Drowning Iowa isn’t New Orleans

For the good people of Iowa, this has been a terrible time. More rain than the ground can take has fallen day in and day out. Rivers are many feet above flood stage, they won’t crest for a while yet, and thousands have been forced to evacuate their homes. The nation remembers the mess that Katrina made of New Orleans, and the hope is that the federal authorities will do a better job in Cedar Rapids than they did in the 9th ward. Iowans have one thing going for them that New Orleans didn’t, geography.

Governments cannot undo acts of God, no matter how power hungry the politicians are. Floods, hurricanes and earthquakes are disasters that mankind must face until the species is extinct. Government, though, can mitigate the effects through proper building codes, evacuation plans and recovery efforts. On these counts, it is too early to tell how FEMA is doing in Iowa.

At least four are dead, 83 of Iowa’s 99 counties have been declared federal disaster areas, and billions of dollars have been lost. Crops have not been planted, and this will affect both farm income in coming months and food prices. Part of the Mississippi River, America’s first freeway, is closed to shipping, disrupting distribution of goods. The water will even pressure this quarter’s GNP.

However, the farms and cities of Iowa are above sea level. The rain will eventually stop (and then, the area could experience a drought just to prove the Fates have a wicked sense of humor). When it does, there will be a lot of mud to remove and a lot of buildings to clean out (mold is a real risk), but the water will go away on its own, pulled down to the Gulf of Mexico by gravity. That’s something New Orleans didn’t have going for it.

Cedar Rapids police Detective Brad Novak said in a CNN interview, “It’s been compared to a 3,000-year flood. So something with that rarity of an event, there is no playbook to go by.” That’s true, but helping people who lose loved ones and property due to acts of God is not rocket science. Any boy scout know to be prepared. The recovery of Iowa and its neighboring states will show if the Feds have learned anything from New Orleans. If they haven’t, a new administration needs to fix FEMA.

© Copyright 2008 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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