Rising Cauca River threatens La Mojana Sucreña - Other Cities - Colombia

The heavy rains that have hit various regions of the country in recent weeks caused a new alert in the La Mojana subregion due to new floods in the sector known as ‘cat’s face’.

In this area, located in San Jacinto del Cauca, Bolívar, reconstruction work is being carried out on a hole to prevent flooding in the 11 municipalities included in the departments of Sucre, Bolívar, Córdoba and Antioquia.

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However, the rains caused the Cauca river to have a sudden rise of 1.90 meterswhich caused alert and concern in this area of ​​the country, since the works were affected.

The first complaints from the residents indicated that the works, which have been going on for more than five months, had collapsed.

This situation occurred at the same time that the National Unit for Disaster Risk Management (UNGRD), in charge of the work, announced that the union of the southern end and the northern end of a 1,234 m jarillón had been carried out. in length, a key step for this emergency mitigation work.

“The megabags were moved from the place of closure and a space of approximately 40 to 50 meters was opened again, in addition, the power lines located in the sector were demolished, leaving Guaranda without electricity,” said Arcesio Paredes, a resident of San Jacinto del Cauca.

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However, from the UNGRD they clarify that this situation does not mean that the works have collapsed. Although they acknowledge that a rise of 1.90 meters was not expected, which caused the water to exceed the level at the time of the work, this was not the final level.

In other words, after closing the points, which was what was achieved this week, The next step is to increase the level to avoid damages after a flood like the one that occurred this week.

“We are on the ground and we have never stopped working on the construction site. We will continue working on this stream until the level is above the levels of the Cauca River so that the water does not exceed the structure, thus mitigating the impact of the floods in the entire La Mojana region. The Unit team met yesterday with the communities and authorities in the area to jointly continue these works, which by their very nature are complex. Our commitment to the communities continues”, assured the director of the UNGRD, Eduardo José González.

For the communities surrounding the ‘cat face’ sector, it is necessary to wait for the levels of the Cauca River to drop before resuming the closure works and once again solving the situation that has arisen.

“If it continues to rain and the river grows, we will be headed for a new emergency due to flooding. We trust that this is not the case and that the closure in this place is a reality,” Paredes said.

In addition, for leaders of the La Mojana region, the closure with the megabags is not enough to conclude the work in this critical point of the region.

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They say that a dredging job must be done in the place and on an island that was formed in front of ‘cat’s face’, in addition to building a garden in the back of where the Risk Unit carried out the work.

In fact, yesterday the dredging work began in this sector, reported the UNGRD
“This is just the beginning. The definitive closure in the place is with the completion of the complementary works”, the leaders of the region have stated.

To continue with the work, there are seven crawler backhoes, eight dump trucks, a dredger and two boats with the required machinery in the area.

NATION AND SINCELEJO

US Child Poverty Rising After Tax Credit Expires

The number of children in America living in poverty jumped dramatically after just one month without the expanded child tax credit payments, according to a new study. Advocates fear the lapse in payments could unravel what they say were landmark achievements in poverty reduction.

Columbia University’s Center on Poverty and Social Policy estimates 3.7 million more children were living in poverty by January — a 41% increase from December, when families received their last check. The federal aid started last July but ended after President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better bill stalled in the sharply divided Congress. Payments of up to $300 per child were delivered directly to bank accounts on the 15th of each month, and last week marked the second missed deposit of the year.

The Columbia study, which combines annual U.S. Census data with information from the Census Bureau’s monthly Current Population Survey bulletins, found that the monthly child poverty rate increased from 12.1% in December to 17% in January. That’s the highest level since December 2020, when the U.S. was grappling with high unemployment and a resurgence of COVID-19. Black and Latino children experienced the highest percentage point increases in poverty — 5.9% and 7.1% respectively.

Megan Curran, policy director for the Center on Poverty and Social Policy, said the sudden spike shows how quickly the payments became core to household financial stability for millions of families after only six months.

“It really had a huge impact right off the bat,” Curran said. “We saw food insecurity drop almost immediately as soon as the payments started … all of that progress that we made could now be lost.”

Curran said the increase in children living in poverty could also partially reflect rising prices.

