Minden Hills mayor Bob Carter said downtown Minden is not out of the woods yet when it comes to the potential for flooding.
“We’re going to be on flood watch right through to next weekend. It’s not over at that point, but that’s our critical time,” he said April 14.
He said while warming temperatures are maximizing snow melt in the County, “north of here, we still have significant snowpack. Even if it isn’t a lot of snow, it’s very dense. It’s got a lot of water in it.”
He said Parks Canada is shifting water through the system.
Carter said, “we thought it was going to be this past Monday and Tuesday’s (April 14-15) weather event. It’s actually going to be the weather at the end of this week.” Environment Canada is calling for rain April 18 and 19.
That said, the mayor added if the weather forecast holds true with minimal precipitation, “we’ll be able to get through this.”
He said the key thing is the amount of precipitation and where it falls.
“If it happens in Minden and Gull Lake, we’ve got no problems. If it happens on Kennisis, then we’ve got problems.”
He added the Burnt River is in decent shape, with water levels going down, and low precipitation numbers.
“It’s the Gull River, so it’s downtown Minden, unfortunately.”
Ice storm update
Carter said in the aftermath of the ice storm, there is “virtually full restoration of power” except for people who have cottages on islands. With the ice, he said Hydro One can’t get to those properties. “There are a lot of places where poles are still down that they can’t access even with their equipment.”
He added the township did wellness checks last week, “but almost in all cases they are cottages or people who have left.” For example, he encountered an older woman who told him she had temporarily left her house and moved in with her daughter.
On April 14, the township essentially wound up its warming centre, but were still offering people showers if needed.
They have been offering free brush dumping at Scotch Line landfill, and Chelsea Cosh, manager of waste facilities said they have had 1,590 cubic yards of brush come since April 1.
Carter added the township and County of Haliburton are still doing road cleanup.
“You can see the shoulders are still blocked, and then we have to figure out how and what we’re going to be able to do to help people with this brush and that’s going to take a lot of planning because you need equipment and manpower and chippers are dangerous, so it’s not like anybody can be doing this and that’s going to be the big next stage.”
