$23M project to combat flooding on east side of Las Vegas valley
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – If you have lived in southern Nevada for a while, you know flooding is a serious issue and now a $23 million project to combat the problem is underway.
The 71-acre Jim McGaughey Detention Basin will be built by Los Feliz Street and East Owens Avenue to help combat flooding on the east side of Las Vegas.
The east side of the valley is hit especially hard by floodwaters because the infrastructure is not in place right now to help.
“The rainfall lands on the mountain it runs off and goes through the developed area and there are not a lot of facilities down there to take it through the developed area,” Chief Engineer of the Regional Flood Control District Steven Parrish said.
Last September, Labor Day weekend storms caused flooding in many areas across the valley floodwaters damaged homes, and cars and even turned streets into rivers. A homeowner on the east side near where this new detention basin will be built told 8 News Now his home sustained more than $60,000 in damage because of floodwaters.
This is one of the last big flood control projects left to build said Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom who led the groundbreaking of the 107th detention basin. It will be named after Jim McGaughey who helped create the Regional Flood Control District.
“These homeowners here will benefit because once this is down, they will no longer be subjected to that where the floods come in and knock out their walls,” Commissioner Segerblom said.
However, there is still plenty of work to be done and more projects in the works to address flooding in the valley. Parrish said one facility won’t solve all the problems, but the new detention basin is one of several as they control flooding on the east side.
“We have about 32 detention basins left to build in our plan and another 212 miles of channels and storm drains left to construct,” Parrish said.
Construction on this new basin will begin this summer and is expected to take about a year to complete.
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