Local residents seek action after repeated floods damage properties, businesses
By Felicity Taylor
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YOUNGWOOD, Pa. (WTAE) — Residents on North Fifth Street in Youngwood are cleaning up after Friday’s flooding, which they say is part of a long-standing problem that has yet to be resolved despite a grant secured six years ago.
Clifford Domasky, a Youngwood resident, described the scene.
“It was like a river from there, clear over to that brush pile over there,” Domasky said.
Floodwaters inundated the street and five surrounding homes in less than 30 minutes, leaving significant destruction in their wake and coating everything in mud.
Jeff Gilligan, another resident, recounted the struggle to protect his home and carpentry shop.
“We were holding the doors tight the best we could to the wall so that it didn’t, because it was just spewing through the walls,” he said.
Gilligan said the flooding ruined nearly everything in his home and shop, much of which had just been recovered from a previous flood on the Fourth of July.
“Took us about two and a half weeks to clean out everything. We just got to clean, and it just happened again. And you’re talking that muck gets into everything. So it could be another couple weeks till I get it all taken care of,” he said.
Residents say the flooding has been a recurring problem for nearly 20 years, caused by an undersized four-foot pipe in their section of the creek.
“This one’s four foot. So all that water goes, and once it hits there and can’t go no more, it just turns or turns around and comes back,” Domasky said.
According to neighbors, State Rep. Eric Nelson’s office and local councilmembers secured a grant six years ago to replace the pipe with a larger one, but no action has been taken. Nelson visited the area on Saturday, but residents are still waiting for answers.
“Someone tell us what they’re going to do to fix it, because they know what the problem is and said they have the money to do it. Why aren’t they doing it? That’s all we want to know,” Domasky said.
Nelson’s office has been contacted for an update on the project.
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