Charsfield Flood Action Group - Charsfield Village

Charsfield Flood Action Group will also be giving an up to date progress report at the Parish Council Meeting next Monday so if you have any questions please come along. Don’t forget this is not just for people who have been flooded – its about making Charsfield resilient to future occurrences and the subsequent benefits to the whole of the village.

Charsfield Parish Council

What is Charsfield Flood Action Group (CFAG)?

After Charsfield suffered two floods last year a group of volunteers have formed an ‘Action Group’ to act together to reduce the risk of future flooding impacting us all so severely. Many such groups now exist across the country, and they are promoted by the various government agencies and supported by the National Flood Forum. (Note Supported and Promoted doesn’t include money!)

Whilst we want to act as individuals to do the best we can to keep flood water at bay some of the issues we face cannot be sorted without significant public investment in infrastructure and potentially changes to the practices of landowners.

Since a Water Act was passed in 2010 the ‘Local Lead Flood Authority’ (LLFA) is charged with investigating serious flooding incidents where multiple properties are flooded. This is known as the Section 19 (S19) Report, and we have been advised that this provides the best route to ultimately get the risks reduced. Suffolk County Council are going to produce the report for Charsfield, but it will not be quick! CFAG is working with those agencies and the local Parish Council (PC ) to ensure we fully linked into the S19 report process and the recent request for information and observations, which many of you have seen and responded to, is our starting point to ensure the real scale of the flood is fully taken on board.

Whilst S19 is ongoing and is really important it is unlikely that any changes will be made in the short term.

We are also doing the following activities to help us deal with the risk of further flooding:

• Identify and produce a set of Flood Risks for the whole of the Brook catchment. Monitor those risks and any planned risk mitigations or actions that effect the risk. Understand the procedures for routine maintenance and their effect upon the risks. (This may require employing a specialist.)

• Work with the Environment Agency (EA) to establish a ‘Flood Watch’ system. They have already offered to improve our early warning system with depth gauges in the Brook, a direct feed of local rainfall data, and a localised ‘Flood Model’ for the Potsford Brook Catchment. (We needed that recently with Storm Henk!)

• Support the PC to update the ‘Emergency Plan’ with actions to follow and support to be given to households potentially impacted.

• Create a ‘Flood Portal’ for the village with information about all the above, including Web Cams and live data.

CFAG will be present at the next PC council meeting (Monday 22nd) and we will provide a progress update.

Of course, if you have questions or suggestions then please feel free to ask. If you want to help us with your flooding experiences, then either use the form or request a visit. Email by clicking on the link below.

Charsfield Flood Action Group – 16/1/24. Email us: flood@potsford.com