Portland can’t dig out of flooding

To the editor:

The flooding in Portland is a Portland problem.

This all began back when the City of Portland was laid out by a greedy surveyor who was told to put Portland on the south side of the Salamonie River but he wanted the land that he owned on the north side of the river to bring him a lot of cash and he got his way and now Portland has to work this out on its own. To correct this grave error of judgment made so long ago is not going to be solved by digging a retention pond for Millers Branch.

A wise man once said words to the effect of, “If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”

If a horse falls into a hole that it is unable to step out of, just pour gravel into the hole and the horse will step up onto the gravel until it is able to step out of the hole.

It is time for Portland to stop wasting money for digging and start filling. My barber’s shop is on Meridian Street and when you open his door you walk up a ramp into his shop. This works well for most of the heavy rain, however he said that his carpet got a little damp during the most recent flood. So there is a point to which you can be above flood level.

For instance, did the grass lawn around the courthouse get under water in the deepest floods of the past? Does the City of Portland on the south side of the river flood? It probably does in a few low spots, but mostly it does not. So it would seem to me that downtown Portland is a natural retention pond and it needs filling, not digging. Even larger tile will not drain this low spot if the river is already out of its banks. Neither will digging a retention pond for Millers Branch, or even re-routing Millers Brand to the east of Portland to the river.

Every few years the city officials call for a new study and spend thousands of dollars that could have been used to fill in the hole. When they get their new study, they ignore what the engineers said because it will cost too much and do some little thing that does not fix the problem but does make the Portland residents think that something of value is being done, only to have a new study done.

You have contracted these wise engineers to bring a solution for this problem and they know what the problem is but they will do what you want to do and take your money because you have money to spend or can get money by taxation, and if you cannot get enough from Portland taxpayers you want to throw your responsibility onto the county and make them pay for your error.

Portland is in a hole, and the only way out is up.

Sincerely,

Max Blowers

Bryant