Storm damage in Lamesa estimated at $10 million and counting

LUBBOCK, Texas (KCBD) - The damage in Lamesa from this weekend’s storm is so severe it could take weeks to get things back to normal.

“We’re all in this boat together right now, there’s not one person inside the city of Lamesa or in the county that has not been affected someway, somehow,” Mayor Josh Stevens said.

Days after the storm, some neighborhoods are still flooded.

“Levels we’ve never seen ever in the city of Lamesa. We had right at four inches in 23 minutes Saturday night,” Stevens said.

Nora Barfield lives by the Boys and Girls Club lake that overflowed.

“We’ve had floods but never have they come up here or inside my house. This is the first time,” she said.

Alexandra Barragan, who lives even closer to the water, had to completely evacuate her home.

“It flooded in a matter of, it literally felt like minutes,” she recalled.

Nearby churches have rehomed at least 50 others.

Mayor Stevens says the cumulative damage across town is estimated to be upwards of $10 million dollars.

On Monday, crews worked throughout the day to restore power as the flood waters slowly receded.

“It’s been a real trying time, especially for the electrical companies that are in town. They can’t work those lines wet. So they’ve been having to stop,” Stevens said.

More problems are now arising such as the three lift stations that are still underwater.

“Just slowing down our process because some of those pump stations that are down help supply water back to certain parts of the city,” Stevens said. “It’s a slow process but we’ve asked citizens to conserve as much water as possible.”

He also says that road infrastructure is failing because of the excessive flooding.

Sewage has also contaminated the standing water surrounding homes that some are still living in.

“There’s a couple entities that have emptied their clean-out valves when they started experiencing some backing up in their sewage systems,” he said. “We want to make sure that we let everybody know please don’t get in the water, don’t go fishing right now.”

And this week, more rain is expected.

“There’s particular parts of the city that we’re not expecting the water to recede for at least another week maybe two,” Stevens said.

“We can’t do anything right now because we have to wait for the water just to come down,” Barragan said.

Officials are preparing a disaster declaration so Dawson County may qualify for state aid.

But Stevens says the first priority is taking care of the citizens, before worrying about how they will be able to front the costs.

“It’s going to be a tough couple of weeks. But we’re Lamesa. We’re pretty tough, " Stevens said.

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