West Nyack & New City Flood Mitigation Progresses

Clarkstown is moving forward with plans to address chronically flooded sections of West Nyack and New City.  On Tuesday, the town board retained consultants to perform a drainage study of the Hackensack River Basin in West Nyack.  The town also announced a flood mitigation plan for the Cranford Drive section of New City has been developed and will be submitted to FEMA. 

Clarkstown hired Brooker Engineering PLLC of Suffern to perform a hydrologic and hydraulic analysis of the Hackensack River Basin tributary in West Nyack.  Brooker’s 12- to 18-month-long engineering study will include recommendations for mitigating the frequent flooding in the area. The town will issue serial bonds for the $112,800 contract and additional possible expenses of up to $3,000.

The West Nyack Drainage Task Force, recommended Brooker to the town board. The task force had sent out a request for proposals that five firms answered, three of them were subsequently interviewed. 

When a Cranford Drive resident complained about the flooding caused by the adjacent Demarest Kill Stream, Town Finance Director John Sullivan explained a mitigation project was almost ready for presentation to homeowners and FEMA.

Sullivan said Town Department of Environmental Control Deputy Director Dennis Letson and other town representatives had been working on a plan for flood mitigation that involves Rockland County. 

“They’ve developed a plan, a mitigation plan which they will submit to FEMA along with cooperation from the county,” said Sullivan. “It’s very much on the front burners. They haven’t forgotten about it. It’s a big project and it’s going forward.”

When Letson spoke about the recurrent Cranford Drive and Cypress Street floodingat a March board workshop, consideration was being given to reviving a project first proposed in the 1990s. That project had been dropped because of difficulty obtaining necessary permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The neighborhood was severely flooded by Hurricane Irene in 2011. 

Sullivan said town officials would meet with Cranford Drive residents in the next three to four weeks to review the proposed project.