Tazewell County hopes flood study will lead to federal funding

Charles Owens, Bluefield Daily Telegraph, W.Va.
Updated ·2 min read

Sep. 2—TAZEWELL, Va. — Tazewell County officials hope a new flood study will lead to federal funding support for future flood mitigation projects.

The first draft of the county-wide flood study was recently presented to the county Board of Supervisors. The study examines flood prone communities across the county, and what can be done to lessen the impact of future flooding.

The study is a first step in seeking federal funding assistance for flood mitigation efforts, said Charlie Stacy, the Eastern District board member.

"I think it was a good report," Stacy said. "Some of the fixes obviously are so expensive that you couldn't do it without federal dollars. But some of the things that can be done locally is maintenance, and just getting into the creek beds and doing the maintenance. We want to explore and look to implement what we can do on our own."

Stacy said the county is hoping to receive federal assistance from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which years ago oversaw a large-scale flood proofing initiative in neighboring Buchanan County. That project involved the actual relocation of a flood-prone town across the Levisa River.

"I think one of the audiences at the federal level we are trying to get the attention of is the Army Corps of Engineers," Stacy said. "They did a lot of the flood work that was done in Buchanan County when that work was done."

Stacy said FEMA also can assist with flood mitigation efforts, even when a disaster declaration isn't declared.

Seeking help from the federal government is the next step, but for now each of the five county supervisors will be seeking public input on the flood study from constituents in their districts.

"I'm more focused on what can be done on the Eastern District end to help with our flooding," Stacy said.

The Eastern District, which includes Bluefield, Va. and Springville, was hit with another flood on Memorial Day of this year. The same deluge also impacted the neighboring city of Bluefield in West Virginia.

Stacy said he hopes to have community meetings on the flood study in the Eastner District in either September or October. However, no dates for those meetings have been finalized at this point.

— Contact Charles Owens at cowens@bdtonline.com

— Contact Charles Owens at cowens@bdtonline.com. Follow him @BDTOwens