City public works director Dee Bruemmer is scheduled to appear at a City Council meeting on the issue on Monday. While Davenport doesn't have a permanent floodwall, it has been practicing flood control for the past 17 years, Bruemmer said. That control stresses removal of homes from flood-prone areas, better flood plain management and some reclamation of wetlands. Opponents of building a flood barrier to protect downtown Davenport, the only major urban area on the upper Mississippi without permanent flood protection, say a floodwall would obstruct views of the river that are worth millions in tourist revenue. Director Joe Allbaugh, who said taxpayers' liability for communities that are repeatedly flooded should be limited if they refuse to build permanent dikes and levees.
Some current aldermen say they have no objection to the issue being debated again.
But renewed debate will not change the answers to some of the questions that killed a floodwall proposal in 1984, they say. Alderman Bob McGivern said. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. We can look at our entire riverfront and see where we can get the biggest bang for the buck.'' On the Illinois side of the Mississippi, residents were waiting for the river to recede before starting to clean up the mess left by the flood. Levees along the Illinois shore have held up well throughout the flood, Minor said.