A farm family in the RM of Grahamdale that was hit badly by overland flooding starting on the weekend of Aug. 24 said they felt abandoned by their municipality and fire department when they put out a call for help after floodwaters advanced towards their home overnight.
Natascha Kitchur, who lives near St. Martin, said her family’s mobile home was surrounded by water and it flooded their yard and garage. And their grain and hay crops were essentially drowned, leaving them with little or no winter feed for their 200 cattle.
“We got hit by the storm on Saturday [Aug 24]. There was a torrential downpour with tornado-like winds. We went to bed Saturday while there were only puddles in our yard – we’re used to spring flooding so this wasn’t new to us,” said Kitchur on Wednesday while still dealing with the flooding that forced her and her husband and kids to move in with relatives. “But the amount of water we woke up to on Sunday morning at 6 a.m. was definitely new to us. It was far past where spring runoff normally sits in the yard; it was up to my [kids’] playhouse and the rain was still coming down.”
Kitchur sent out a plea for help and photos of the rising water to their RM councillor Dollard Gould on Sunday morning at about 9:30, but the family received no practical help (no sandbags, sand, pumps, volunteers) that day, she said. It wasn’t until late afternoon on Monday that staff from the local [provincial] conservation office and the family’s relatives and friends – some of whom drove for four hours to get to their home – were able to start sandbagging the residence.
Conservation also brought its own pumps to remove water from inside the dyke that was built around their home, said Kitchur, as she thinks the municipality might not have any. Her husband said the fire department doesn’t have pumps.
“They [the RM] didn’t help us on Sunday. The only help we got was from the septic to pump out my tank because it was coming up into my toilet,” she said. “At 5:45 p.m. or so we got a text message from Dollard, our councillor, saying that [RM public works] had come by our yard and there’s nothing that can be done for us until the water recedes.”
With that, the family was left to deal with the situation themselves. On Monday morning, the water had advanced to the home’s deck steps.
“We continued to ask for help. We finally got [empty] sandbags at about 11 a.m. on Monday. But our sand didn’t arrive until 3 p.m. that day. We had to fill the bags ourselves. By that time, we were sandbagging in near knee-deep water,” she said. “We had the Gypsumville conservation team sitting in my yard waiting for the sand to be delivered. They had come to help us sandbag. While we were waiting, the four gentlemen actually helped me load up all my belongings into my vehicle. They were the only help offered to us at the time.”
The Kitchurs’ home sits about a foot and half to two feet off the ground and is saturated underneath, she said. They’re not sure if the home will start to sink. Her garage and its contents were flooded.
“My garage is under water and everything in my garage, including our lawnmower, my kids’ toys, my husband’s tools. Whatever didn’t get lifted in time is under water,” she said. “Had we got help when we first asked for it on Sunday morning, we could have protected my garage and my house from being in the water.”
The response they got from their RM really upset them, she said. They also had no emergency services such as police or Hydro come to their property to provide advice or assess possible dangers, and no one told them how the floodwaters were moving.
Express Photos Courtesy of Natascha Kitchur
To add insult to injury, Kitchur said both she and her husband serve as volunteer firefighters on the local fire department, and their councillor Dollard Gould is their fire chief. Her husband has served for two years and she joined in the spring.
“That lack of respect or concern for us is beyond me,” she said. “I bawled my eyes out so bad the last couple of days. Dollard as of today [Aug. 28] has not stopped in to make sure we’re OK.”
In addition to having their home hit by water, Kitchur said they’re sure they won’t be able to salvage any of their hay and grain.
“All our hay in our fields and our grain is gone. It’s underwater. The bales are floating. That’s how deep the water is,” she said. “We won’t be able to harvest the grain because the water is taller than our grain. Once this is all done, the bales are going to be so wet and mouldy that we won’t be able to use them. We have 200 head of cattle. [Neighbouring farmers] have 600 head and all their fields are affected by this water, too.”
Reeve Craig Howse did call the Kitchurs on Monday evening to ask for details of the flooding, she said, and she told him they were “hurt that we were left alone by the RM and that no one really cared that we needed help on Sunday and no one helped.”
She said the family has also been in touch with the provincial Emergency Management Organization (EMO), and that a senior staff person attended their residence.
“The one thing I learned from this is the resilience and strength that my kids and my husband and I have to have, knowing it’s literally just going to be the four of us having to fend for ourselves,” said Kitchur.
The Express reached out to the RM of Grahamdale with questions for the reeve and councillor/fire chief Dollard Gould regarding flooding in the area and the RM’s response. The questions included why there was a delay in getting help to the Kitchurs after they reached out on Sunday morning, how was it determined by public works on Sunday that there was nothing the RM and/or the fire department could do to help them, why sandbags and sand were not delivered to the family on Sunday as a precautionary measure, and whether the RM has pumps and/or sandbagging machines.
Chief administrative officer Shelly Schwitek said they’re “still in the midst of the state of local emergency dealing with the affected areas of Gypsumville, St. Martin areas,” and that “once we have had a chance to meet and debrief, we can certainly get back to you.”
