For my research paper I decided to focus on Valley City since I was born and raised there and have been through the flood from start to finish. I saw this flood culminating, oh right around the end of December when it relentlessly dumped the most snow I've seen since 1997 through Febuary. The two blizzards in the middle of March didn't help either. When you can't get anywhere to go ice fishing because your four wheel drive can't make on the ice or out to where the fish are biting you know your going to have a wet spring. Valley City defenitely got that.
Lets see how did I get my information about the flood first hand? Well there where many sources out there relaying information thats not hard to do in a small town. How I first found out that the flood was going to be bad was looking at fargo's case. I heard about that when I was spring breaking in Florida on The Weather Channel. Then realizing we lived in a valley on a town built next to a river I realized...Oh no, where gonna be the next Fargo except worse. After the first blizzard pandamonium was creeping in with sandbagger sirens, VCSU email anouncements, KOVC, the Times Record and that crappy valley new channel shouting all sorts of calls to fight the flood. These outlets all played a particular role in the crisis communication channeled throughout Valley City. The main spokesperson of course was the Mayor Mary Lee Neilson and many other spokespersons where out there for the Corp of Engineers and Valley City Public Works and others. These spokes people where heard through mostly KOVC, the newspaper and the public access channel.
In my research project all of the major crisis communications will be covered including who said them, how they where sent out, and why they were important. Also much of the catastrophies that plagued this poor town for several weeks will be looked into on how they where handled with the crisis communication side of things.
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I am doing Valley City also. I agree with how you said that there didn't need to be that many communication mediums because the town is so small that word of mouth travels fast. I agree that the mayor was the spokeseperson.It seems that wherever I read about the Valley City flood I found a quote from her. I haven't seen quotes from many other people making her the spokesperson.
ReplyDeleteI think it will be very interesting to see how you two think Valley City handled crisis communication. I believe in some parts they excelled and in others they lacked.
ReplyDeleteI lived in Mandan during the whole 1997 ordeal, so i experienced the blizzards but not the flooding. But I think the part that made this so bad is that it all melted at the same time.
Well the mayor being the spokesperson seems to be what everyone else is thinking also. Word of mouth is the biggest source of information to many people including me. Many news articles I hear about by other people before I see it on the news or hear it on the radio. VC made it heard by everyone by either the TV or radio. Something about the flood was always on air.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Mayor Neilson was the main spokesperson during our crisis, she was always being interviewed and quoted in newspapers. Word of mouth is also a quick way of obtaining information, though it is not always correct. The flood coverage was great. People were always being informed of who, what, when, where, and why things were happening. This was crucial in times of emergency.
ReplyDeleteAll of the fall rain that was received in the southeast part of the state also contributed to the flooding. With all of the snow on top of the rain I thought that the flooding was pretty much inevitable. The snow storms that we received after the sandbagging effort began also did not help matters much. The sirens, the emails, listening to the radio, watching the announcements on television and word of mouth all contributed to the flood fighting effort.
ReplyDeleteI first start off by saying that I did not appreciate the " 4 wheel drive pickups getting stuck while driving on the ice" comment. MY TRUCK DIDN'T GET STUCK.....REMEMBER (Shoveling for 1 hour just to get on Moon Lake after I Buried it....haha).
ReplyDeleteHey im also doing Valley City for my Research Crisis paper. I chose valley because this is where Ive lived for the last 6 years. I think alot of people saw this flood comming, including main officials for the city of Valley City and the Coor of engineers.
Also by the way I love the Valley City Channel that broadcast all the news. If you dont like this channel you can always turn it to Poka spotlight with Bev Rambough...haha
Good blog man, It will be interesting to see what everyone else is writting about.
Valley City is definetely one of the major cities that got hit with the floods this spring of 2009. Many other towns got hit really hard and were in utter chaos since this situation has never really been contemplated. But it hit us with a very short warning and everyone kept up to pace... Everyone that put effort into diverting this water situation earned themselves a huge pat on the back and a job well done. I am also writing about Valley City, but not the inner city, but more of the rural aspect. I wanna know what happened to everyone that was down river, like the Pederson farm, Stevens Ranch, and my home, the Fairfield Ranch... I will tell you how this flood affected their lives.
ReplyDeleteHow much did this winter suck? I'm used to getting alot of snow and I'm used to getting late snows, but I've never lived near a river when this happened. The thought of a flood didn't even cross my mind until after Spring Break. Maybe I'll have learned something when this is all said and done.
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