By Pepper Parr

September 11, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON.

Everyone knows what happened – a lot of rain came down and the pipes underground couldn`t handle it – which is true.

But there is more to the story than that – and understanding the more is, what will get the city and the Region to the point where they can figure out what they have to do to handle the next big storm. Everyone on this file seems to have assumed that we have not seen our last big rain storm.

City staff prepared an elaborate presentation that set out the full picture – and as ugly as it was – it is a look at what we might be facing for the next 50 years.

Weather Network map of the part of Burlington where all the rain fell. The rain came over the city in three waves.

The rainfall began to approach the city from across the lake at around 1:00 pm and was the first of what is reported to have been three different rain storms.
The 1:00 pm storm was followed by another at 4:00 pm and a final blow at 9:00 pm; the storms basically followed one another.

The 191 mm of rain worked its way into the creeks and roared into the city – heading for a storm water system that couldn’t deal with the volume.

As the rain blew in off the lake and approached the Escarpment the water made its way to the extensive creek structure that drains into Lake Ontario

Members of city council, who are all now in full election mode, tell people that we were not equipped to handle a storm of this size.

The city has creeks, storm sewers, culverts, catch basins, storm ponds, roads and swales to handle large sudden amounts of water. Unfortunately for all of us – we have let the swales and the creeks get away from their intended use and, when we needed them, – they didn`t do the job they were supposed to do for us.

Who is to blame for this – because there are a lot of people in this city who want to blame someone? Ward 5 Councillor Sharman held a meeting at the Pineland Baptist Church that he wanted to characterize as a private meeting. Sharman appears to have an understanding of what the problem was and is – but that didn`t wash all that well with the 30 some odd people who were in the church.

A decent grass roots community has evolved and they are gathering information – but don`t seem to have a sense as to what they want to do. Is there anything they can do?

Councillor Sharman commented frequently that the Region wasn`t anywhere near as forthcoming as they had to be with the homeowners – but he didn`t stress that he was running not just as a city Councillor but as a Regional Councillor as well.

Creeks had far more vegetation than they were designed for – the Conservation Halton policy of letting the creek beds be as natural as possible – may have been a mistake. Those tree limbs got pushed and began to form dams that prevented the water from flowing into the lake. Water takes the path of least resistance – which turned out to be the streets of the city.

To his credit Sharman did manage to get the Region to agree to do a detailed study of the storm water problem at a July meeting of the Region; little did he know then that his ward was to be deluged with rain fall less than three weeks later.

Contractors were brought in to clear the debris from the badly damaged creeks. Watch for this expense to get reflected in the budget that gets put forward in the New Year,

Sharman doesn`t have the political touch that Councillor Jack Dennison has and struggles with many of his constituents. Some of those constituents are flaming mad – one walks about with a thick file of papers urging people to think in terms of a class action suit.

These people are hurting – the financial burden to most of them is exceptionally difficult – and their homes cannot be sold. No one is going to want to live in those communities for some time.

How the city manages this crisis seems odd at times. City hall is focused on the infrastructure – they don’t seem to have anything for the citizens. Any help a citizen is going to get will come from their member of council.
What the city has done is outsourced the raising of funds to help people get at least some of the financial support many of them are going to need. The Burlington Community Foundation has taken on the task of raising funds that they hope will be matched by the province on a two for one basis under a provincial program called ODRAP –Ontario Disaster Relief and Assistance Program.

No one is certain just what the status of that application for help is at this point in time. When the BCF announced how they were going to manage the distribution of funds Mayor Goldring mentioned that this might take a long time – which doesn’t create much comfort or assurance for the people who need help.

The BCF has said they will begin to issue grants of up to $1000 for those people who are desperate and need some cash to cover the daily necessities. They are going to distribute funds even though they don`t know when or even if the province is going to match what the community raises on that two for one program.

Burlington is about to see just how slowly provincial bureaucrats move.

The city did see how fast people can get things done when they are committed, focused and motivated. The Samaritan’s Purse was in the city repairing homes the day after the storm.

This is what Burlington looked like in the late 1990’s. Trees weren’t all that big and there were few swimming pools.

Same streetscape as above – see all those swimming pools – what did they do to the natural flow of rain water. We know now what they did.

During the briefing given at Council on Monday, city staff explained that the problem lies with changes that were made in the Ontario building code and how storm water pipes and sewage pipes were put in place.
Homes built prior to 1968 had to meet a code that called for pipes being put in one way – homes built after 1969 called for a different set up.

