They take flooding seriously in the village of Virginia Gardens.
The tiny suburb of Miami, with a population of less than 2,500 people, is completing its latest drainage improvement project designed to prevent the type of widespread flooding that hit much of South Florida last week.
“Downpour that we had last week, we had not one house or one garage flooded,” said city council member Richard Block.
Block has been in the village government for 20 years. He told us no homes were damaged in his town during last week’s rain bomb event because, he says, the drainage project is working. But it wasn’t always that way.
“The city was a swimming pool, every time it rains, water would creep into their garages,” Block said, pointing at homes in the neighborhood.
The city obtained $850,000 from the state of Florida to improve the situation: building new drains and installing a …