GiIbert F. White
A: I don't know enough about it to know whether it's been successful or not
because the Corps hasn't carried out full evaluations of what's been happening
in the communities. If we ask them they give us information about how many
inquiries they've had. But that doesn't tell me what happened thereafter in
the community. It's like being able to say that so many acres have been
protected by levees or reservoirs but not what's happened in those acres of
land.
Q: So there's been no follow-up by the Corps on what's happened with this
advice?
A: So far as I am aware, nothing beyond keeping a kind of a log, a systematic
log, of who asked them for advice about what. I have the impression that the
service has been downgraded, that as a part of the floodplain management
effort it has a less important role in the Planning Branch of the Corps than it
was expected to have at the outset. Again, this is an impression. Goddard
came in with the idea that floodplain management was going to be a more
important part of the Corps operations than it turned out to be. After he left
the post it became less important in terms of the sort of recognition that was
given to the people in that unit. They have been well informed and very
conscientious individuals.
Q: Do you know whether the FPMS [Floodplain Management Services] program
made any suggestions that the program would not be part of planning but
maybe would be in kind of a branch or something? Were there any ideas
about that?
A: I heard a lot of discussion about it but I was never party to the arguments that
went on within the Corps on that subject.
Q: I see. Do you think this service is known very well to localities? How do
localities find out about this service that the Corps offers? I should be asking
the people in the Corps, I realize.
A: I do have a few impressions that are not statistically valid. Other sections of
the Corps, in my observation, are entirely capable of never telling a local
community there is a floodplain management service. If a community hears
about it, fine. But it's not one of the services all sections of the Corps were
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