Much of the problem rests on weeping tiles and downspouts and where the water that passes through these two parts of a house actually goes.

City staff talked of the “new norm” and how we can prepare for that change. That new norm has been around for more than a decade – In Peterborough there was 193mm of rain on July 15th, 2004. Hamilton got 110mm on July 26th of 2009. Thunder Bay got 91 mm on May 28, 2012.

Peterborough didn’t get a dime from the provincial government – which does not bode well for Burlington’s chances of getting all that much from the provinces ODRAP program. Not much has been heard from MP Ted McMeekin who represents Flamborough just to the west of us. No one is sure that he is at his desk all that much.
The city activated its Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) at 9:00pm on August 4th. Roads and Parks Maintenance people responded to 103 calls and the city called former city general manager Kim Phillips, who had retired a month earlier, back to city hall to help out. Both the city manager and the Mayor were out of the city and didn’t get back until the following day.

The colours tell the story. The older sub-divisions adhered to a different building code. There is a direct correlation between the older subdivisions and the flooding.

Scott Stewart, City general manager for Development and Infrastructure, was left to handle everything on his own. Interim city manager Pat Moyle referred to Stewart as the “man of action” which he certainly was on this occasion.  Stewart lost out to Jeff Fielding when Burlington went looking for a new city manger three years ago.  Fielding thought the grass was greener in Calgary and he departed in month 26 of a 60 month contract.  Many thought Stewart should have been made at least interim city manager then but because the Kim Phillips retirement was in the works, Council decided to bring in someone to oversee projects and add some stability to the senior management level.

The 407 – engineered not that long ago – wasn’t able to handle the water that flowed into it. The water roared down the creeks – and found that the 407 was a barrier.

Stewart will in all likelihood apply for the job again when it is opened up – that will happen once the municipal election is a done deal.  If Stewart doesn’t get the nod this time around – heck he might join Fielding in Calgary; the two of them worked very well in Burlington.
While city hall is doing as much as it can to take care of the infrastructure – much of the problem lays in the way we have managed that infrastructure. The creeks are the responsibility of the Conservation Authority that has a policy of letting the creeks be as natural as possible. That meant they didn’t get all that much done to them in terms of maintenance – which resulted in tree limbs being left in the creeks. Those tree limbs became dams which resulted in serious damage because the water flowing into the creeks couldn’t flow properly.  That water backed up and flooded into streets.

Downspouts that have been set up so that they drain into the storm water system added to the problem. The spouts could not handle the amount of water that was landing on roofs.

The Red Cross was out on the street going door to door 36 hours after the scope of the flood was evident; they made 10,970 calls and did 1,532 assessments and determined that 501 homes will require some form of financial aid. They reported that 271 home had partial or no insurance.

The average cost of restoring homes was set at $18,000 – if you can find a contractor. City general manager Scott Stewart commented that the market for contractors is “red hot” right now.

Red hot is a phrase that some 24 homes in this city will not be using – there are that many homes in one part of the city that may not have furnaces in place before December 1.

Earlier this week Calgary had its first snowfall.

Hard times may be ahead for some of our neighbours. 

By Pepper Parr

September 1, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON.

Communities organize themselves in various ways. Almost a month ago many of the people in Wards 4 and 5 were scrambling to save as much of their possessions when their basements were being flooded.

The food lines wound their way back and forth on Elwood Street. The Bake Sale was a hit and the T- shirts also did very well. That little red head, with blonde Mom behind her gets the hair from a grandmother.

That was a month ago and there has been a lot of anguish, despair and hard kitchen table conversations about the financial impact since then.
Many had insurance that covered their situation but just as many, perhaps more, had insurance that is proving to be inadequate. All have homes that are less today than they were August 3rd.

Each household works through its situation differently, some talk to immediate neighbours, some work with their extended families. The placement of homes in suburbs is such that community is different. People aren’t always as close. Burlington has districts, but it doesn’t have neighbourhoods with strong sense of identity.

There are few large apartment buildings where people gather in a party room.

For those in that pocket of Burlington, west of Walkers Line and north of New Street – a short, short walk to Tuck Creek that over ran its banks and did serious damage to the infrastructure – their sense of humour came to the rescue and they organized a street party.

