Olmsted County Extends Help to Residents With Flood Damage

By Jeffrey Pieters, Post-Bulletin, Rochester, Minn.

Aug. 24–Despite its own damage tab that might top $25 million, Olmsted County is a helper to neighboring counties in the aftermath of last weekend’s flood.

“I don’t want to minimize what has happened in Olmsted County, ’cause we had serious damage,” said county board chairman Jim Bier. “But it’s not to the extent that Winona and Houston (had). We’re trying to help them out.”

Here is how Olmsted County has helped:

–Early Sunday morning, sent the Sheriff’s Department Dive Team to assist with water rescues in Rushford.

–Sent seven assessors to Winona County to help estimate and tabulate property damage.

–Temporarily relaxed a ban on out-of-county waste at the Kalmar Landfill, and extended haulers’ daily drop-off hours to 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

–Its Public Health Department distributed custom-made packets of information describing proper cleanup practices.

–The Community Services Department dispatched community-work-service crews to help clean flooded basements, and offered mental-health professionals to counsel the traumatized.

In addition Public Health was planning to send a team of public health nurses, sanitarians and health educators to Winona on Friday. Those professionals are to be dispatched to their assignments by a regional coordinator.

Of course, Olmsted County is still fully engaged in getting help to its own residents. Anyone who needs help and hasn’t gotten it just has to ask, Bier said.

“Get a hold of your commissioner, get a hold of public health or Terry (Waletzki) out at emergency response,” Bier said. “We’re trying to do the best job we can.

“This is a major disaster,” Bier said. “We haven’t seen anything like this. Even the ’78 flood was not this bad — we didn’t have this quantity of water to deal with. Anything — don’t wait necessarily for us to come to you, you come to us, and we’ll try and get you answers.”

To get help or offer help in Olmsted County:

–From a landline, dial 2-1-1.

–From a cell phone, dial 1-800-543-7709.

–On the Web, visit www.uwolmsted.org or www.olmstedcounty.com.

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Copyright (c) 2007, Post-Bulletin, Rochester, Minn.

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