Residents can still apply to the basement flooding program and wait times are shorter
Windsor's mayor is touting the Basement Flooding Protection Subsidy Program as a success for both residents and the city.
Since the last major flooding event in 2017, the city has received more than 12,000 applications awarding more than $12-million in subsidy payments to residents.
A fast-track program was created for the high volume of applications and Drew Dilkens says staff did a great job in clearing up the backlog.
Mayor Drew Dilkens says, now that the program has slowed down, resources are being redirected.
"We have a backlog that we want to see shrink in the building department, get more building permits out in a more timely way. So we're going to take the resources that were in the fast-track program, move them to the building department and add some additional resources as well. Our goal is to move this forward and get this development out the door as quickly as possible."
He says if you live in Windsor and you haven't taken advantage of the program, you should.
"We encourage residents to do this because, even though we have great ambition to fix the sewer system, if it's half a billion dollars, which is the amount that's notionally been put out there, it will take us at least 20 years to move throughout the entire city. So give yourself a fighting chance, use the program, it's there, it's funded and we want all residents to have the best line of first defence."
Dilkens says there's still plenty of work to do when it comes to flooding.
"We continue to work on the $90-million sewer plan for Riverside and east Riverside, but that's just the first of many that will come back later this year. There's likely in the range of $500-million worth of projects that will need to be done throughout the city to be able to provide more safety for residents during high intensity rain storms."
The Mayor reminds residents the flooding subsidy program is still available and wait times are significantly less than they were a year ago.
Last week, Windsor received $32 million in funding from the federal government to go towards the ten year, $90 million flood mitigation project.