Page 94 - Mapping the Nation: Taking Climate Action

93 The area near the bottom of Bee Branch Creek near the intersection of Kaufmann Avenue and 22nd Street saw some of the worst flooding before the project. The city uncovered and restored an eight-block stretch of the creek, which required the purchase of more than 100 properties. "It's a beautiful waterway and park now," Rosemeyer said. "It has playground equipment, a garden, and an amphitheater. When it rains, the creek rises out of the channel and fills the green space, keeping water away from homes. It's unfortunate we had to tear down all those houses, but we needed a safe way to channel stormwater through the neighborhood." For the 275 refurbished homes, crews working for the city applied a mix of strategies that included repairs to foundations and basement windows, adding sump pumps and perimeter drains, installing gutters and downspouts, replacing furnaces and water heaters, and improving yard drainage with landscaping and soil modifications. They also removed mold, mildew, lead paint, and asbestos from homes. The infrastructure improvements encompass the major expansion of three culverts that drain into the uncovered, or daylighted, creek, including the culvert under the railroad, which was damaged during the 2011 flood. Although these projects address the hard infrastructure of homes and stormwater channels, the effort also addresses the soft infrastructure of community services. "We look at resiliency as a triangle, addressing the public infrastructure in the street, the housing structure, and the social situation of the family or occupant to identify barriers to success in their lives," Gaul said. Social Equity Social workers from the Visiting Nurse Association in Dubuque addressed the social resilience aspect of the projects, visiting families during home refurbishment and after completion to address any underlying health and welfare issues. "We're in their life for 6 to 18 months from application, verification, inspection, bidding, and construction," Gaul said. "Then we do follow-up visits at 6 and 12 months, working to make a positive outcome to make sure each person or family is resilient, thereby creating a more resilient neighborhood and community." The city collected data for all aspects of the projects and imported it into GIS to visualize, analyze, and monitor progress on all fronts. "We wanted to collect all the information related to the people who were living in each house to determine if they had health problems, if they had asthma issues, or if there was mold in the house," Rosemeyer said. Each contact was entered in the GIS to record all the work and all the issues discussed with residents. "Some houses have dozens of visits because the social workers got them connected to the local community college for classes or training for jobs, or to the food pantry, or Goodwill for furniture or clothes, or something from the school district," Rosemeyer said.