SUTTON, Vt. (WCAX) – One week after powerful storms slammed the Northeast Kingdom for the third year in a row, roads are opening back up. It comes as Vermont continues to try to better prepare for future floods, and federal dollars to pay for that planning are in jeopardy.
Three years to the day, last week, intense rain flooded areas of the Northeast Kingdom.
“Maybe next year I should take out a lottery ticket on the 10th of July,” joked Fred Graves from Sutton.
Powerful storms swept through West Burke, Lyndonville, and Sutton, washing out roads, bridges, and homes.
What was a shallow swale in Nancy and Fred Graves’ backyard turned into a raging river, wiping out their driveway and stranding them for two days. “It was more like the Connecticut River raging in the springtime, ” Nancy said. “I’ve been out here 40 years and I’ve never seen anything like it. It just kept raining hard.”
The couple is thankful for the road repair cavalry working around the clock for the last week to dig them out of despair. Crews from half a dozen contractors are working long hours, filling and rebuilding the damaged roads. “I think we’re going to be over a million,” said Sutton Road Foreman Shane Heath.
Restoring roads, replacing bigger and newer culverts, and paving won’t come cheap for the local budget. “If FEMA don’t kick in, it’s not going to be good. We’re going to have to take a loan out to pay for it all,” Heath said.
The latest round of rebuilding comes as Vermont sues the Trump administration to recover $5 million in disaster funding. The Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program gives towns money to target areas where flooding is likely and engineer projects to better withstand floods.
“When a flood happens, we can have projects ready when that funding becomes available. We can have shovel-ready projects and get that project funded,” said Stephanie Smith, the deputy director of Vermont Emergency Management.
Some are concerned that without the cash, Vermont flood prevention efforts will be left in the dust. With more rain in the forecast this week, Sutton’s two-man road crew is trying to stay optimistic. “Hopefully it’s a nice light rain, and it’ll knock the dust down for us,” Heath said.
He says they’re going to keep working on the roads and figure out how to pay for it, hopefully with FEMA kicking in some dollars later.
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