Some things can’t be purchased with money, and among them is the Chippewa Valley’s relative safety from the nightmare threats posed elsewhere by earthquakes, hurricanes, pet reptiles released into Lake Wissota-Placid or else the north woods for hunters to find (Minnesota), deserts, nuclear radiation, subways turned into lava tubes via turn of the century Hollywood apocalyptic cinema releases like ‘Volcano,’ and the odd and occasional (but extremely rare) Sharknado coming in from the nearby ocean—mind you, the ordinary twister still blows through every once in a while—just ask Cadott. You can’t escape it all, even in the Chippewa Valley.

Given the otherwise inevitable threat of life hazards, then, the Boyd Village Board undertook to approve Resolution 2020-03 at its Monday November 9 meeting, by which ordinance it renewed its adoption of a “Natural Hazard Mitigation Plan” (hereafter “report”) in place of the one said to be expiring.

“Every five years they have to renew or update,” Clerk Sandi Isaacs said of the plan prepared by the West Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission after Village President Randy Setzer announced the agenda item Monday, being followed in her short explanation by a motion from village trustee Bob Geist.

“I’ll make a motion that we approve Resolution 2020-03, a resolution approving a natural hazard mitigation plan for the village of Boyd,” he said, being seconded in this by village trustee Gwen Krizan. Upon the voice vote following the said resolution passed. So what’s in the broader county plan?

For those who like reading, a full 225-page final draft is available in PDF form by traveling to wcwrpc.org and clicking on “Documents,” followed with choosing Chippewa County. Among the potential hazards to beware of in Boyd itself? Power outages.

“There is one powerline into the community, and it does not have redundancy,” the report states for Boyd regarding the lack of backup in case something goes wrong with the local power supply, then giving a precedent for this statement of caution. “A six-hour power shortage occurred in 2018 when the line broke,” the report stated. In addition, there is a reported need for electrical generators in Boyd as the fire hall doors “cannot be opened without power.” Another concern in terms of hazard mitigation is keeping power on for assisted living and long-term care facilities. With the annual budget cycle coming up, it wouldn’t hurt for local governments to add power generators in it seems. The larger report says as much in Section V.

“Should funding opportunities arise, acquire additional electric power generators for emergency use,” the report states, listing this as a “medium-to high-priority” for Boyd, Cadott and Chippewa Falls, along with the possibility of sharing a generator on a trailer between communities. Among the local municipalities that appear to have their act together generator- wise in the county are Lake Hallie and New Auburn, where “no emergency power generator needs were noted,” per the final draft report. The City of Bloomer is halfway there with access to a portable generator available but no such generator “dedicated to the dam,” nor emergency power generator at the fire department.

More locally, the Stanley Mill Dam that holds back Chapman Lake was reconstructed in 2010 with part federal funding and downgraded from a “high” to a “significant” risk, with several low-lying flood paths through the city, including the Wolf River.

Meanwhile, although the demand for storm sirens has gone down on account of the popularity of other warning systems such as smart phone alerts, there’s still the human body to think about, in strictly material terms.

“Identify storm shelters” the report says of hazard mitigation for the communities of Bloomer, Boyd, Chippewa Falls and Stanley, also listing a second storm shelter site as a good thing to consider. “If a shelter is not readily available, pursue grant funding to construct a public storm shelter as opportunities allow,” the report states, with Chippewa Falls needing these for mobile home park and Stanley given the suggestion to include one in new city infrastructure, also a “medium to high priority.” The Cold War might be on temporary hold of late and the otherwise constant threat of annihilation pushed out of consciousness at present, but that’s no excuse to forestall building adequate concrete hideaways from Mother Nature’s fury. Stanley is listed in the meantime as having high priority problem area for storm water and flash flooding concerns. Speaking of which, working to get that flood insurance in place wouldn’t be a bad idea it seems.

“Flooding is the only serious natural hazard facing Chippewa County that has definable areas of higher risk, with the possible exception of wildfire,” the natural hazard mitigation update for Chippewa County states. With wildfires more common in the immediate post-logging area with high amounts of dead stumpage and debris as fuel, there have in contrast been 19 flood events registered locally from 1993 through 2019 in Chippewa County—sixteen of which had “flash” attached as a prefix to the event. With a flood in Cadott from August of 1999 that caused $10,000 in damage and two “Countywide” flash floods on August 1, 2001 and July 7, 2005 that caused a combined $55,000 in damage, having up to date homeowner’s insurance is best in place before the fact.

Meanwhile for Boyd, Edson, Delmar, Cadott and Colburn, a stormwater flash flood event from September of 2000 caused several road and culvert washouts, including one estimated at $15,000 to $20,000 of damage on Boundary Road in Boyd. The same flash flood event caused damage to a self-insured squad car estimated at $27,000. Pertinent to the near and approaching present are two scenarios in particular: pandemic, and winter storms. First up, pandemic!

“Within Chippewa County, the County Public Health Department has been the primary coordinating entity on communicable diseases and pandemic flu,” the countywide hazard mitigation report states, “working in conjunction with partners…” the report goes on, listing County Emergency Management and area health care providers among them. With influenza pandemics taking place in 1918, 1957 and 1968 respectively, with a combined death toll nationwide of 779,000 people and worldwide of 51.7 million people, the threat from species-jumping zoonotic diseases getting on the loose—bat, swine, or bird, to name a few—is still very real. But with a set of precautions in place including “Biosurveillance,” “Community Resilience,” “Countermeasures and Mitigation” (including “non-pharmaceutical” interventions), along with “Emergency Operations Coordination,” “Information Sharing” (including public warnings) and “Surge Management” to meet a spike in infections, the threat from pathogens of terrestrial origin could be tackled, provided that the plan worked. A special subset of the report deals with Coronavirus and its effects, giving contemporary input.

More perennial as of now to the area, however, is the yearly snow invasion, when cold temperatures and frozen water vapor conspire to turn the landscape and roads white or else to black ice, depending on conditions. As hazards went in the plan, the snowstorm threat was quite frequent but not as deadly as could otherwise be in the modern day, with just one death recorded as such over 73 separate events and spanning two decades.

Not everything can be foreseen but where it can, not preparing in advance or else not enough can be a disaster. Including in the “flood prone” areas of the Chippewa County map is one in section 20 along the Yellow River, north of Boyd. As late as 1902, the site on what is now listed as county property in the plat book had a heading and stave mill for the “Circle (Cirkel) Mfg. Co.,” according to a map now present at the town hall in Edson, Wisconsin. Among the things that did the once-great Cirkel manufacturing firm in to judge from past newspaper articles? Not having adequate insurance despite suffering repeated visits from the fire fiend.