Around Des Moines

Neither rain nor seasonly-limited produce kept people from the first downtown farmers’ market of the year in Des Moines on May 10, 2008. Rhubarb, a few leaves of spinach, some young garlic, greenhouse tomatoes, and a bit of asparagus from Polk City were the local fruits and vegetables for sale. One vendor clearly labeled out-of-state produce. There were plenty of bakeries, a few wineries, meat producers, and value-added agricultural businesses with booths. Most of the people I saw making purchases were waiting for warm food prepared for immediate consumption.

There are several residents of Des Moines who believe the best economic plan for the city would include no zoning laws. Seeing several signs with rules scattered around the market this year, I kept thinking about the idea that too much legal restriction leads to economic contraction. On the public side of the market, there are instructions on how dogs should behave and times when vendors must start and stop selling. On the business side of the market, there is a new application process that requires vendors to apply online and submit photographs of every type of item to be included with instructions that they cannot depart from that list at all. There may be good reasons for all of these attempts at control; nevertheless, they threaten to squeeze the vitality of experimentation out of the market.

One of the new cottage industries that made it onto this year’s vendor list is Beaverdale Confections Co. You can buy blocks of gourmet marshmallow, lollipops (marshmallows on a stick), and hot cocoa gift boxes. The Kahlua marshmallow was a well-balanced taste but there was competition between the smooth creaminess of the Kahlua and the granular chewiness of the marshmallow. The coconut and marshmallow combination offered uniformity in textures and sweetness. These are not the air-puffed marshmallows sold in most grocery stores.

Often what I find most useful about the downtown market is learning about the many non-profit and political events happening around the city. At the May 10th market, I picked up literature for Walk Now for Autism, talked with Rep. Leonard Boswell’s (D-3rd District) primary challenger, and learned more about Bike to Work Week.

Autism Speaks was founded in 2005 by the grandparents of a child with autism. The organization informs about, funds research into, and advocates on issues related to autism. The Iowa Walk Now for Autism fundraiser will take place June 7, 2008 in Gray’s Lake Park.

Ed Fallon was shaking hands and talking with voters so I took the opportunity for an impromptu interview. I asked him how the campaign was going. He replied, “good,” then talked about Boswell’s refusal to debate and linked that to democratic injustice. I asked Fallon if he thought Boswell’s campaign mailings and his own personal appearances did not satisfy democracy. The challenger said people want to see the two candidates side-by-side, answering the same issues.

Bike to Work Week Project Coordinator Tina Hadden said over 1600 people have registered, which is nearly 300 more than last year. Approximately 70% of the registrants are in the greater Des Moines area. Most of the remaining 30% are in the Iowa City-Cedar Rapids corridor. There are several events being held in Des Moines during the week, which officially runs from May 10th through the 16th. Hadden said the new Johnston trail allowed a bicyclist to miss beating a motorist by only a couple minutes on an annual race from Johnston to downtown Des Moines. Registering helps bicyclist activists to demonstrate support to elected officials for bicycle-friendly polices.

M.R. Field covers local events for AroundDesMoines.com.

(Des Moines, IA, May 5, 2008) Ask your elected officials if it is okay to use a cash advance check from one of your credit cards to pay the minimum amount due on another card. Then ask that same official if it is okay to use funds from one source of government to pay for a project by another level of government. Most likely the elected official would express concern about the former and praise for the latter. Yet, in the end, the source of all those government funds is the same: the taxpayer. In theory and in practice, I favor using taxes from one source to pay for essential needs in another part of a jurisdiction. For example, I have no problem with some of my federal tax dollars earned in Iowa going to pay for food stamps in Louisiana. However, I have major objections to one level of government telling me something is free because another level of government is paying for it.

