A Dallas County man died Wednesday afternoon near Perry, when the pickup he was driving went out of control and rolled into a ditch. The Iowa State Patrol says 44-year old Andrew Dean Bock, of Perry died at the scene of the crash in the 14,000 block of H Avenue.

The accident happened at around 2:15-p.m., when Bock failed to negotiate a curve in the road, and his 2003 GMC Sierra rolled into the east ditch. The Patrol says Bock was not wearing a seatbelt.

With flooding in many areas of the state and the extended forecast calling for more rain, Iowans who’ve not had wet basements before are having to face unfriendly realities. Art Hill, spokesman for the city of Council Bluffs, is warning homeowners in that southwest Iowa city to take more precautions against the rising Missouri River. 

Hill says, “At this stage, we’re recommending that anybody that has any sort of threat or history of having groundwater coming up into their house, get your valuables out of the basement.” Hill says residents need to be prepared by packing an emergency kit that includes money, important paperwork, medications, baby items and clothing. Also, he says to make a plan that includes where to meet family members in the case of evacuation.

“We want everyone to be prepared as we look at the rain that’s going to be coming over the next several days and the situation we have,” he says. Hill also suggests taking the time to inspect your basement walls and the foundation. Just across the Missouri River, Omaha leaders are renewing the call for volunteers to help fill sandbags. Two weeks ago, the city’s Levi Carter Park was converted into a massive sandbag-filling factory. Melinda Pearson, Omaha’s director of Parks and Recreation, says the 100-thousand sandbags that were just filled are already spoken for and many more are needed.

“We’d like anywhere between 100- and 200-thousand sitting without being taken to somewhere else,” Pearson says. “Right now, the ones that were created at Levi Carter are mostly gone. They have been moved.” Pearson says hundreds of volunteers are being recruited through companies, individuals and families. She says many sandbag fillers are burning the candle at both ends.

“We’re asking the city to continue be helpful,” Pearson says. “We do want to come into a little bit more manageable schedule so our people don’t get burned out and our volunteers don’t get burned out.” Sandbagging operations will run until 8 o’clock tonight (Thursday), Friday and Saturday at Levi Carter Park.

State officials are preparing for the impact of increased water flow on the Missouri River from the Gavins Point Dam in South Dakota. Emergency Management and Homeland Security director, Derek Hill, says the increase is expected to raise the water levee in Sioux City from one half to one foot, while in Council Bluffs and points south, it will go up only inches. Hill says they do expect other impacts from the rise in water. 

He says the increase flow will create more backup in the tributaries, as there has already been some backup. Hill says it is particularly a concern if there is more rain. Hill says the increase flow also increases the pressure on, and water flow around structures that they are already monitoring. 

Hill says the most obvious concern are the levees as the increased flow and pressure could cause boils to form. He says they will continue with patrols looking boils on the levee. Hill says that’s not the only concern. 

Hill says they are also watching to see how the increased flow impacts the embankments against the bridges and the culverts and the roads that have gone under water. Hill was asked which tributaries that flow west cause the most concern.

He says “basically all of them” as he says the Nishnabotna floods periodically anyway and it backs up for several miles, the Floyd River, the Big Sioux and Perry Creek which flows into Sioux City. Hill says residents around those rivers should be prepared for possible flooding. 

Hill says their advice for people on the tributaries or areas that could be inundated with heavy rain, is they should be prepared for flooding. He says people living near levees should also be alert to the changing conditions. The Fremont County emergency manager ordered mandatory evacuations Wednesday for resident who live west of Interstate 29. Hill says that’s a precaution mainly because the levee there is new. 

Hill says the dirt was settled the best it could be, but he says it has not like an older levee where the earth as had the opportunity to naturally compact. Hill says they are monitoring all the levees in the area and do not have a particular concern about one over the other. Hill says the impact of the increased Gavins Point output will be less downstream of Sioux City as the water has gone down some there and that will be offset by the increase flow. Hill made his comments during an update Wednesday afternoon.

Iowa’s emergency call centers are facing a deadline to upgrade their equipment, or pay big federal fines, but their major source of the money for the upgrades has been disappearing. Phone users are required to pay a 9-1-1 surcharge, but the surcharge paid on cellphones is less than that paid on land lines, and more and more people are no longer using land lines. Bob Sievert is emergency management director in Shelby county, and he heads an association of similar officials.

“Sixty-five of Iowa’s 99 counties are experiencing a decrease in revenue because of the migration of people from traditional wire line phones in their homes to either wireless technology, a cellphone or and I-P based phone,” Sievert says. Sievert explains that most Iowans pay a one dollar 9-1-1 surcharge on their land line phones every month which all goes to counties to pay for the service.

A cellphone bill has a monthly 9-1-1 surcharge of 65 cents, and only 25 cents of that goes back to local governments. The F-C-C is cutting in half the bandwidth public safety radio systems use and that will require all new equipment by December 31 2012. Sievert says it’s not likely federal officials will change the deadline.

He says the F-C-C mandate has been pushed back many times, and they have now “drawn a line in the sand” and said the change has to be made by the end of 2012. Senator Tom Hancock, a Democrat from Epworth in Dubuque County, tried to get the legislature to raise the mandatory surcharge on cellphone bills to the dollar most landline users pay. The extra 35 cents would go to local governments to let them make the mandated upgrade, but Hancock says cellphone companies fought the bill.

 “You call it what you like, a user fee, a tax increase, it was considered a tax increase and I think that’s why it didn’t get a bunt in the Iowa Senate,” Hancock says. Hancock is a retired firefighter, and is worried about how local agencies, especially volunteer fire departments can raise the money.

 He says there are only so many bake sales and pancake breakfasts you can have to pay for things. Cellphone companies are urging lawmakers to help counties out with infrastructure funds instead of raising the surcharge. Hancock says local governments may have to raise taxes to pay for the upgrades. Or in a kind of ironic twist, voters have the option of raising the monthly surcharge on land lines to two-dollars-and-50 cents ($2.50). Linn county voters rejected that. Shelby county voters approved it.

(Dar Danielson/Radio Iowa)