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Governor Kim Reynolds says she’s grateful the U-S Congress has finally approved a 19-billion-dollar disaster aid package that includes money for Iowa communities affected by flooding.
Floodwaters devastated western Iowa in mid-March, and floods have been affecting more and more of the state since then.
Reynolds says officials haven’t been able to get a complete damage assessment yet.
0604reynolds2: 10 “This is a good start, but I think as you continue to see catastrophic disasters happening all over the country, we’re going to need more and other areas are going to need more too.”
Reynolds adds she’ll ask President Trump when he visits Iowa next week to re-open the presidential disaster declaration to include more counties.
Thousands of gallons of untreated wastewater are flowing into the Little Sioux River because of a broken sewer line under the river in Cherokee County.
The City of Quimby (QUIM-bee) reported the break Monday morning. Julie Sievers (SEE-vers) with the D-N-R says officials are unable to determine the cause because the river levels are sitting pretty high.
((0604sievers 0:15)) They will be monitoring the river levels and observing to see if they can see exactly what happened but at this time we know the water levels have to go down some before they can begin to determine what happened for sure.
Sievers (SEE-vers) adds because the river levels are higher than usual, people have not been recreating on the water. Sievers says the environmental impacts should be minor. A large amount of water recent rains brought to the river is diluting the wastewater.