Take the new D-Line shuttle that starts today in Des Moines as an example. This shuttle will run from the Des Moines Public School’s Central Campus at about 18th and Grand to the state Capitol at approximately East 13th and East Grand. The shuttle will run the loop in approximately 10-minute intervals, from 7:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. It will be free to riders. In contrast, riders of the regular DART buses that cover that same run and a few additional blocks on their regularly-scheduled hourly runs, from approximately 6:00 a.m. to 10 p.m. weekdays and 7:00 to 6:00 on weekends, will see the fare for that zone go from $0.25 to $0.50 on June 1, 2008. DART and city officials sing the praise of this new simple-and-free shuttle. Alas, whether a regular DART route bus or a shiny new downtown shuttle, you and I are the ones paying the price and it is not free.

Similarly, I was not happy when the state legislature passed the $0.01 property tax/school construction bill this past session. If that sales tax were a permanent source of funding for operations of schools, I would have been a supporter. As it is, the construction tax bill has consequences not mentioned by its proponents. Yes, money from retail-rich parts of the state will help construct school-related buildings in less well-financed districts. However, if those districts do not vote in favor of the new school construction, they can use that money to lower property taxes that are already lower than those in many retail-oriented metropolitan areas. In other words, residents of Des Moines who shop within the city may soon be paying for property-tax reduction of corporate hog confinements across Iowa. Furthermore, another expense of the housing bubble was that governmental projects also cost more as construction workers and building materials went to residential construction, thereby raising prices for all projects. That means the General Assembly increased the cost of the Polk County courthouse reconstruction, should voters approve it at a later time. (Supporters of a new courthouse have been arguing since their defeat that the voters’ rejection of their plan increased the cost by millions of dollars due to the inevitable delay. One more thing on that school bill. Many of Des Moines’ big companies that supported Project Destiny have offices in those smaller communities whose property taxes may be reduced thanks to the state legislature.)

The April 2008 Polk County courthouse vote also suffered from the fact that it was about the prison system, something most people do not think about on a regular basis, unlike the sales taxes associated with Project Destiny. Why should county voters be taxed for something they don’t think they will use? I noticed that in the media discussions about the courthouse vote, the voices that were missing included jurors’ experiences, plus witnesses and victims who had to appear in court, a grieving survivor who had to struggle with probate, and even ex-offenders who were transported between the county jail and the courthouse. How would they improve the facilities? It is also possible that money being spent on new prisons in Iowa helped defeat the courthouse vote, at least subconsciously, but I don’t think that would have been a major factor in anybody’s decision.

The final part of this commentary is the tax levies themselves. I took a look at the levy maps and tables available on the county auditor’s website and was surprised at how much variation there is even within the city of Des Moines. A quick look at the table shows a range of rates from just over 25.13, including a sanitary sewer charge, in parts of Windsor Heights in the West Des Moines school district to over 49.92 in Des Moines in the SE Polk schools district.

M.R. Field was editor of Leading Voices: Iowa.  

Valley Junction’s first farmers’ market of 2008 was held on a humid afternoon. Fortunately, the rain and thunderstorms forecast for May 1st held off until the next morning. Fresh produce was scant but not absent. There was a handful of new rhubarb, greenhouse cucumbers, and hydroponic tomatoes. Other Iowa food was available as prepared items. These included preserved meat, jams and jellies, cheese, and wine. Someone was even selling aged garlic. There were also plenty of bakery products, from breads to cakes. Entertainment was provided by musical groups at two different locations. There was a band and a drinking tent at the depot and a more intimate group of musicians north of the community center. Many people seemed satisfied to spend their time admiring the numerous puppies that were being walked around the market. I chatted with a few of the vendors.

Kirk Sloan, owner of Sloan Brothers Iowa Organic Produce, wants to bring Fairfield’s riches to central Iowa. He had cucumbers from the Maharashi Vedic City Organic Farm and clarified organic butter from Spring Sunrise. Next week he expects to have basil and bell peppers, too. Sloan used to live in Fairfield but now resides in West Des Moines. He will be at the Ankeny and downtown Des Moines farmers markets, too.

Maria Burham and her husband, John, started a Knead to Treat about three years ago. Although the idea was John’s, Maria is the one who does the baking and selling. They supply bakery items to Fareway stores in Osceolo and Winterset. I asked Burham to describe her product. She said it is basic homemade, “the kind of bread you would buy that reminds you of your grandmother.” They have scones, breads, sweets, and croutons. Customers can call ahead to order breads and cookie baskets to be picked up at the farmers’ market.