The new numbers represent a serious setback from the original goals of the child tax credit program, which ambitiously sought to cut nationwide child poverty in half. As part of Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 rescue package last year, the existing child tax credit program was massively reshaped, boosting the amount of the payments, greatly expanding the pool of eligible families and delivering the money in monthly installments designed to be incorporated into day-to-day household budgets.

The program extended payments of $250-per-month for children ages 6 through 17 and $300-per-month for those under 6 to most families in the country, at an annual cost of about $120 billion. The goal was to put discretionary cash in the hands of parents along with the freedom to spend it as they saw fit month-to-month.

Republican lawmakers are generally unified in opposition to the expanded tax credit — describing it as excessive, inflationary and a disincentive to work. But when it was originally passed, many Democrats openly declared their intention to make the payments a permanent anchor of the American social safety net.

The goal for the Democratic-held Congress was to keep the program running, and fight about its future months from now, armed with data and millions of anecdotes about the tax credit’s benefits.

Instead the 50-member Democratic bloc in the Senate collapsed from within, with West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin holding out on his vote for weeks before finally refusing to endorse Biden’s social spending package. Manchin cited his opposition to the child tax credit’s massive price tag among his reservations with the bill.

Earlier this month, Manchin called negotiations on Biden’s Build Back Better bill “dead.”

Democratic New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, one of the expanded child tax credit’s strongest advocates, said Wednesday in a statement to The Associated Press that nearly all the children in his state benefited from the credit and that letting it expire was “a moral failure.”

An informal survey conducted of families by the nonprofit advocacy group ParentsTogether Action found a similarly immediate impact to the lapsed child tax credit payments for respondents, with roughly 1 in 5 families surveyed reporting they could no longer afford housing or enough food for their kids.

Allison Johnson, the organization’s campaign director, said the child tax credit payments were designed so parents would “not have to make these really hard choices,” she said.

The end to the deposits makes it nearly impossible for needy families, who may be struggling to pay down debt or cope with major expenses, to develop financial stability or momentum, Johnson said.

“This lack of clarity is super difficult for people. It makes them unable to plan for things,” she said.

Neiva: Alert for Rains and Rising River Las Ceibas - Other Cities - Colombia

Relief agencies in Neiva, Huila, remain on alert due to a flood that was recently detected in the upper part of the Las Ceibas Riverthe main water source of the city.

The mayor of Neiva, Gorky Munoz Calderon, He stated that the flood was detected at the height of the Pueblo Nuevo path, in the upper part, where it has rained torrentially.

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“Due to the rains, we are constantly monitoring this river to know its levels and to be attentive to an evacuation of people, in case it is required,” said the president.

He also called for calm in the community and added that the municipal administration hand in hand with relief agencies “we remain attentive to the evolution of this situation.”

Armando Cabrerasecretary of Risk Management, pointed out that, due to the levels of the tributary, “it is a growing one and not an avalanche”.

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The Las Ceibas river early warning system allowed us to detect a torrential or rising flood that was coming over this tributary. It is not an avalanche according to the monitoring of the tributary.
We are in the risk areas from Risk Management and official Firefighters. pic.twitter.com/WrFnEDKmms

— Gorky Muñoz Calderón (@GorkyMunozC) February 19, 2022

We make loudspeakers and go to alarms in the neighborhoods

The attention of the authorities with the monitoring networks is focused mainly on critical points in the city, such as the settlements of La Veguita, Bajo Tenerife, Andesitos and the José Eustasio Rivera neighborhood, located in areas near the Las Ceibas River.

In the midst of the alert, personnel from Management of Risk together with the Fire Department They are arranged in the areas surrounding the tributary, since the flood could generate an emergency, which would lead to the immediate evacuation of the community at risk.

“We make loudspeakers and go to alarms in the neighborhoods so that the community remains on alert,” said Armando Cabrera.

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FABIO ARENAS
For the time

China-Born Kai Owens is Team USA’s Rising Ski Star

Born in China, and adopted by American parents, 17-year-old moguls skier Kai Owens is returning to Beijing to compete for Team USA in the 2022 Winter Olympics where she hopes to win a gold medal in freestyle skiing. VOA’s Adrianna Zhang introduces us to the China-born Olympic skiing phenom.