MURRAY, Utah — Mayor Jenny Wilson announced Monday that the Wheeler Historic Farm will now be the flood control base of operations for Salt Lake County.
“We've always known Big and Little Cottonwood Canyon are obviously our biggest concerns," she said. "You can see the elevation, the large amount of snow that's still within the mountains, and for that reason, we know that June will likely be pretty active.”
This is the first time the County has ever created this, said Scott Baird, the director of the Salt Lake County Department of Public Works.
“It's a location where we have an area that we can spread out and deploy equipment, and we have a facility here where our employees can meet and grab a bite to eat if they need to eat during their long shifts," he said. "We have a trailer that we can have meetings; we have Wi-Fi access.”
Wheeler Farm is also a detention basin for Little Cottonwood Creek, said Kade Moncur, the director of Salt Lake County Engineering and Flood Control.
“We use this detention basin to actually take the water off the higher peaks at night, and then we release that water in the day," he said.
Baird says both creeks are already at a manageable rate, and if these mild temperatures and cloudiness continue, flooding hopefully won’t be a huge concern.
“Right now, the weather that we're having and the temperatures we're having are really ideal for snow melt, run-off — these temperatures in the low 80s right now, they have all of the creeks flowing really well and the creeks are flowing high, which means we're melting a lot of snow and bringing the snow down," he said. "It's at a rate that we can manage.”
Mayor Wilson is hoping Salt Lake County’s State of Emergency for flooding can end by the fourth of July, she said.