The Harvest Barn, an Osceolo business that opened in 2001, sells naturally raised meats. The meat is packaged in a variety of styles from dried beef to cooked shaved brisket to raw pork loin. There is also homemade fudge. In addition, you can find Milton Farms cheese at the booth. If there is a particular product you would like, you can call Harvest Barn and then pick up your order at the market.

Gino’s sauces were on sale. There was marinara, garlic cream, and Italian. The person marketing the product described Gino’s as an Italian steakhouse. It is located at 2809 Sixth Avenue in Des Moines.

The Brain Injury Association of Iowa, based in Waterloo, was selling helmets for bicyclists and extreme sports enthusiasts. The group holds a walk around Gray’s Lake the first Saturday of October as an annual fundraiser. It also offers a monthly support group and hosts activities for survivors. The Family Help Line number is 800-475-4442.

The Valley Junction Farmers’ Market is held every Thursday (except July 3rd) through October 2nd. It is located in West Des Moines at approximately Fifth and Elm Streets. Hours are 4:00 to 8:00 p.m.

M.R. Field writes about local issues for AroundDesMoines.com. 

The quantity of legislation in committees increased in the third week of the 2008 Iowa legislative session. In addition, SF2054 (HF2098) has been sent to the governor. This bill allows for payment to counties of certain mental health services expenses if paperwork is filed by March 15, 2008, instead of being due December 1, 2007.

A Senate committee passed legislation to exempt from property taxes structural work to farm buildings necessary to preserve their uses as barns, if the barn is over 50 years old. The current tax exemption exists only for barns built before 1937. The bill (SF2075) passed on a vote of 13-0, with 2 absent.

February 29th was the day I spent at the capitol this week. The day started with a legislative breakfast for the Chrysalis Foundation, an organization serving girls and women in Polk, Warren, and Story counties. One of its projects, The Women’s Alliance, is working to increase the number of girls and women living in economic self-sufficiency by promoting employment, education, and health care opportunities. Rep. Cindy Winckler (D-Scott County) was one of the legislators attending and talking about issues with middle school students, the foundation’s board members, and partners from other organizations and businesses, including myself.

The Iowa Water Well Association had a table set up in the morning on the first floor by the rotunda. I spoke with Justin Rewerts of Rewerts Well Co, Inc., out of Nevada, Iowa. Rewerts is on the IWWA board of directors. He .said the association was at the capitol to talk about proposed Department of Natural Resources (DNR) regulations for runoff of muddy water from drill sites.

Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement had a press conference and lobbying day. This was originally scheduled for the prior week but a snowstorm forced a postponement. I missed the speeches because I had to make a quick trip back home to pick up material I needed later in the day and had forgotten. Factory farms and campaign finance reforms are two of the group’s biggest issues. CCI’s literature distributed for the lobby day noted that Iowa is the only state that does not allow consumers to file a private lawsuit under the state’s Consumer Fraud Act.

As I was preparing to leave the capitol in mid-afternoon, I met up with the Iowa CareGivers Association. These are the people, mostly women, who help with basic needs of patients, whether at home or in hospital. In addition to improving their own access to health care, the association’s members are hoping to establish health training standards that can be portable across employers. That way if a direct-care worker decides she doesn’t like working with one group of people, she might be more likely to stay in the field by working with another group.

