Money moves ahead for flood resilience project in Longboat neighborhood

Funding is moving ahead for the first phase of resiliency projects in Longbeach Village designed to help fight off chronic flooding during storms but also during less-extreme events that can lead to watery roads in the town’s northernmost residential enclave.

With Sarasota Bay directly to the north and east and the Gulf not much farther to the west, the Village has long been one of the town’s most flood-prone neighborhoods. In some cases, named storms are not even responsible.

Before a series of drainage installations in 2018, higher-than-normal celestial tides led to frequent flooding of low-lying streets as water levels rose through storm drains that emptied into the bay.

Special one-way drains were installed as a result, designed to allow stormwater out while keeping rising tides away.

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“Performance monitoring over the past 5 years has shown that while the valves have successfully reduced tidal backflow in certain areas, flooding remains an ongoing issue in the Village,’’ the town wrote in a resiliency report.

Enter Hurricane Ian in 2022 and the first phase of the 2024 Longboat Key Village Stormwater and Flood Mitigation Project, funding for which was sought in August 2023.

The town earlier this year learned it had been awarded a $2.8 million federal grant from the state’s Division of Emergency Management to target 3,000 feet of the lowest road segments, including Broadway Street, Lois Avenue, and others. The plan includes elevating roads by up to 1.1 feet and installing a stormwater management system with inlets, pipes, separation boxes, and newer one-way valves.

The catch: a $700,000 matching requirement.

Instead of simply writing a check, the town tapped Kalee Shaberts, its grants coordinator, to find grant money to help offset the original grant’s matching requirement.

“We’ve been really aggressive with grants lately,’’ she said. “It’s not common, but you can apply for a grant to help match another grant. That doesn’t typically happen.’’

It did in this case.

Shaberts said recently the money now heading Longboat Key’s way ended up originally going back to the state from Manatee when that county wasn’t ready to accept it. The state then decided to make it available as a match-funding source.

Shaberts said the first installment will be around $230,000 for Phase 1 of the project, then the remainder will come when Phase 2 is ready to begin. 

“They’re going to cover the full $700,000," she said. "We just don’t have the paperwork because we have to go through the phases and do all the red tape from Phase 1.’’

The town applied for the original grant about a month after Shaberts’ first day on the job.

Mayor Ken Schneier thanked Shaberts for the work she’s done thus far for the town.

“I’d like to congratulate you on that and hope it all continues,’’ he said during a June 27 Town Commission meeting.