Corps Re-certifies Pearl Levees

Also see: Complete Pearl River Archive

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported yesterday that they have re-certified the levees protecting the Hinds and Rankin County edges bordering the Pearl River. After weeks of trepidation by members of the Rankin-Hinds Pearl Flood and Drainage Control District Levee Board and many Jackson home-owners, the Corps sent its approval of the flood control abilities of the levees to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which will likely base its own certification of the levees upon the Corps’ assessment.

“It’s a load off our minds,” said Levee Board member and Flowood Mayor Gary Rhoads. “It’s certainly good news for us.”

“Hinds and Rankin Counties have met all of the requirements established by USACE for determining that the levee system can be reasonably expected to protect against a flood event with a 1 percent chance of being exceeded in any given year,” wrote Corps Levee Safety Officer Robert Fitzgerald in a letter he forwarded to FEMA’s Flood Hazard Mapping Department.

FEMA notified the city of Jackson in 2007 that it would be modernizing flood maps around the city of Jackson. If FEMA does not certify the levees, the new flood map will reflect the inundation of the massive Pearl River flood of 1979. The change would place many properties into the flood zones that had never flooded prior to the 1979 flood, and raise the price of home insurance of affected homes and businesses, or possibly prevent coverage in some locations.

Corps Chief of Project Management Doug Kamien told the Levee Board at a 2009 meeting at Corps headquarters in Vicksburg that a joint $206 million endeavor by the Corps and the Levee Board to upgrade and expand the levees could represent an “update” to the Corps’ assessment of the levees, considering the current levees failed to restrain the waters of the Pearl in 1979, flooding parts of Jackson, as well as Rankin County.

The Levee Board voted to approve the Corps’ levee expansion in December, but Corps spokesman Kavanaugh Breazeale said Kamien’s statement did not amount to a promise of a favorable report to FEMA if the levee board approved a Corps-endorsed levee upgrade.

Nevertheless, Corps approval came primarily due to the Corps decision to based its approval upon a 1 percent annual average flood level of about 87,000 cubic feet per second, rather than the 128,000 cubic feet per second flow of the 1979 100-year flood. The standard adopted by the Corps appears to have put the elevation of the lowest top of levee along both the east and west banks of the Pearl River safely between two and three feet. The levees, however, could still prove incapable of handling another 1979 flood event.

Corps spokesman Frank Worley did not return calls this morning

Richland Mayor Mark Scarborough, also a member of the Levee Board, said FEMA will still have to make the final decision, but will likely base its decision upon Corps recommendations. The certification is up for re-appraisal in about 10 years, and will expire in 2020.

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