Anderson dam in San Jose spilled over, have you looked at the Fema flood maps? Maybe we all should

  On February 18, 2017 the Anderson dam in San Jose spilled over the top flooding many homes downstream. The previous spill over was in 2006, 9 years earlier during our last deluge. There was confusion prior to and during the overflow, Federal and State regulators had directed the Santa Clara Valley Water District to cap storage at 68 percent to avoid a catastrophic disaster in the event Anderson's dam were to fail due to the very real threat of an earthquake. District officials disagreed saying the chances of that happening were extremely low, then we had the wettest winter in 20 years. The residence went to the dam to take pictures and watch the 70 foot man made waterfall, which was soon to become an uncontrollable situation. In all fairness the District wanted to hold on to the water as long as possible due to the long drought that had preceded it. However it appears they were focused on a one two punch, earthquake, dam collapse finally flood, they planned their odds on a dam failure not an overflow. I wonder if they looked at the FEMA flood maps.

Anderson dam just prior to the overflow, when would you call
for an evacuation?

  The Anderson dam feeds Coyote Creek which flows through numerous residential neighbor hoods as well as mobile home parks. The residence are demanding to know why the authorities did not send an alarm until the water was at their window sills and rising. Some civilians that experienced the flood in 2006 went door to alerting residence it was about to happen again, few took the warning seriously. San Jose's leaders did appear to leave the resident's unprepared for the the worst flooding in 20 years, there was no evacuation alarm sent. 14,000 residents were ordered to evacuate after the floodwaters had filled most homes. Rice University has a web site outlining a well planned out alarm system here.
  In contrast, the Oroville dam (the tallest dam in the U.S.) evacuation was criticized for being early and other issues, but the evacuation was needed and was called at the correct time and situation. Happily Oroville dam is still intact, it does have repairs to be made and political patchwork to do. The people making the calls did not fail in their leadership decisions to evacuate the town, in fact Walmart shoppers were instructed to leave their baskets and evacuate. Oroville did confide in the FEMA flood maps it appears.
  On another hand, (I don't live in San Jose) the Mayor of San Jose Sam Liccardo stepped up to the plate and accepted responsibility on behalf of the City of San Jose. It kind of surprised me because politicians normally take zero responsibility for anything.

Who ends up being the adult in the room?

  It is now four month's later, and the big question is asked "who's to blame?"
  The affected people are suing the City of San Jose, Santa Clara county and the Santa Clara water district to recover their losses from the flood. People were granted $3,000.00 from a private donated fund. That amount was not nearly enough to cover most losses. There appears to be enough blame to be spread around, the real issue is being overlooked.
  I live next to a river, not far from San Jose, 75 miles or so. I have to have flood insurance, I like the people in San Jose live in a "flood zone". We pay to maintain our own levee's, although the entire state benefits from it and will suffer if there is a breach. Our houses must be built above the flood 100 year occurrence level, 14 feet. My second deck is at 13'6", I have to pay more for flood insurance. I'm not complaining, I love living on the California Delta so I will pay mandatory flood, earthquake and homeowners insurance. Everyone on our island is in the same boat, we pay our own way, State, county and city regulated.
  The issue that is being lost in all of this is "Why didn't the people have flood or renter's insurance? One man was on TV the day of the flood saying "I cancelled my flood insurance a few years ago, I'm going to call my agent to see if I can get it re-instated." Unfortunately for him that's not how insurance works, no pay no play, it's important to have if a person want's to return to a somewhat normal life after the disaster. Their levee's were in need of repair, who's responsible for that, we have a special levee district to perform all levee maintenance and repairs. Landlords, the owners of the buildings in many cases did not have flood insurance, they lived within a mile of a dam that was built for flood control. Where was FEMA, every where in the U.S. residents in a flood plain have to buy flood insurance through FEMA. Flood insurance explained click here.  I bet San Jose and the district look at the FEMA flood maps from now on.
 

A breached levee, if you live in a flood zone, there is most likely a levee
involved at some point. This breach affected the entire state of California.

If the people succeed with the lawsuits to recover claims, why am I, my neighbors and other people mandated to buy insurance? Why do we have to maintain our own levee's? Why do we have to build our houses on stilts and live above the high water mark? Apparently the people do not realize what the words "flood zone" means, it's a very serious statement, it's not a joke. There are people in L.A. living on the top a flood control levee and did not know it until FEMA re-wrote the flood rates and notified people. Some live in the water flow, in other words they are living in the river bed that flooded until the flow was diverted by a flood control dam. The residents and landlords should all have had insurance.
  Not only was the water flood a disaster, the entire episode was a disaster. It sounds like Mayor Sam Liccardo is on track to spearhead the efforts to build regulations and procedures to make sure that an event such as this (when it happens again, it will) the City of San Jose, County of Santa Clara, the people and the District will perform in an orderly and sensible way.
  I'd really like to hear your comments, do you think I'm all wet? Do you think flood insurance should be mandatory in a flood zone? Do you live downstream from a flood control dam?

Thanks for reading!

jimandkate  emergencykitsplus.com