Photo and video of flood damage in Mount Tremper after Hurricane Irene. By Laura Levine.
The wake of the flood is an uneven time. It was a very uneven flood. And it’s hard to strike the right balance between moving on with normal life and focusing on the damage that still remains in many people’s lives because of it.
I filed a dispatch recently called “Shandaken Wants You Back” that made the point that most of Shandaken’s businesses are ready to get their customers back, thank you very much. Very few of them aren’t up and fully running by now. Main Street Phoenicia, a good point of reference, looks somewhat the worse for wear, but that’s only on the actual pavement. Meanwhile, Route 28 is good to go from Kingston to Shandaken’s western border, and beyond. People can easily reach Shandaken from most places without any trouble.
A lot of folks in Shandaken are working to get that message out, especially after some recent coverage in the New York Times (the subject of another recent dispatch) made it seem as if Phoenicia was among the Catskills communities hardest hit by the flooding, which is far from being true. But it would also be far from the truth to say that everyone in Shandaken is doing just fine now.
Very serious problems are still being dealt with, but that burden did not fall evenly onto all of our townships residents. It completely depended on exactly where you lived or worked. Sometimes it only came down to the difference of a few feet up or down, right or left, as rushing waters staked claim to the paths, ruthlessly efficient in getting from A to B regardless of our thoughts on the matter.
There’s a gully of sorts that makes up part of Mount Tremper, a depression near the junction of Routes 212 and 28. It was one of the areas in Shandaken hardest hit by flash flooding, and I took a drive by there this Thursday. Much of it decidedly is not up and fully running yet.
The Mount Tremper Post Office is closed to the public, but its door stood wide open to allow fresh air to freely circulate through it. The inside is completely gutted; it won’t be ready to reopen for a month or more. Nearby, homes had white official inspection notices taped to their front doors with assessments like “Restricted Use – clean up and repair." Other structures in the vicinity looked to be in even worse shape.
I ran into Dave Smith, a licensed master electrician working for Network Contracting, over at the post office. In addition to being someone involved in a fair amount of the repair work now taking place throughout Shandaken, Dave is himself a resident of Mount Tremper. Glancing at the post office he mused, “Without a post office, what is Mount Tremper, really? We have a post office and a fire house. Without those two things, what are we?“
Soon, in the course of our conversation, Dave essentially answered that question. Near to us, along with the many signs of destruction, were other signs: signs of hope. In front of one of those restricted-use homes was a placard that read: “Thank you for all your help. We love you.” It wasn’t addressed to anyone in particular, it was addressed to everyone.
Dave described how, after the flood hit and the power went out, his own house became an electrical oasis for that part of Mount Tremper. Dave had a generator to share, and four unused refrigerators which soon were stocked with a neighborhood's worth of food. Even if they had little else, the residents in the heart of Mount Tremper's flood zone still had each other, and a party of sorts each night until the power came back a week later..
A short ways up the road I read another sign, this at the Shandaken Reformed Church of Mt Tremper: “Anyone affected by the flood please stop by Saturday. Many donations available. Free Events. Free Refreshments. 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM.” I doubt anyone in Mount Tremper needs to read about it here to find out about that event. Mount Tremper is a lot more than a post office and a Fire House. Mount Tremper is a community.
That is what has been left standing in all areas of the Catskills hit hardest by the floods: community. It can’t easily be washed away, and it only comes back stronger if it does. But community alone can’t solve all of the problems that remain. It will also take time, and it will surely take money. The dike that failed above that portion of Mount Tremper hasn’t been repaired yet. It remains on a list, a long list, of things that still need to be done in the wake of our flood. Repairs are still needed to our roads, to our infrastructure, and to many of our neighbor’s lives.
Tom Rinaldo writes the Dispatches from Shandaken column for the Watershed Post's Shandaken page three times a week. Email Tom at [email protected].