In addition to attending the joint meeting of judiciary committees, as reported earlier this week in a post on Iowa’s prison population, I sat in on a House Economics subcommittee meeting with Reps. Helen Miller (D-Webster), Art Staed (D-Linn), and Tami Wiencek (R-Black Hawk). The subcommittee met in the House Lobby Lounge. Several subcommittees use this area and it is easy to hear discussions of more than one meeting at the same time. The economics subcommittee was considering HSB540 and HSB569. Gordon Hendrickson, administrator of the public trust division of the Department of Cultural Affairs and the state archivist legislative liaison, was available to answer questions. HSB540 is a simple bill that includes discontinuing an insurance option for museums exhibiting loaned art. There has been no demand for the option in two decades so the recommendation was made to take the law off the books. HSB569 is more complicated. It directs the department to establish a web-based portal for historical documents and to expand cultural tourism in the state. The latter proposal would not be in competition with the Tourism Office but would lean towards better promotion of many of the smaller activities held throughout the state each year. In addition, Cultural Affairs is working on projects connected with the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, starting in 2011. Wiencek was concerned about future funding needs related to the web portal and electronic storage and maintenance of documents. Miller asked that language requiring minority participation in planning of Civil War commemorations be included. This was of particular importance given the continued existence of properties in Iowa that were part of the Underground Railroad.

On the General Assembly web site, select Committees on the left hand side. Click the committee in which you are interested. Scroll down that page to the option for subcommittees. Click on that and you will see individual bill listings. Do not hesitate to contact the chair of the committee if you want to provide testimony.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa. 

The Chicago Tribune’s January 13th edition included an article that featured an Iowan dairy farmer who cloned a prized cow. The story was tied to the January 15th announcement by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) that meat and milk from cloned animals is safe for humans to consume.

The FDA found cattle, swine, and goats that are cloned to be safe for consumption. In addition, the offspring of cloned traditional food animals are acceptable to the FDA. However, cloned sheep and other animals that are not cattle, swine, or goat are not recommended to be consumed directly.  Labeling of products from cloned animals, or their offspring, is not being required by the FDA.

Ben & Jerry’s web site includes an animated cow singing about cloning, which I have not heard. The ice cream company’s site also expresses concern about possible limitations on labeling by companies who want to stress that their products do not include ingredients from cloned animals.

Practical cloning of farm animals has been experimented with since at least the early 1980’s. The FDA’s January 15th statement notes that U.S. producers voluntarily agreed to withhold cloned products from the marketplace until after the FDA made its evaluation. It is not clear at this time how quickly such products will begin to appear in grocery stores or in restaurants.

Frank Reagan of Waukon, Iowa, the farmer featured in the Chicago Tribune story, uses milk from Debra, a six-year-old clone, and four other cloned cows to feed to calves. In the article, Regan is noted as saying that using the milk is cheaper than buying milk supplements. Animals who consume milk from cloned animals, are the offspring of cloned animals, or are otherwise not the original clone are considered by the industry to be no different from any other animal.

The Seattle Times reported on January 12, 2008, that the European Food Safety Authority issued a draft opinion that stated risk for consumers from meat and milk of cloned animals is “very unlikely.” The article goes on to note that the European Union may not approve sales of the products, however. In Europe social and ethical factors must be considered and many Europeans support the concept of the precautionary principal.

A 2004 paper by D.C. Faber, L.B. Ferre, et al., published by Mary Ann Leibert, Inc. identifies several potential uses for cloned animals. These include the production of pharmaceuticals in transgenic cattle and the use of clones for research. The summary of the paper opines, “[t]he ultimate goal of cloning has often been envisioned as a system for producing quantity and uniformity of the perfect dairy cow.”

Denise O’Brien reacted to the FDA’s rule in a telephone interview I conducted with her by saying, “I think it is a dangerous thing.” She said the decision “is an indication of how closely connected our FDA is with the industrial…culture of agriculture.” O’Brien is coordinator of the Women, Food & Agriculture Network and ran or Iowa’s Secretary of Agriculture in 2006.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa. 

George Washington Carver is one of the greatest of all American scientists, and he has strong connections to Central Iowa. He started college at Simpson and earned his B. S. in Agriculture at Iowa State where he also earned a Master’s degree. If you read his fascinating biography at the George Washington Carver National Monument website, you will find among other facts that he made sure when he applied to Simpson that they knew he was a Negro. Why? Because after showing up at Highland University in Kansas, the first college in Kansas, he was turned away with the words, “You didn’t tell me you were a Negro. Highland College does not take Negroes.”¹ Simpson can be proud to have been founded by a Methodist bishop who believed in the equality of all persons.

