City misrepresented 91-93 Coquina Avenue land purchase as flood solution -- waste, fraud and abuse (HCN)

The City of St. Augustine's scienter and guilty knowledge was on display when it denied me a press pass or scholarship to national conference at Flagler College, the bogus KEEPING HISTORY ABOVE WATER Conference, where City Public Works Director MICHAEL G. CULLUM, P.E., made a presentation about the 91-93 Coquina Avenue land purchase as if it were a solution to flooding. Pugilistic Public Works Director CULLUM ducked my questions and asked me to "step outside" when I asked him about this supposed "Flood control" measure at the KHAW pre-conference on January 31, 2019 at the Willie Galimore Center

At the February 25, 2019 City Commission meeting, then-Mayor Nancy Shaver attempted to discuss reconsideration of the wasteful spending leading to petulant displays of animus from two of her colleagues, NANCY SIKES-KLINE and Vice Mayor LEANNA FREEMAN (R-LEN WEEKS). Their animus was just minutes before Nancy Shaver's stroke. She lost sight in one eye.

Has vile vicious vindictive nasty Vice Mayor LEANNA SOPHIA AMARU FEEEMAN been to Confession since then? Pray for her. Pray that she never becomes Mayor of St. Augustine, and Republican Lord of All She Surveys, doing the bidding of disgraced ex-Mayor CLAUDE LEONARD WEEKS, JR., who on September 25, 2014 destroyed Don Pedro Fornells House, working without permits, fined only $3700 by the Code Enforcement Board (after which maladroit City Attorney ISABELLE CHRISTINE LOPEZ publicly hugged LEN WEEKS.)

Good reporting and videos from my friend Bruce Kevin Bates, heroic twice-prevailing civil rights litigant in artists' cases against the itty-bitty-City,'

From Historic City News blog:

City misrepresented risk of flooding and they are doing it again

September 17, 2019 Government 0

City Manager John Regan recently told City Commissioners that thirty-two residential structures suffered some type of flooding damage during Hurricane Dorian.  There was flooding throughout St. Augustine; but, most of the damage occurred in South Davis Shores where Regan and Commissioner Leanna Freeman reside.

Historic City News readers will remember when Regan through his marionette, Public Works Director Mike Cullum, argued that buying property at 91-93 Coquina Avenue for a park, then building a “berm”, would alleviate flooding in South Davis Shores as part of the City’s “Resiliency, Adaptation and Sustainability Program”.  

During the brush with Hurricane Dorian, the South Davis Shores neighborhood was hit harder than anywhere else in the city.  Nothing has been done to build the promised berm.  The berm will do nothing to protect the other parts of South Davis Shores along Quarry Creek from flooding during major storms.

Instead, the city’s existing system collects stormwater in the streets through a drainage swale or inlet when it rains. Under low tide conditions, gravity pulls that stormwater through drainage pipes and out into the Matanzas River or Salt Run.  But during high tide events, ocean water can make its way up the pipes and into the streets, causing floods.  If adverse weather conditions occur at the same time as one of these tidal flooding events, the street flooding conditions are made significantly worse. 

During tropical storms, winds push tide water farther up into the storm water collection system, which leads to more extensive road flooding. If it rains, stormwater can’t gravity drain until the tide falls, so it becomes trapped in the streets, worsening flood conditions.

To address these issues, the City has begun installing what are known as tide check valves. These valves allow stormwater to drain out under low tide conditions, just like the city’s current drainage system, but during high tide these valves prevent ocean water from backing up into the stormwater pipe network.

Not surprisingly, of the 31 tide-check valves installed, Davis Shores was the first place where they were installed.

This is the lot at 91 Coquina Avenue in South Davis Shores. You can see the water flowing over the lot and onto the street.  Historic City News videographer Bruce Bates

Regan and Cullum continue to tap dance around the truth, claiming that tidal flooding has essentially been eliminated in areas where these valves have been installed. They even claim that the valves offered some flood protection during Hurricane Dorian; despite all evidence to the contrary.

Video shows the adjacent channel and outfall pipe overflowing onto Coquina Avenue, across the street from the lift station at 91-93 Coquina Avenue.  Historic City News videographer Bruce Bates

“The thirty-one tide check valves that we installed city wide, most performed as designed. We had a couple that did not, and they’ll be inspected,” Regan recently told City Commissioners.  “For a low storm like Dorian, they do what they’re designed for.  The North Davis Shores valves that we installed worked very well.”

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The truth is, the city’s “flood mitigation” claim was just a cover story to get the City Commission to spend one half million dollars in city emergency reserve funds to create a park in one commissioner’s neighborhood. The fact that the city’s berm would make no real difference during a serious storm was well identified during the commission debate earlier this year. It just didn’t matter.