Tories would order review

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/09/2011 (5171 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Progressive Conservative government would restore public confidence in the province’s ability to forecast and fight spring floods, Tory Leader Hugh McFadyen said Monday in Brandon.

But Premier Greg Selinger, whose government is now more than six months into fighting this year’s unprecedented flooding, accused the Tories of playing politics with peoples’ lives.

“If they want to come out now and play politics with it, that’s an indication of the kind of leadership they’re offering Manitobans,” Selinger said.

McFadyen said if he’s elected premier he would order a review of how the province managed this year’s flood fight and its performance in getting compensation in the hands of Manitobans who saw their homes, cottages and farms damaged or destroyed.

“We certainly committed to rectifying those broken promises and taking action on those fronts,” McFadyen said.

McFadyen’s announcement came as Manitoba Water Stewardship issued another wind alert for Lake Manitoba’s southern basin, where hundreds of properties have been damaged by waves this year.

Garth Emmonds, whose extended family owns a pair of properties at Twin Lakes Beach in the RM of St. Laurent, said he was having trouble digesting McFadyen’s flood-fighting platform while he was waiting to see whether his parents’ cottage and uncle’s year-round home will survive the combined effect of wind, waves and high water over next few days. Waves came within a foot of both properties in May, he said.

“On a day when they’ve evacuated the area because water levels are rising again, it’s hard to find the words,” he said of the Tory platform. “I’d like to see a commitment to making a statement toward lower lake levels.”

Emmonds also said he would like politicians to promise to pay full market value for flood-damaged properties.

“No one’s really willing to commit,” he said. “I understand that, but I wish they would do what’s right.”

Selinger said his priority on the flood is people, not politics.

“We have put the priority on action from Day 1, to make sure people had the best compensation program in the country to doing everything we could to prevent flooding with the early start on mitigation,” he said, citing dike building in the spring to sending out the Amphibexes to break up ice on the Red River last March.

“We’ve moved very rapidly on this channel (to lower Lake Manitoba). It’s the fastest it’s ever been done, for a major engineering project like this.”

bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca

Highlights of PCs’ flood-fight plan:

Upgrade Manitoba’s flood forecasting capabilities based on the outcome of the review of the handling of the 2011 flood;

Build the leaf gates on the Shellmouth dam to increase its capacity;

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Complete emergency $100-million channel to lower Lake Manitoba and Lake St. Martin;

Expand the Brandon diking system and restore the Assiniboine River dikes east of Portage la Prairie;

Strike a Lake Winnipeg watershed roundtable to discuss water management with neighbouring states and provinces;

Implement an ecological goods and services program to support sound, watershed-focused conservation practices;

Create a water management committee of Cabinet, chaired by the premier, to ensure proper long-term planning and co-ordinated water management decision-making within government.