Although some farmers in the Municipality of Bifrost-Riverton were unable to seed their crops because of wet conditions earlier this season and are suffering from low grain prices, they’re not facing what could be considered an agricultural disaster.
Gordon Klym, who farms in the community of Ledwyn, said he wouldn’t characterize the situation in his municipality as an agricultural disaster, but there certainly have been challenges this year with too much water then high temperatures that have hampered seed development.
“We had an extremely wet spring that continued through the season and a lot of guys didn’t even get their fields half-seeded. Fields that did get seeded before the [insurance] deadline had rain again. In the second week in July in the Ledwyn area, we got almost five inches of rain, and low spots [in the fields] were drowned out,” said Klym. “Then we got the heat, which helped dry things out, but it’s not that great for a growing crop because the seed size will be really small.”
Express Photos Courtesy of Natascha Kitchur
Heat above optimal conditions for some plants can suppress growth.
He planted wheat, canola, beans and a bit of winter wheat this year, but didn’t get everything seeded because of wet conditions. Despite that, he said he’s doing alright. And it’s normal for farmers in the Interlake to “struggle almost every year” as opposed to other regions of the province.
“Even though I didn’t get everything seeded – I got 80 per cent seeded – I was probably one of the lucky ones. There were a couple of quarters I did seed but probably shouldn’t have because we were struggling with the weather and wet land. But it turned out for the most part,” said Klym.
The municipality dodged the storm that hit Grahamdale on the weekend of Aug. 24, he said, but heard that it may have hit further north in the Matheson Island region.
Agricultural producers in other areas of the province, such as the RM of Dauphin, got hit badly by too much rain and were unable to seed earlier this season. Crops that were seeded end up drowning.
RM of Dauphin chief administrative officer Nicole Chychota said RM council passed a resolution at its July 9 meeting to declare a state of agricultural disaster. Agricultural production is the most prevalent part of the RM’s economy and the resolution requested that the province initiate a financial assistance program for all those affected.
“It was an unfortunately wet spring, she said. “I know that farmers didn’t get to seed everything as a result of the rain.”
Chychota said that such a declaration does not make the municipality – or any municipality – eligible for disaster financial assistance, but it does ensure the provincial government is made “aware” of the situation.
At its Aug. 14 meeting, RM of Gimli council agreed to send a letter to the Association of Manitoba Municipalities, asking the organization to lobby the government for an Agriculture Disaster Assistance Program. Council had been asked by some resident farmers to make the request.
“The letter was sent on immediately after the meeting and we have received a reply that it will go before the AMM Board at their next meeting,” said Gimli CAO Jim Fenske.
He added that, to date, the RM of Gimli has not declared an agricultural disaster, and that property owners impacted by water/rain “do not require the municipality to declare a disaster in order to make application for a Disaster Assistance Program created by Canada.”
In addition to farming, Klym is a Bifrost-Riverton councillor. He said there are a number of farmers on council and nobody has yet stepped forward to suggest that there’s a need for the municipality to approach AMM or the government to offer an assistance program this year. And programs that are out there already to help farmers have not really been improved despite promises to do so.
A number of years ago when the province was suffering extreme drought, cattle producers were desperate for feed and they had to import it, he said. They did get compensated to some extent under a government program, but he isn’t sure how well that program worked out overall as sellers with feed jacked up prices. And there was no help for grain farmers.
“A couple of years ago [2021] municipalities in the Interlake declared a state of agricultural disaster because of drought but nothing really happened, and I can’t remember any time that declaring a state of disaster helped me out,” he said.
In addition to climate-related losses, Klym said crop prices have tanked to an “extreme low,” and that will affect him.
“Everything impacts us farmers. Some will have a reduction in crop [yield] and overall prices are at an extreme low,” he said. “Taxes haven’t come down. Fuel hasn’t come down. Nothing has come down except crop prices.”
The province’s Grain and Oilseed Prices report of Aug. 16 shows the price of canola having dropped $23.37 a tonne to $523.37 per tonne. Last year it was $761.91 a tonne. All other grains and oilseeds also show a drop in price. And Statistics Canada shows canola prices in June across the prairie provinces are down by at least 12.5 per cent.
Klym said farmers were getting $20 a bushel for beans two years ago, and now they’re down to about $11.
“Wheat was up to $14. But this morning [two weeks ago] I got a [notice] saying you can lock it in for $7. Wow. Who’s going to lock that in? It’s absolutely ridiculous how the prices have dropped,” said Klym. “We keep hearing that there’s a grain surplus in storage worldwide and that may be the reason for the low prices. Or maybe they don’t need a reason. There are only a few companies buying grain out there, and if they get together and set the price, then that’s the price.”
The Express asked the provincial department of agriculture a few weeks ago – prior to the flooding in Grahamdale – whether it had received any concerns from Interlake municipalities regarding an agricultural disaster and whether it plans to introduce a disaster financial assistance program for 2024.
A spokesperson said only that a disaster financial assistance program would be “announced through the appropriate channels.”
