What can Iowans do to reduce future floods and their impacts?

The Cedar River in eastern Iowa reached record levels in June 10, 2008. Severe storms and flooding left 85 of Iowa's 99 counties eligible for federal public disaster assistance, which totaled more than $500 million by December 2008. Lynch/FEMA

This information was updated Nov. 1, 2010

Learning from recent floods, planning for a better future

Iowa has experienced more frequent and more severe flooding in recent years. Many experts believe that these trends are part of "the new normal," an increase in flooding events caused by land use changes, climate changes and other factors. What are causes of flooding and what can Iowans do about it?

Recent perspectives

• Mark Ackelson: Will this time be different? (opinion piece from Summer 2011 magazine)
• Helping farmers out of the floodplain (pdf)
• Iowa Floods: the New Normal? (pdf) By Mary Skopec, PhD. Trends and impacts of recent floods.
• New policies for the New Normal. (pdf) By Duane Sand, INHF. Policy recommendations to reduce future floods.

Background

• The Losing Ground interactive report shows unsustainable farming practices, exacerbated by severe storms and floods, are allowing Iowa's agricultural soils to be washed away at alarming rates and causing polluted runoff into rivers and lakes. By the Environmental Working Group, using new data from Iowa State University. (April 13, 2011)
• Video clips, from a speech by Lt. Gen. Ron Dardis, executive director of the Rebuild Iowa Office, which was established to coordinate the statewide recovery effort after the floods, tornadoes and severe weather of 2008. See all four clips on our Iowa floods playlist on YouTube.
• Manage land to manage floods, policy article in INHF's Summer 2008 magazine
• Lessons from the last big flood, looking at a post-1993 floodplain success story in Louisa County.
• Proposal for a Coordinated Flood Mitigation and Infrastructure Protection Initiative. Policy white paper by INHF (Dec. 2008).
• Learning from the Floods of 2008: Practical Strategies for Resilience (Dec. 2008). Materials from conference, include news release and presentation featuring comments by INHF President Mark Ackelson. Sponsored by Iowa State University's Leopold Center and the University of Northern Iowa's Center for Energy and Environmental Education.
• Final report of the Rebuild Iowa Advisory Commission Unified Task Force. INHF participated in this policy effort, including its Agriculture and Environment Task Force.
   

For more information, e-mail Duane Sand, INHF Public Policy Director, or call (515) 288-1846.