FLOOD RISK MANAGEMENT

The Southwestern Division’s (SWD) Flood Risk Management (FRM) business line reduces the risk to human safety and property damage in the event of floods and coastal storms.  The program includes 74 flood damage reduction reservoirs with over 33 million acre-feet of flood storage, and more than 760 miles of local flood protection projects.  The cumulative flood damages prevented by these projects exceed $95 billion.

The SWD Levee Safety Program includes levee systems typically constructed by the Corps but operated and maintained by local sponsors.  The SWD Levee Safety Program roles and responsibilities include inspecting and assessing the reliability of the levees and floodwalls in the SWD portfolio; communicating risks to life, property and the environment to local communities; assisting local communities in flood fighting; and developing and sharing state of the art approaches, tools and standards related to levee safety as a means to raise the understanding of risks posed by levees as well as methods and tools to assess, communicate and address those risks.

The SWD Dam Safety Program is built on the principles of holding life safety paramount above all objectives, and through communicating risks openly to the public and stakeholders through ensures all dams are designed, constructed, operated, and maintained as safely and effectively as is reasonably possible.  At the 91 multi-purpose dams within the region, this work includes of routine inspections.  The SWD Dam Safety Production Center, located in Tulsa, Oklahoma conducts non-routine activities such as conducting Dam Safety Modification Studies (DSMS) to identify remediation measures to reduce the risk to the public.