Monday, August 27, 2018
BOARDMAN
The Aug. 10 flooding continued to dominate the conversation at the Boardman trustees meeting Monday evening.
The township’s approach to recovery is twofold. It aims to provide relief to affected homes and to prevent future flooding.
To determine the extent of the damage, Boardman fire Chief Mark Pitzer sent assessment teams to collect data on local homes and applied for disaster relief grants from the state. While the township did not qualify for assistance, he reported that residents appreciated the effort.
“I was out with the assessment teams, and the residents were very happy that we were out trying to give them a hand, trying to get this funding,” he said.
The trustees intend to utilize the Austintown Boardman Canfield Water Management Utility to prevent flooding in the future. Because ABC is permitted to go on private property, unlike the township, ABC could coordinate projects such as digging up unused parking lots and planting grass.
Trustees aim to prevent flooding on developed land by requiring that redevelopment projects implement stormwater management.
According to Krista Beniston, director of zoning and development, redevelopment projects “have to account for all of their hard surfaces. All those projects give us a second shot at putting stormwater [management] on those existing developed areas.”