It seemed like a good idea to Glenn Nicholson, the Elwood Street resident who came up with the idea of holding an event for his neighbours. He then watched it grow to the point where he was able to get the Burlington Teen Tour band and CHCH television coverage. Not bad for a local kid.

Glenn Nicholson, an Elwood resident decided to organize an event for his neighbours. It was going to be small – just for the people on the street at first – but when the name of the event got around – the occasion grew like topsy.  “I have about 35 volunteers and we expect somewhere between 1000 to 2000 people.

Nicholson did get loads of support from his ward Councillor. Jack Dennison made phone calls and got permit fees waived and someone got the Burlington Teen Tour Band out on the street for some marching band music.

We don’t know yet how much Nicholson and his volunteers managed to raise – we will report that when it is available.

The T shirt says it all for a lot of people.

They called it “Up the Creek” which reflected just how many of the people flooded felt as the struggled to save their homes with little in the way of support from the city corporately.

City hall decided to outsource the resolution to another organization and asked everyone else to take on a task while the city worked on recovering as much as it could from the province for the damage done to its infrastructure.

Ward 4 Councillor Jack Dennison chats with Mayor Goldring and his wife at the Elwood Street Up the Creek event. The Mayor apparently chose not to wear one of the Up the Creek T shirts.

While Calgary is a much bigger city and the flood it was hit with this year was bigger – there wasn’t a day that the citizens of Calgary did not see and hear from there Mayor. Naheed Nenshi, Calgary’s Mayor was everywhere.

Yes Calgary has better media than Burlington ; we are squeezed between Hamilton and Toronto – but a little creativity on the part of the media people at city hall could have had video done and posted on the city web site and loaded up to YouTube.

The Mayor could have gone into communities and meet with people. He did this the once – to great effect. Handling people and their issues seems to be within the Mayor’s comfort zone; certainly not the case with Gary Carr the Regional Chair.

Burlington MPP Eleanor McMahon is everywhere. She is being referred to as a “rock star” by Ron Foxcroft, chair of the Disaster Relief fund.

Would it have been different were Goldring being opposed in the municipal election for the job of Mayor? Most certainly – but while it isn’t too late for someone to step forward – those who hold their breath waiting for another name to appear on the ballot are going to have health issues.

For those who felt they were left “Up the Creek” – they will work things out and come away with a different understanding as to what their municipal level of government is doing for them.

By Pepper Parr

August 23, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON.
“We should have the door to door work wrapped up in a few days” said Peter Hodgson, lead Red Cross person on the task of learning just how many homes were damaged in the August 4th flood, and the extent of that damage.

Peter Hodgson, lead Red Cross volunteer points to maps that show how many homes were damaged and where they are located.

The volunteers will have covered in excess of 10,000 homes, explained Hodgson. Their data gets sent to the Region, where it is plotted on maps, which will allow the city to quantify the damage.

Mayor Goldring had explained at the city council meeting earlier in the month that “we need to know how extensive the damage is”.  It is extensive and it is tragic.

For Hodgson the story is much more than numbers on a map. There are some truly tragic situations out there. “We were working with a man who had an extensive “collectibles” collection in his basement. “This was his retirement – and it was gone. The man valued it at more than $1 million.”

The dots indicate a house that was flooded. This was not a small disaster.

There was an apartment building that had some affordable housing units in it. The owner of the building had moved a tenant with little in the way of personal means into a basement unit a few days before the flood so he could renovate the unit they lived in. All was lost.

There was an elderly couple who had suffered extensive damage to their house – all of which was more than they could cope with – but they didn’t want to leave their home.

Hodgson wasn’t able to say, but the sense is that there may be some homes that have to be torn down.

Red Cross volunteers get training on what to do at eah house they call on.

“We don’t talk about poverty in Burlington, but it is there” said Hodgson “and it is situations like this that bring these people to the surface – they have no resources to fall back on. The Red Cross is able to help out but just for a very short period of time.”

“We have people sleeping on air mattresses on the floor in some places” said Hodgson. “We opened up Evacuation Centres but they didn’t really get used – but we had them in place if needed.
The Red Cross has a Memorandum of Understanding in place with the Regional government- which allows them to move into a community on a couple of hours’ notice.

Their volunteers were on the streets within hours doing the door to door work. At the same time the Samaritan’s Purse had crews ripping carpet out of flooded basements and doing power washing, while the fire department put a calendar up on their website showing times, when fire fighters were available to help people with the clean-up.

