Flooding concerns on Salinas River ahead of forecasted El Nio

The most recent El Nio prediction from the National Weather Service says there’s a 90% chance of severe weather this winter. It’s got a lot of people on the Central Coast nervous, including longtime resident Caleb Randall.

“It’s been so long since we’ve had a good flood and a lot of rainfall in the area we tend to forget,” Randall said.

However, Randall hasn’t forgotten the 1998 El Nio which triggered landslides and floods throughout the Central Coast. He remembers trying to drive to work in Watsonville and being forced to turn around because of the rising waters.

Ahead of yet another El Nio, which some describe as “Godzilla,” Randall says he isn’t seeing many preventative measures being taken. Just look at the bridge on Davis Road over the Salinas River.

“You’re looking at just trees,” Randall shows us. “It’s not just shrubbery, it’s not just grass. What’s going to happen is, up above, as you have more debris, lots of dead grasses, you have smaller trees, as those loosen and come up, they’ll come down here. They’re going to wrap around the different trees then you’re going to have a natural made dam.”

That water, with nowhere to go, will top its banks and spread. Neighbors and a number of local, state and federal agencies want to maintain the nearly 100 miles of riverbanks, but the overload of paperwork is overwhelming.

“You have to get a 404 permit, a 401 permit, a 1600 permit and that is a lengthy process, said David Chardavoyne, the general manager of the Monterey County Water Resources Agency. “And the regulatory agencies have their processes. If we showed you, and we have these flow charts, all the different steps needed to be able to start work in any piece of the river channel, it’s a little scary.”

In a perfect world, with all the permits and environmental impact reports approved, it would still take more than a year for any actual work to be completed. Right now, permitted work is going on at the Salinas River between Gonzales and Chualar.

“This is a dynamic program so as events happen, as floods happen, as drought happens,” said Shaunna Juarez, associate water resources engineer said. “We do have flexibility within the permit to make modifications and make it make sense on the ground and that’s a really key issue to this program is that it needs to be feasible, it needs to be practical and it also needs to have a benefit. So we’re looking at all of those components as we do work.”

But unless there’s an immediate need, it has to be done by the book.

“An emergency can be declared if there’s a hazard that’s imminent,” Juarez said. “So we want to be as prepared as possible, having the scientific data to support that so that in case of an emergency, we can be ready to act.”

Until then, a word of warning ahead of the rains.

“Forewarned is forearmed and we know there’s a good possibility, that there’s a very good chance that we could get rain this year,” Randall said. “The wise thing to do is to be prepared.”

The city of Salinas is trying to get ahead of this here. Mayor Joe Gunter said the city is inspecting our infrastructure. The fire department will begin training for water rescues in a month or two. Salinas city council member Steve McShane also told News Channel 5 they are planning a flooding/disaster preparedness meeting in October.