A new agreement has been reached by the City of Hamburg and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to raise the Hamburg Ditch 6 levee system by eight feet. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, the agreement reached Tuesday marks the first project in the U.S. to utilize the Section 1176 authority to raise the height of a federal levee system.

Aerial photo of Hamburg – Ditch 6 shows scope of damage from the flooding. Photo taken Mar. 17, 2019. – US Army Corps of Engineers photo

Corps officials say the achievement comes after the Omaha district, the city and other shareholders worked to implement a section from the 2020 Water Resources Development Act, or WRDA. Representative Cindy Axne said Wednesday, the agreement is a critical step to protecting the flood-damaged city from future risk.

When devastating floods hit Hamburg in 2019, Ditch 6 was overrun by water and sustained severe damage that resulted in the City of Hamburg being inundated with flood waters. The result was bipartisan legislation being introduced to provide the Army Corps with new authority to cut through red tape and provide federal funds for levees in repeated flooding communities.