OCEAN CITY — The Town of Ocean City has reached out to Ellicott City with offers of assistance after the historic town was hit with a major flooding event that devastated much of the downtown area last weekend.
For a resort town that yearly stares down major Atlantic hurricanes and other severe coastal storms, reaching out to other communities when they are devastated by weather events has become a natural response. Over six inches of rain fell on the historic town along the Patapsco River west of Baltimore in about two hours on Saturday night. The torrential rains quickly swelled the river and its tributaries and severely flooded downtown Ellicott City, sweeping cars down Main Street and crumbling businesses in what the National Park Service called an “off the charts” event.
City Manager Doug Miller, who was city manager of La Plata, Md. when a major tornado swept through in 2002, said he immediately reached out to Howard County and Ellicott City to offer the resort’s assistance if needed.
“Over the weekend in Howard County, the area of Ellicott City was inundated with six-and-a-half inches of rain and experienced probably its worst flooding since Hurricane Agnes in 1972,” he said. “We are reaching out to the Howard County government to offer any assistance they might need from Ocean City and if they do request help, I will get back to you with more details.”
Mayor Rick Meehan said on Monday he appreciated Miller reaching out to Howard County in its time of need.
More
DelMarVa's Premier Source for News, Opinion, Analysis, and Human Interest Contact Publisher Joe Albero at alberobutzo@wmconnect.com or 410-430-5349
Ocean City, with it's 3000 voting residents, has all those non-resident condo owners for a piggy bank. The continue to build/remodel town owned buildings, purchase new fire vehicles and police vehicles. Their drug investigative units travel multi state where they have no jurisdiction. They utilize tag scanners on visitors. They look for ways to generate more revenue from boardwalk performers and spouses caught sleeping in their vehicles while the wife shops. At the same time, their public benches are filled with sleeping vagrants and homeless
ReplyDeleteNOW, they want to spend taxpayer resources by sending personal and equipment to Ellicot City? Back in the day when Fire/EMS was all voluntary, this was noble but with a PAID/FUNDED force, this is a slap in the face of the Town's taxpayers.
Quite a rant.
ReplyDeleteThe cost of emergency services and assistance provided by OC will largely be reimbursed through state and federal emergency and disaster funding.
Yes God forbid Ocean City try to help a devastated town in need.
ReplyDeleteI don't know who organized this totally but I can say that I know that several of the bar owners in EC are owned by people who also live in OC so it doesn't surprise me at all.
ReplyDelete