High River residents grill officials at packed flood meeting

Hundreds of people packed a school gym in High River Wednesday night as government officials were grilled about flood recovery and mitigation efforts.

Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths and other officials faced an overflowing audience that was hostile at times.

Security guards lined the perimeter as people waited for a turn at the microphones, many of them demanding to know what's being done to stop the next big flood.

"Because we only have10 months left in10 months it's all going to happen again, so therefore let's find out specifically what they're doing every month," resident Robin Hethy said.

Griffiths told the crowd the river is being scraped, a bridge in town will be widened and an engineer is looking over the town to see what else can be done.

The minister said he expects to receive the engineering plans in a few weeks.

Steve Hanulik wanted to know if the health ofresidents is being put at jeopardy.

"Where are the reassurances, backed up by scientific facts, that tell us our home is going to be safe, our ground is going to be safe, our water's going to be safe, our air is going to be safe and things like that," he said.

Alberta Environment is monitoring the air and water quality and so far it's at acceptable levels, officials said.

Emergency room reopens

The emergency room at the High River General Hospital, closed since Junes flooding, reopened Thursday morning.

The hospital will continue to reopen in a phased approach. Next to open will be beds used for obstetrics, gynecology and general surgery patients in mid-August, officials said.

The expectation is that all services will be offered by the middle of September.