Carver’s work at Iowa State brought him into contact with two noteworthy professors, James G. Wilson (Secretary of Agriculture) and Henry Cantwell Wallace (Secretary of Agriculture and Editor of Wallace’s Farmer) and with Wallace’s son Henry Agard Wallace (founder of Pioneer Hi-Bred, Secretary of Agriculture and Vice-President of the United States).

George Washington Carver was a spiritual man who felt his work was a God-given mission. He worked without bitterness. Carver was prolific; he held few patents but had hundreds of agricultural inventions and processes to improve crop yields, revitalize depleted soil, and make products from peanuts and peanut waste. The American Chemical Society has a series of pages devoted to his work as an agricultural chemist and a teacher. Simpson College has named a science building after Carver; Iowa State has named a building too.

In recognition of Black History Month and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and in honor of George Washington Carver, Simpson College will be holding a free event on Thursday January 17 2008 at 7:30 pm in Smith Chapel on campus in Indianola. (W. Clinton and N. Buxton). The Reverend Dr. Jeremiah Wright, will receive the first Carver Medal and present the college’s 34th Annual George Washington Carver Lecture. Dr. Wright is the senior pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Dr. Wright sometimes uses the phrase, “Unashamedly Black and Unapologetically Christian.” I can’t afford to miss it so I’m going.

¹ http://www.nps.gov/archive/gwca/expanded/gwc_tour_03.htm (accessed 1/13/2008)

Guest Writer: James G. Lindberg (Jim) is the the Purple Wren’s sweetie and is a visiting chemistry professor at Grinnell College and retired from Drake University.

Technorati Tags: Iowa, Indianola, Ames, George Washington Carver, Black History Month, Central Iowa News

Women in Denim, labeled as a conference for women in agriculture, is an example of how government discriminates against women while pretending to support equality. A recent rule from the Small Business Administration, currently in a public comment phase, is another example. It is important for women to understand how business programs marketed to them differ from events that are not defined as gender-specific but are attended mostly by men.

Women in Denim will be held in Storm Lake January 18-19, 2008. According to information on a web site for the conference, Women in Denim is dedicated to giving women opportunities to learn about agricultural opportunities and financial management, as well as for networking and for fun and enthusiasm Session 3 workshop options are typical of the agenda. Participants can choose from getting to know their digital camera, marketing where the grass is always greener, jam and jelly making, goal setting for women (emphasis mine), and coping with grief. Last summer there was a meeting held by one of the non-gender-based business organizations in Des Moines to talk about agricultural marketing opportunities related to the bilateral trade agreement between South Korea and the United States that was signed in June 2007. That is not a topic at Women in Denim. The new Farm Bill won’t be discussed either, nor will topics such as choosing between a small seasonal business or a multi-level, year-round, employee-based production. Decorating with accessories and losing weight without dieting are on the agenda, though.

The workshop on goal setting at the conference implies that women will have different goals than men. Over the past year I have written about the different way women and men are promoted in business in Iowa. Women are praised for having $20,000-a-year businesses that will take them off the welfare rolls or help boost the family’s total income. In contrast, the types of jobs and companies that benefit from laws requiring above average or median pay tend to benefit men. (The median Iowa pay for full-time work in 2006 was $39,753 for men and $29,824 for women.)

The Los Angeles Times ran a story on January 3rd about rules for awarding women-owned business a whopping 5% of federal contracts. According to the article this rule comes from a 1994 law followed by a 2000 law ordering the SBA to implement the Congressional directive. The proposals would limit contracts to four areas and to businesses owned by economically-disadvantaged women. In addition, contracts would be limited to $3 million or to $5 million for manufacturing contracts. Another requirement is that each agency would need to analyze its procurement history to determine if there had been discrimination. The SBA cited Supreme Court decisions and an increase in the dollar value of contracts awarded to women-owned businesses as validation for its rule. Women objected to the use of dollars instead of number of businesses and to the limitation of four categories. Comments are due February 25, 2008.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa, a news publication for women, politics, and change. 

