More than six inches of rain has fallen on the Mahoning Valley so far this month

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

Though the Mahoning Valley isn’t on pace to set a record for the most rain in June, it’s been a very soggy month.

The 6.24 inches of rain for the month, as of Tuesday afternoon, already is good enough for the fifth-wettest June on record for the area, according to National Weather Service statistics that go back to 1897.

The good news is today’s forecast calls for no rain. If that happens, it would be only the second day since June 7 without rain in the Valley.

The bad news is a Thursday thunderstorm will drop a quarter-inch to a half-inch, said Zach Sefcovic, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Cleveland.

And more bad news: There’s a chance for rain Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and it could get heavy at times, he said.

The wettest June on record is 1986 with 10.66 inches of rain.

“I do not foresee breaking that record,” Sefcovic said. The NWS doesn’t “see that as being a concern,” he added.

The average rainfall for June in the area is 3.79 inches for the entire month.

Flooding was reported in several areas of Boardman Township on Tuesday. The areas with the most issues, township Administrator Jason Loree said, were Glenwood Avenue and Western Reserve Road, the stretch of Market Street populated with many car dealerships, and the Hitchcock Road area.

Flooding also was reported on Lockwood Boulevard, Tippecanoe Road and the area near Boardman Plaza.

“In Boardman, if you were in a low-lying area, you got hammered hard,” Loree said.

Although township officials were in crisis mode, dealing with flooding and a few hours in which the 911 service was down, Loree said, all things considered, water in the roadways isn’t a huge deal.

“As long as it’s not in houses and basements, I’m OK with that. ... If the water is in the street and the backyards, that’s OK. That’s where it should be,” he said.

He said it could have been worse, too, were it not for a $1.4 million retention-system expansion the township did off Ewing Road near Boardman Lake two years ago.

“That stopped a lot of homes from getting flooded,” he said.

Flooding also caused Mill Creek MetroParks to close West Golf Drive and the U.S. Route 224 entrance to the park and golf course. That road as well as the north and south golf courses, the foot bridge between the East Golf hike & bike trail, and the West Golf overflow parking lot remain closed until further notice.

Debbie Burnside of Canfield hit a snag on her way to work Tuesday: She turned off into the Shell gas station at West Glen Plaza near the intersection of Western Reserve Road and Glenwood. While some drivers made a U-turn to backtrack, others charged ahead with the water flying in different directions.

“It always gets flooded here,” she said.

Burnside said she noticed much heavier rainfall in June. “I’m sick of it,” she said.

The Westgate Pizza Co. is nearly its own island at the same plaza. Jim Marx, the eatery’s owner, said the water has not come inside the store.

He said the area has had occasional flooding since he opened the restaurant in 2007. But Tuesday’s flooding was nothing like it was before, he added.

Marx said it’s the third or fourth time this year that the area has been flooded. “It’s been going on for some time,” he said.

Austintown police said flooding in the township was the worst in the 4400 block of Burkey Road and on Norquest Boulevard, under the state Route 11 bridge.

Canfield Township administrator and road superintendent Keith Rogers said a garage had water in it on Alvacardo Drive, off Aladdin Street in the Cornersburg area. He also said a detention pond off Tippecanoe Road that frequently floods was impacted by Tuesday’s rain.

Canfield city police officials said Chapel Lane, which is frequently troubled by heavy rains, had calls for flooding Tuesday.

Campbell Administrator Judie Clement said the city received some reports of flooding earlier in the day. The intersection at Struthers-Liberty Road and Tenney Avenue, along with Wilson Avenue, flooded temporarily, she said.

Hubbard police Sgt. William Fisher said the flooding mostly spared his city. “Other than some soggy yards and a few sinkholes near storm drains, it wasn’t too bad,” Fisher said. Fisher reported that sinkholes developed near storm drains at the corner of Melody Lane and Oriole Drive and the corner of Waugh Drive and Saul Drive.

Liberty Township experienced soaked streets initially, but the flooding “pretty much subsided quickly,” said Gino Bidinotto, senior foreman for the Liberty Street Department. The worst areas were Northgate Avenue, Roosevelt Boulevard and Samson Drive. Northgate Avenue, which re-opened about 1 p.m., was the only street closed due to flooding in Liberty, he said.

Struthers police said they were not aware of any flooded areas in the city.