The Branson most tourists know is not flooded now nor has it been. Even when some of the lower lying, mostly non tourist areas were flooded as the US Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) opened the spillway gates in April, the flooding was limited to a very few low lying areas and didn’t impact the vast majority of tourists coming to Branson.
Most people know what a “flood” is, but only a few have heard about a “plood.” Comparatively speaking they are close with an important exception. A “flood” is, “An overflowing of water onto land that is normally dry and usually caused by an act of God.” On the other hand a “plood” is defined as “The overflowing of water onto land that is normally dry, or the constant real threat of such flow, usually caused by the development and administrtion of "The Plan” by the Corps.
Now some might ask if it takes God to cause a flood what is “The Plan” causing a plood? It’s something the vast majority of property owners and business owners had no idea existed until after the floods of April when the levels of Beaver, Table Rock, and Bull Shoals Lakes (Tri-Lakes) were kept at record and dangerously high levels. People noticed days when very little water was being evacuated from the lakes and began asking why.
As the answers began to emerge, it appears, for the first time, the Tri-Lakes general public became aware of The Plan as the Branson Tri-Lakes Community began to pay the price for not becoming more fully aware of it and its potential impacts sooner. From an Ole Seagull’s perspective The Plan was set up by the Corps for the economic benefit of agricultural interests hundreds of miles downriver from the Tri-Lakes dams and most assuredly has more to do with the economics, politics, and exercise of influence than with flood control, power generation, common sense, or fairness.
In a nut shell, The Plan reduces the amount of water that can be released from the Tri-Lakes dams by limiting such releases to the level of a river gage located in Newport, AR. That level is called the “Regulatory Stage.” The lower the Regulatory Stage the less water can be discharged from the Tri-Lakes dams.
Under The Plan the Regulatory Stage is 21 feet from Dec. 1 through April 14. At that level it appears no homes or businesses are in danger of flooding. On April 15 the level automatically drops from 21 feet to 14 feet unless the Tri-Lakes and Norfolk lakes storage capacity exceeds 50 percent full in which case it drops to only 18 feet. Now what’s wrong with this picture?
The storage capacity could be filled to 51 percent of capacity or, as it was on April 15 of this year in excess of 95 percent capacity and the amount of water that can be released from the Tri-Lakes Dams is automatically reduced without regard as to the difference. That’s nuts!
Oh it gets worse, on May 15 the level automatically dropped to 14 feet even though the Tri-Lakes, especially Bull Shoals are still at record levels for this time of year. Is it even common sense to have a plan limiting the amount of water that can be discharged from the Tri-Lakes dams during the very time of the year the area having the control reservoirs usually has its rainy season? Yet, as the Corps fiddled “The Plood” the community’s elected and non elected leaders and paid officials did little more than hum along and dance to the tune.
Is there any official record anywhere that even one petitioned the Corps, on an emergency basis, for a temporary exception to lowering the Regulatory Stages at Newport until the Tri-Lakes levels, especially Bull Shoals, were back to safe levels? Did even one initiate official action with the Corps requesting a process be set in motion to evaluate changes to The Plan? At least Nero fiddled while Rome burned. In the opinion of an Ole Seagull Branson area leaders and officials are doing nothing, absolutely nothing while the very real danger of "plooding" casts its cloud over the Tri-Lakes area.
