Falls Church City Manager Wyatt Shields reported to the F.C. City Council Tuesday night that the City’s stormwater prevention efforts are centered on protecting private property, homes and businesses, and that the effort is stymied by the need to recruit two engineers to work on the problem and by high costs of general contracting work, a problem for the entire region now due to its “heated economy.”

Smaller jobs are being handled “in house,” he said, such as work on the Laura Drive to Poplar Drive area and the 900 block of Lincoln Avenue. Other areas needing attention are W. Columbia at Shadow Walk, the 1200 block of Lincoln Avenue, the lower Hillwood Avenue where sanitary sewer and basement flooding issues exist, Sherrow Lane from Tripps Run, and E. Columbia from the Harrison Branch.

He said the work cannot prevent major floods like the July 8 event, but can help with routine “nuisance” flooding.