City and school issue joint statement: No flood mitigation at stadium

Dear Community Members,

The Roland-Story School Board is planning for its next facilities improvement project, which is the renovation of the district’s existing athletic stadium. The board has engaged a 10-person steering committee and has maintained communication with the City of Story City throughout the process.

After a careful review, the board has decided not to pursue significant flood mitigation strategies at the stadium site. Specifically, the district will not install a flood wall or berm, and will not be raising the field level by 2-3 feet so that it is above the 100-year flood plain. There are a number of factors behind this decision.

First, a flood wall/berm or raising the field level is a very expensive process. After reviewing options with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Iowa Department of Natural resources, school district engineers, and architects, it is estimated that a flood wall/berm would cost $2,072,000. Raising the field would cost an estimated $944,000.

Additionally, investments the city has made recently to improve South Park and North Park, as well as recent improvements made at River Bend Golf Course, could be negatively affected by flood mitigation strategies at the athletic stadium. There could also be negative impacts on Story City residents both upstream and downstream if these flood mitigation strategies were to be implemented.

For these reasons, the board is no longer considering these flood mitigation components at the stadium. We appreciate the engagement of our community surrounding this important issue.

Sincerely,

Marc Soderstrum, President

Roland-Story School Board

and

Mike Jensen, Mayor

City of Story City