There is an informative post by Lynda Waddington on Essential Estrogen about a former operative at a political call center in Iowa. It is a reminder that no matter who we elect, there is a professional group of people whose goals cut across partisan debate.

A blog post written by John Tierny, a science writer for The New York Times, opines about a call made by scientists and journalists for the presidential candidates to debate on the topics of science and technology. When I checked out the blog, there were 150 well thought out comments. One person pointed out the need to discuss if we are going to invest in research for those rewards that may be decades away, if they ever are received. The Ames Laboratory at Iowa State University was established to help refine uranium in the 1940’s and is now owned by the government with funding from the Department of Energy.

Amy Morton’s blog about Georgia Women Vote has been an entertaining read. She is a supporter of John Edwards and has visited Des Moines, including a New Year’s trip. She was excited when Ben Cohen threw the support of his Sensible Priorities group to Edwards because 10,000 people supported Sensible Priorities. Her latest post is dated December 31st and is as gleefully-biased as any other supporter’s plug for a candidate of choice. Morton cites an InsiderAdvantage poll that she says would have Edwards win the caucuses with 41% after second-choice preference groups are formed.

There seems to be far more women in 2008 who are fed up with candidates pandering to women as voters but not caring about them as activists. Still, there are many women who keep their opinions quiet. In a December 28th poll, Morton asks where the outrage was when Fred Thompson referred to his wife as a possession in response to a question. Over at BlogHer, several women are wondering why the presidential candidates won’t respond to their request to answer a few questions on camera or even in writing. Apparently, a couple of the campaigns have offered to have the candidates’ wives answer the questions.

Over at the Century of the Common Iowan there is another endorsement for Barack Obama. The reason given is that Obama will lead the nation in the direction it needs to go and will change the way we live our lives. However, there is no indication given in the endorsement as to what the new direction will be or how our lives will be changed.

Candidates had position papers on and talked about rural issues, particularly economic development, early in the campaigns. In the last couple of months, though, I have heard less talk about agriculture. The advertisements I’ve heard don’t mention food security, which is part of port security, or the health benefits of organic food. There is still talk about obesity in terms of health, but no discussion about the role of corn syrup in that obesity. Maybe that’s happening in New Hampshire.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa. 

What would Christmas dinner be if it were prepared from locally-grown food? What would your neighborhood look like if land were protected to provide a varied locally-sustainable diet? What would your larder look like if you could order locally-grown food online? The first question is one I have been pondering over the past week. The third question is one that Practical Farmers of Iowa is hoping to answer. They all return to the main question of what is locally grown food?

In terms of distance, 100 miles is the number often used to define local. However, does that mean grown, raised, and processed within those hundred miles, or is it sufficient merely to be grown, raised, or processed locally? In addition, how far should component parts travel, such as fertilizer for crops or fuel for tractors?

Applying the hundred-miles rule to Des Moines, food would need to come from no farther than Clear Lake; Denison; Maryville, Missouri; Fairfield; the Iowa City-Cedar Rapids corridor; or Waverly. This includes many good choices. There are goat cheeses, the Maytag Dairy Farm, the Barilla pasta plant, Grady’s hydroponic tomatoes, and cattle and hog operations. There are vineyards and farms offering a variety of tubers and squash. Soybeans, the vegan protein staple, are plentiful but peanut oil is not. Blue Bunny ice cream, located in Le Mars, is not within the hundred miles, either. As a child, peaches bought from a nearby orchard in summer and then frozen were a tradition at breakfast on Christmas morning. That, too, is a possibility in Des Moines.

In a sustainable local diet, how much food is allowed to be brought in from greater distances? How is that food measured? Is it counted by calories or by tonnage or by nutritional value? Iowa is not wheat or rice country. Would we need to give up bread and crackers? From where should we get salt and how many bananas or how much chocolate can we allow ourselves?

Transporting delicacies great distances is not new. The trade in Asian spices is but one examples. There was also trade among American Indian tribes. In Victorian England ice shipped from the Hudson River in New York state was praised for its purity of taste. Cheap fuel and private automobiles merely made the movement of food easier.

