After going through the 2 worst floods in Valley City I figured I could easily compare the two and decide what they did then compared to what they are doing now and how much more effective it is or was. However, the more I sat and thought about the 1997 flood I realized I was younger than I maybe had realized at first and don’t remember that much other than riding around in the streets in my dad’s truck and the water hitting the running boards on it.
So I am sticking to the present flood and the community I am either going to do is VCSU or Valley City as a community. Identifying a spokesperson for VCSU was easy and kind of confusing for Valley City. Yes the Mayor was the primary one, however, I feel that when she was asked any question she pawned it off to someone else and it was always a different person. There could easily be credibility issues here as you never knew who was answering what question or their knowledge about that matter. If I choose to do my research on Valley City I will be researching more on who was answering those tough questions and what their credibility was.
I will be doing some informal interviewing with my family mostly about what channels of communication were most effective and what ones weren’t. With either community that I might choose to research I feel that my own family has a few members in each community and would be great sources of information for this. One that just works within the community, 3 that are within the VCSU community, one that’s in the VCHS community and then one that is younger and within the elementary school systems.
There are a few mediums that I am going to do research on such as the radio primarily and how effective and at times ineffective it was. Providing specific examples on matters such as no school, conserve water going down the drains, sandbag volunteers, and where sandbags could and couldn’t go, also about the contingency dikes. If I choose to go the route of Valley City my letter would most likely be to the Mayor since I feel she is the primary spokesperson and if I choose to go the VCSU route it will go to the president of the school as I feel he was the spokesperson for VCSU.
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It looks like you have very good ideas going as far as for your project. The flood was a good choice, considering you have experienced it first hand. Also, you made a good point that it is hard to pick one spokesperson for Valley City, because there seemed to be a couple. Although, the mayor was probably the biggest one.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea that the flood was this bad here in '97. I'm assuming that they weren't as proactive as this year considering there was water up to the running boards on a truck!
ReplyDeleteI am also doing my project on Valley City. I chose the mayor for the spokesperson of VC. But I do agree that it was hard to determine who the primary spokesperson actually was. And also, I definitely think that the president was the spokesperson for VCSU.
This year's flooding really showed towns what their mayor was made of. This put a lot of pressure on all city officials and some of them did awesome and some didn't do so well. I wasn't really watching the VC flood because at the same time my town of Jamestown was flooding, but if the mayor handed to much stuff off to other people, that might not look to good if she goes for re-election.
ReplyDeleteGood choice, i see that Valley City was a popular choice, being that is where many of us were during the flooding. The flooding showed just how communities either come together or falter. A lot of this was on how the information was communicated throughout the city by officials. Some handled it well, while others did not.
ReplyDeleteI think that this flood was a very historic one for me, being that I have never experienced such a situation before. I think there is definitely controversy on who exactly, the spokesperson was for Valley City. There always seemed to be various people conveying messages to the general public about various issues concerning the flood.
ReplyDeleteAs for the university I definitely think that the President was the spokesperson and did a phenomenal job in keeping the students updated on the various events.
I think it would be interesting to see what the flood was like in 1997 after experiencing the flood this year. I’m sure that the communication was different in both of the floods. When the mayor was talking on TV, I noticed that she would ask other people questions about what was happening but it was always the mayor speaking on the radio or had quotes in the newspaper.
ReplyDeleteThis flood was recorded breaking. I am wondering why the mayor was not the main spokes person for Valley City because as Annie said "I feel that when she was asked any question she pawned it off to someone else and it was always a different person." if that's what happen then she was not the main person in my eyes. Pawning off questions to someone else leads to creditability issues.
ReplyDeleteThe thing with the mayor having everybody else doing the briefing would be very confusing to deal with as there must have been several people that talked about what was going on in Valley City. It almost sounds like the mayor was trying to avoid doing any of the briefing on what was going on around the community. I felt that Dr. Shirley did an excellent job of getting the message out to the students during the flood.
ReplyDeleteWell Annie, sounds like you got a good start on the Reserach paper assignment. You made a really good point in saying that althought he Mayor was the main King pin as far as the town went, most of the questions were directed toward other officials. In my research I found that some of these other officials were Rich Schueneman (manager of the Baldhill dam), Valley City Police Chief Dean Ross, and VC Public works chief Jeff Differding.
ReplyDeleteSounds like you will have enough people that you personally know that will make this assignment alittle less difficult. It would be interesting to know how the grade schools opporated during this stressful time.
Good Blog!
Either community would be really good to do the research on. Both were hit pretty hard by the flood. Both also had great communication with the public, keeping everyone informed as to what was going on in town and on campus. It does sound a little confusing about who the spokesperson was for Valley City. But I agree that the president of VCSU was the spokesperson, because that is who was sending out most of the emails regarding VCSU.
ReplyDeleteMary Lee is defenitley the primary spokesperson throughout the whole flood. So was Fargo's Mayor when their flood was going on. However there were many different underlying spokespeople out there who also helped handle situations during this whole thing. I wonder how Grandforks' mayor reacted to being the spokesperson in 97?
ReplyDeleteI think the fact that the water was up to the bottom of you dad's truck in '97 just speaks to how well the town prepared for it this time around. From the old timers that I've talked to from around the area, they've all said that this Winter/Spring was just as bad, if not worse, than '97. It's good to see that the town and its officials were prepared this time around and no water came through the dikes.
ReplyDelete