After a concerned resident made a plea to Penhold Town Council last month asking for help to solve the flooding problems near her property, town council has decided to hold an open house to hear other citizens' concerns.
On June 6, council will be hosting a community open house at the town office at 6:30 p.m. Residents are invited for coffee and encouraged to bring any concerns forward to council.
"What we want to do is try to engage our community a little more," said Dennis Cooper, Penhold mayor.
"We want citizens to come and talk about whatever they want to talk about. At this first one I am encouraging citizens to come with pictures or problems regarding the drainage issues."
Cooper said having citizens bring up these issues to council helps them to know where the issues are in town, and to ultimately solve them.
"We used to have an issue with the area around Lincoln and Dundee but were able to fix it," said Cooper.
However, it was the area around Robinson Avenue and Lee Street that resident Jo-Ann Grimwood had made the presentation to council about.
Grimwood showed videos of last year's flood to council during the April 11 council meeting and pleaded with them to help work with the residents to solve these problems.
Grimwood's concerns not only were for her property but also for the safety of residents in her neighbourhood after seeing the floodwaters so high that children could float across the street on inflatable toys.
At their most recent council meeting on April 25, council members approved a response letter to be sent to Grimwood that answers some of her questions she had posed to council.
Grimwood said she will be waiting on their response to her presentation and is hoping other residents will speak up about the flood problems in town.
While the response answers a number of questions regarding the procedure during such a flood event, as the one that occurred last year, it did not outline any solutions to solving the flood problem.
The response does identify the intersection in question as a problem area that is monitored to ensure the pipes are clear but says that during any rain event larger then a one out of 50 rain occurance will cause problems.
Cooper did not say if they are currently working on additional solutions but said that he thinks the open house will help them get a better idea of where to go now.
"I think the open house will be a good thing. We want to talk to people and then figure out how to move forward from there," said Cooper.
