Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Flood Documentation topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
MyCoast FloodWatch project pitched as low‑cost tool to document inland flooding and support response
Summary
Representatives from the New York State Water Resources Institute and student interns described the MyCoast FloodWatch app and outreach plans to gather historic and current flood photos for Tompkins County, and emergency managers reported real‑time operational uses elsewhere in New York.
Kristen Hitchka of the New York State Water Resources Institute and intern Ali Hartung described the MyCoast FloodWatch tool to the county Planning, Energy and Environmental Quality Committee on July 14 as a free platform to crowdsource photos and site‑level reports of flooding, link them to environmental data, and make them available for emergency managers, planners and researchers.
Hartung said MyCoast’s FloodWatch lets users upload current or historical photos (mobile app or browser), tag location and date, and add context about the cause and impacts of flooding. The data generate a searchable database and can be downloaded as CSV files for use in planning, grant applications and emergency operations.
The presenters cited municipal examples: the Town of Southampton’s emergency manager uses MyCoast in the operations center to receive field photos and crowd‑sourced reports in real time; a Southampton official estimated the tool provides roughly $100,000 in annual value as a “force multiplier” for operations by reducing the need for staff time to collect and organize images.
Local outreach plans include municipal historian outreach, booths at community storytelling events and coordination with county emergency management and Cornell extension staff. The presenters said historical photos may be uploaded if provenance and permissions are noted; they are working with local archives and media outlets on permissions.
MyCoast is now exposed as a layer in New York State’s geographic information gateway, the presenters noted, which allows GIS users to add FloodWatch reports to maps. The committee discussed using the app to support flood documentation, planning and possible early‑warning workflows; presenters recommended municipal signups, uploading historic photos and coordination with emergency management for operational use.