For some people, local purchasing is simply about how it can help sustain family farmers or the taste of truly fresh food. Practical Farmers of Iowa is looking at launching an Iowa Food Cooperative based on programs in Oklahoma and in Nebraska. Consumers would place orders online and then collect the food at a central location. This would occur monthly or at other regular intervals. For an extra charge, the products could be delivered directly to your home. Before the cooperative is launched in 2008, Practical Farmers is soliciting input from potential users of the service through an online survey as to what they might purchase and what type of pick-up location they would prefer.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa and went with a traditional theme for this year’s holiday dining.

A public meeting was held on Tuesday, November 20, 2007, on Des Moines’ east side to talk about the revised floodplain and floodway maps around Fourmile Creek. The maps were updated recently thanks to a survey by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and compilation of data from storm events. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) last updated the zones in 1987. I was unable to attend the meeting, but I did talk with employees in the city’s community development and engineering departments.

One of the many questions I had was about the proper name for the waterway. I have seen it spelled as one word, as two words, and with a numeral. The single-word version is what the city uses officially. The creek starts in Boone County, runs for 26 miles, and has a drainage area of 92.7 miles. In the graphic to the right, Fourmile Creek is shown in orange. The creek curves down from the northwest (not shown), starting at a point roughly north of the arm jutting off of Saylorville Lake. As the creek heads towards the Des Moines River, it runs through Pleasant Hill from University to Scott Avenue.

Both of the city employees with whom I spoke stressed the large size of the creek’s drainage area when talking about flood control. Planning Administrator Mike Ludwig pointed out that Des Moines has authority over only a small part of the creek’s route. Development decisions made by other municipalities and county governments impact how much water runs into the creek and how quickly it enters the waterway. I talked to people who know the east side area and they thought the city had spent money on flood control about five to ten years ago. However, according to a city engineer who deals with storm water and sewers, a storm basin and related work was not connected to any flooding of Fourmile Creek.

The current map revisions, according to the city employees, came about when residents who live near the creek complained in 2000 or 2001 that their properties were being flooded. Apparently, the 1987 maps did not include those properties in the floodway or in the flooplain. The city received grant money to help pay for an updated study. The Army Corps of Engineers was already in the city doing analysis on the Des Moines River.

FEMA manages the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), which has three parts: flood insurance, floodplain management, and flood hazard mapping. The FEMA web site has an interactive tool to determine how much flood insurance would cost depending on the risk (low to moderate, with and without prior flood claims; high; and, coastal high). Insurance may be bought for either ground or contents separately or for both together. Prices for combined insurance covering $250,000 and $100,000 in ground and content damage, respectively, range from $317 annually for low to moderate risk without prior flood claims to $5,358 per year for a high risk coastal residence. Separate $500 dollar deductibles apply to ground and to content damage even when combined insurance is bought. Some mortgage lenders may require homeowners in a floodplain or a in floodway to buy flood insurance.

A floodway is defined as the channel of the creek plus the adjacent land that is needed to spread the flood waters without raising the elevation of the water’s surface more than a foot. A floodplain is the relatively level land on either side of the creek’s banks that is subject to flooding. The 100-year floodplain is the area around a waterway that is expected to flood once every hundred years. Just glancing at the new maps it appears that, in general, the floodway has been reduced slightly but the floodplain has been expanded by several blocks. However, any given piece of property along the course of the river may have a different type or degree of change as the adjacent land.

The revised maps will not help to provide relief from flooding. Instead, being included in one of the designated areas may allow homeowners, renters, and businesses to obtain flood insurance under the NFIP. In addition, the designations will not limit development but certain requirements, such as the height of living space above flood levels and inclusion of retention ponds, may apply.

The Army Corps of Engineers applies a cost-benefit analysis to flood control measures. According to the storm water engineer, there is a negative cost benefit assigned to Fourmile Creek. In contrast, the value of some businesses along the Des Moines River means there is a high benefit compared to cost for changes along that waterway. Residents living near Fourmile creek believe the cost of insurance should be included in the cost analysis done by the Corps. Flood analyses were also done for the Raccoon River and Walnut Creek.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa.