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Iowa Silver Jackets

The Iowa Silver Jackets Team has a Vision of strong intergovernmental partnerships that result in comprehensive and sustainable solutions to state flood hazards. Their intergovernmental team of state and Federal agencies, aims to:

  • Facilitate strategic, integrated life-cycle mitigation actions to reduce the threat, vulnerability and consequences of flooding in the State of Iowa;
  • Create or supplement a mechanism to collaboratively solve issues and implement or recommend solutions;
  • Foster leveraging of available resources and information among agencies;
  • Increase and improve flood risk communication and outreach;
  • Promote wise stewardship of the taxpayers' investments;
  • Develop more comprehensive regional flood risk management strategies through participation in the Regional Interagency Flood Risk Management Team;
  • Inform the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers District Commander and State-level agency directors during flood response and recovery activities; and
  • Integrate mitigation into recovery actions.

Team Activities

Budget Savings Analyses of Impacts of Landuse Change

Communities often rely on floodplain maps based on historic flood frequency information that may no longer be accurate. Hydrologic variation due to land use and climate changes may cause greater flood risk than identified in currently available floodplain mapping products. New mapping and modeling with revised hydrology and hydraulics for evaluating flood risk often take considerable time and resources to develop, which a community’s budget may not support. Consequently, communities are making land use decisions based on the best available science that may be outdated and no longer representative of the existing flood risk.

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Nonstructural and Natural Storage Approaches after Levee Damaged

Recurring significant flood events and resultant physical damages to levees throughout the Midwest region have increased interest in implementing nonstructural alternatives to levee repairs. Public Law 84-99 (P.L. 84-99) provides the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) with the authority and responsibility to either repair flood-damaged levees enrolled in its levee Rehabilitation and Inspection Program or to implement nonstructural alternatives to those structural repairs.

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