While all this was going on, citizens were making donations to the disaster relief funds – the total on Friday was $140,000

By Pepper Parr

August 9, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON

When there is a disaster in a community the province has a program that requires the community to raise funds locally which the province will match on a two for one basis.

It’s a sort of ‘if you will help yourselves – we will join you’.  You can donate online to the United Way

It seemed to take a little longer that one would expect for the city and the United Way to get together and create a Burlington Flood Relief Fund.  Everyone knew how bad things were by Tuesday morning but it was Friday before there was any announcement about the plans to solicit donations which the province will match.

A number of people have commented on the paucity of information available to the public Monday evening – other than requests to stay off the roads and stay inside your homes.  Tough for those who had water several feet deep.  There wasn`t much more information available on Tuesday either.

Burlington had much the same problem with the ice storm last December.  There was very poor communication between the city and the different media outlets – turned out that the city media people didn’t have an up to date data base and weren’t able to get information out.

For those who were not caught in the storm it is difficult to grasp just how bad it was.  Some television footage tells part of the story.

Well managed cities have contingency plans that were written, tested and sitting on a shelf ready to be implemented in hours.  Imagine how much relief those dealing with flooding would have felt, had they known that come the next morning the city would have the wheels rolling.

We didn’t see wheels rolling in this town until Friday, when there was what amounted to a photo-op for the Mayor and the Regional Chair.

Earlier in the week ward 5 candidate James Smith urged Council to declare a state of emergency and get a disaster relief program rolling.  It might take months to get funds into the hands of people, who have gone through several floods in the past and seen their insurance cancelled or capped at $10,000 when they face a restoration cost of $150,000.

Burlington has massive reserves; funds set aside for specific situations.  Was there anyone at city hall on Friday pouring over the rules and looking for ways to loosen up some of those reserves and make funds available to people who need the help now?

Burlingtonians are generous people – the donations will flow and the province will eventually cut a cheque – but that will take time.  Why can’t the city loan a couple of hundred thousand dollars to the relief fund the United Way is going to set up and have funds move into the hands of that family on Stanley Drive, where they were up to their knees in feces.

Ted McMeekin, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, said that Burlington must declare a “disaster area” for the purposes of the ODRAP program.  That apparently isn’t going to take place until the Council meeting on Thursday – why the wait until close to the end of next week?

A large congregation in the east end of the city had senior staff members driving to the homes of the members of the church with cheques in their hands within 36 hours of the flooding.  If a church can move this fast – city hall should be able to do so as well. .

The Ontario Disaster Relief Assistance Program is intended to ease the hardship suffered by private homeowners, farmers, small business enterprises and non-profit organizations, whose essential property has been damaged in a sudden and unexpected disaster, such as a flood. The program provides funds to those who have sustained heavy losses for essential items such as shelter and the “necessities of life.”

Jeff Valentin, CEO of the United Way said: “The families of at least 1,000 homes in Burlington are struggling to get their lives back to normal following the storm, and some do not have the means to make this happen. The United Way is here to help direct the generosity of people in Burlington toward their neighbours into a fund that can help the people who need it most.”

The City of Burlington has been working with Halton Region to clean up following the storm on Aug. 4, repairing, reopening and cleaning roads and sidewalks, and clearing debris in creeks and parks. Nearly 200 millimetres of rain fell in three hours. The high-intensity short-duration storm caused creeks to overflow and resulted in road closures and flooded basements in many areas of the city.

“We are very grateful to the United Way for setting up a community flood relief fund to help the people of Burlington affected by the flood,” said Pat Moyle, Interim City Manager with the City of Burlington. “The creation of a community-based fund is crucial to the success of securing provincial funding support for the residents impacted by the flood. For every dollar raised locally, the province has the ability to double that amount through its Ontario Disaster Relief Assistance Program.”

“I have spoken to hundreds of people since Monday’s storm. Everyone is doing the best they can to return their lives to normal, clean up their homes and to try to make it work financially,” said Mayor Rick Goldring. “This is truly a very serious situation for the people of Burlington. I look forward to our provincial partners helping the United Way help those in need.”

Halton Region announced that it will support the City’s request for provincial assistance through the Ontario Disaster Relief Assistance Program (ODRAP). The provincial program provides assistance for those who have experienced extraordinary damage due to a natural disaster. The City will adopt a resolution next week requesting funding from the program. To strengthen the request, the Region will provide a letter to support Burlington’s request for Provincial assistance.