The City of Melville has applied for support through the Provincial Disaster Assistance Program (PDAP) after receiving significant rainfall Aug. 7.
Mayor Joe Kirwan said the community received a significant amount of rain in a short period of time.
“Depending on what part of the city you were in, it was over four inches, and in my area, it was over two and a half [inches],” said Kirwan. “The sanitary drain systems and the storm drain systems just weren’t able to handle that amount of water, so there was a fair bit of water that got into different basements around different parts of the city.”
Some people would have insurance if water backed up, others might not, he said. It depends on their insurance policies and what their policy includes.
City council looked at the issue and met the threshold to apply for PDAP, the mayor said, so members passed the necessary motion at an Aug. 14 meeting.
“That allows people, if they don’t have insurance, there’s an avenue for them to get some assistance to repair their basements,” said Kirwan, adding almost 100 per cent of the storm damage was to people’s basements.
Melville didn’t get strong winds or hail, he said.
People who need to access PDAP can do so once application forms arrive, Kirwan said.
“There are some timeframes around that they have to get the applications in, but it’s not onerous. It’s not a week or two weeks; it’s longer than that. We’re hoping that this is just another avenue that we can use to assist our residents.”
He doesn’t know how many homes were damaged, but it affected different subdivisions in the city.
“One crescent, I think there was nine homes just immediately adjacent to one another [that suffered flooding]. So, there was quite a number. We’re slowly getting some reports trickling in, but we’ll have a better idea, I think, as we talk to the disaster restoration folks, and see what kind of uptake we get on the PDAP program.”
Melville also had a tornado warning Aug. 17. Kirwan said the city received a little bit of rain, but nothing too serious occurred, and a funnel cloud wasn’t spotted.
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