Brandon preparing for rising water levels following significant storms

Mayor Jeff Fawcett provides an update as the city of Brandon responds to a local state of emergency, with rising Assiniboine River levels expected to peak soon.

The City of Brandon is trying to make sure it’s ahead of the game as it anticipates rising river levels due to significant rain in the region over the past several days.

The city declared a state of local emergency on Saturday, saying it was put in place due to forecasted levels on the Assiniboine River.

Brandon Mayor Jeff Fawcett said the declaration was made so the city could bring in the contractors to help shore up any areas of concern.

“They’re in there right now at the gold course and they’re going to be over at our Canada Packers Soccer Complex as well. Those areas were going to be inside the two-foot freeboard from the current projection that we received on Saturday,” said Fawcett.

“So right now, they’re in there, they’re topping things up, they’re just bringing forward enough clay to get us to that comfortable two-foot freeboard and hopefully that’s all we need to do and hopefully we’ve got the time to get it done.”

Clay plugs are also being put in place in some areas of the city to connect dikes and limit the potential of any overflow.

One of those plugs has been built up over the road at Grand Valley Road and 18th Street.

“Thankfully we do have a lot of infrastructure in place because this isn’t the first time we’ve been going through these kinds of things. So the dike is good; the dike has been maintained. It just needs a little bit of a top-up. Everything is being monitored. We’re going to do everything that we can do to make sure that we’ve got the situation in control.”

Carl Chandler was out for a bike ride with his daughter Monday to see how high the river is.

“We got to 18th Street and noticed it was definitely up,” said Chandler.

Even though there is no guarantee the rivers will spill their banks, Chandler said he is happy to see that the city is taking proactive action.

“It’s probably a good idea to be proactive, rather than end up in a big, big situation where we’re in a lot of trouble.”

Fawcett said he is in constant communication with Premier Wab Kinew, noting he is very supportive of everything the city is doing.

While the city waits to see what Mother Nature has planned over the next few days, Fawcett is asking residents to be aware of what is going on and is assuring everyone that the work is being put in to keep everyone safe.

“We are doing everything that we can,” he said. “We’re trying to make sure that everything we can do is being done.”

In an update Monday afternoon, the city said sandbagging is underway at locations that need the protection. It is expected the peak of the water will come on July 12.

“The city continues to closely monitor conditions and adjust response efforts as needed.”

Hundreds still without power

Manitoba Hydro said hundreds of residents are still dealing with outages because of the storms in the province.

As of around 1:15 p.m., a spokesperson for Hydro said there were 1,800 customers without power and that restoration times will vary depending on where people are.

“While crews were able to restore several outages overnight, additional storms continued to move through the region, causing further damage and creating new outages,” the spokesperson said in an email to CTV News.

“We are asking customers, particularly in heavily impacted locations, to continue reporting outages. In some cases, when a larger station outage is restored, outage reports may automatically clear even though individual customers remain without power. Customer reports help us maintain an accurate assessment of the situation and identify remaining outages.”

RM of Rockwood calling for infrastructure improvements

While one community is bracing for rising waters, another is asking for help after it was hit by heavy rain nearly a month ago.

Farmers’ fields and people’s homes were drenched by heavy rain in the RM of Rockwood. Trevor King, the MLA for Lakeside, is calling for infrastructure improvements to help prevent flooded fields in the future.

King said thousands of acres remain underwater and residents are now asking the province to address agricultural flooding in the Interlake.

“What we’re seeing here is years, and years, of neglect to drainage systems and infrastructure and maintenance that needs to be done to alleviate a lot of these issues,” King said at a news conference Monday.

King notes he has spoken with the agricultural minister, who says help is on the way for area farmers.

Parts of the RM received more than 250 millimetres of rain during June storm events.