissourian.com Pam Davenport, left, and Liz Rodgers prepare lunch options Tuesday morning, March 17, 2009, at Smith Stop in Dutchtown. Smith Stop opened Sunday for the first time since March 2008 flooding closed it almost a year ago. [Click to enlarge]

Life became a little more normal in Dutchtown this week as Smith Stop reopened Sunday, just three days short of a year since record-setting rains sent floodwaters swirling through the Cape Girardeau County village.

But the future of Dutchtown remains uncertain. Townspeople are no closer to paying their share on a levee that would protect the town in most major floods and federal rules may stymie their efforts to give themselves a more modest level of protection.

The village, with an official population of 100, has repeatedly faced flooding as the Mississippi River rises. But last year's surge of headwaters that overwhelmed the Little River Diversion Channel almost destroyed Dutchtown.

Beginning March 18, more than a foot of rain soaked Southeast Missouri. The biggest recorded rainstorm in the area's history tore down levees, flooded towns from Piedmont, Mo., to Southern Illinois and put water in places that had always stayed above the raging waters.

Since reopening Sunday, Voyann Smith said her customers are starting to come back. Her store, at the intersections of Route A and highways 25 and 74, serves hot lunch sandwiches and breakfast, provides a spot to pick up convenience items and sells fuel.

On Sunday, as she was closing up, she said she was wary of a pickup truck in the lot. "Down came the window and they said, 'We missed you,'" Smith recalled as she sat at a table in the store Tuesday. "It was almost humbling. I just didn't realize that so many people cared."

When the rain started March 18, it seemed like a typical spring storm. Forecasters predicted heavy rain, but the water kept beating down. As it rose, small towns first were isolated and then inundated. Residents in Allenville, Delta, Zalma and other locations left for higher ground. Many people had to be rescued from their homes and some stranded motorists were saved through heroic efforts of passers-by.

When the water went down, the cleanups began. But for the residents of Dutchtown, it was time for a decision. Families upset about their damaged homes wondered whether to rebuild.

When floodwaters rose again in June, the town held two meetings — one to discuss a buyout of damaged properties and another to learn how much money was needed to pay for a levee that would protect the town and keep the highways that meet at Dutchtown open.

They rejected a buyout, despite a report from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that the projected cost of a levee had grown to more than $4 million, up 36 percent from the previous estimate. That meant the town would be required to contribute $1.4 million.

After 10 years of saving tax money, the town had about $140,000 in the bank and a promise that the state would provide a $297,000 Community Development Block Grant to help.

A new idea began forming in the minds of Dutchtown's leaders as the waters rose in June. In a 48-hour period, a group of townspeople added about three feet of gravel and sandbags to a mound snaking behind several houses near the highway junction. That temporary barrier kept out the floodwaters in June and has not been removed.

Now the town would like to add a layer of dirt and make the temporary barrier a permanent levee.

The town could afford the smaller levee, said Doyle Parmer, the town clerk. But it may never collect enough money to fund its share of a levee that would give protection up to a 100-year flood.

"The town is resolved that we have to do it ourselves," said Larry Crutsinger, the village levee committee chairman. "We cannot count on any county, state or federal help."

But federal laws governing levee construction could block their plans. Every levee that is eligible for federal assistance during a flood must be three feet across at the base for every foot it rises above the surrounding landscape.

"It has to be bull strong and pig tight or you can't build it," Crutsinger said.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was instructed in the federal budget bill passed last week to make the Dutchtown levee project a priority. But the bill included no money to aid the town and the corps won't build until the town is ready.

"We have proposed several ideas to them," said project manager Dewey Powell of the corps's district office in Memphis, Tenn. "One removes 90 percent of the risk to the locals. Some have less than that. It is a decision the locals will have to make."

The corps is willing to help as long as a levee project provides at least $1 of benefit for every dollar spent on construction, Powell said. Any levee that includes corps assistance must protect the highways or it won't meet that standard, the townspeople were told in June.

There is not enough room to make the temporary barrier meet federal specifications, Crutsinger said. And the town has unsuccessfully sought to persuade adjacent landowners to allow the construction of a small levee in a different location, he said.

A year of trying to find money for a major levee or a place to build a minor one has had one benefit, Parmer said.

"We got more knowledge in the last year about how things work than we did in 10 years," he said.

rkeller@semissourian.com

388-3642

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Pertinent Addresses:

10469 Highway 25, Dutchtown, Mo.

167 North Main, Memphis, Tenn.