A housing study estimates the population of a northwest Iowa city hit by flash flooding in 2024 has dropped by about 100 — far less than expected. Keith Carl is the researcher who conducted the study in Spencer. He says only 22 percent of the 750 vacant housing units he identified are “habitable” — which means the rest aren’t safe to move into.
Carl suggests the city could consider putting new housing in some of its older neighborhoods.
Over two-thousand structures in Spencer were damaged by flooding in June of 2023. That includes 80 homes that collapsed or had foundations that caved in.
