8 months later, Buffalo flood repair still going on

Photo by Meg McLaughlin / Quad City Times

By Alma Gaul / Quad City Times

Ron Brougham, 59, didn't know where to start.

It was July and, sitting on a bench outside the converted doctor's office he calls home in Buffalo, he stared at the big pile of debris in his yard.

Before unprecedented flooding on the Mississippi River last spring, that debris had been the drywall, insulation, flooring, furniture and other accoutrements that made up his home. Although he and others had sandbagged his house just off Front Street, they finally conceded it to the rising river.

Brougham found temporary housing and, in June, a group of volunteers from a Baptist church in Kentucky cleaned out his home, removing all the drywall and insulation from four feet down and hauling it and everything else out to the yard. The group also did mold remediation.

But then the debris just sat.

With his dog Chance, his Mountain Dew and his cigarettes, Brougham didn't know where to turn, didn't know how to start putting his home back together. He received some insurance money, but it was not enough to cover the work that was needed. Plus everyone was so busy. 

Through a series of connections, Habitat for Humanity-Quad Cities got involved in late July, first by providing volunteers who loaded the debris pile in a Dumpster donated by Republic Companies, and then with the recovery work that is still going on, eight months after the river crested in early May.

While Habitat has been building new homes in the Quad-City area for 26 years, 2019 marked the first time the nonprofit organization got involved in flood recovery, receiving a $51,000 grant from the Quad Cities Community Foundation.