With the help of individuals who have a connection to the Columbia Slough floodplain, the Multnomah County Drainage District (MCDD), in coordination with FEMA Region 10, created a storytelling collection called Life Along the Columbia: Stories from Behind the Levees (English) or Historias De La Vida A Lo Largo Del Río Columbia (Spanish). The collection was recorded during the Annual Columbia Slough Watershed Council’s Regatta in August 2019 and features 8 stories from people who live, work, and recreate within our levee system.  

From October 4^th to November 22^nd, we will be featuring one story per week on our social media channels every Monday. Our hope with these stories, told in a mix of English and Spanish, is for our community to better understand the watershed and its many benefits, while also illuminating the flood risk that remains and the work that MCDD is doing to prepare for future floods.

Through this campaign, MCDD is incentivizing people to sign-up for our newsletter by 11/24 to be entered to win an emergency kit. We ask that you consider featuring this campaign in your upcoming newsletters and also re-posting on social media platforms (Facebook (MCDD), Facebook (Levee Ready Columbia), LinkedIn, Instagram (Levee Ready), Twitter (MCDD)).

Below is our schedule for the social media campaign. Feel free to focus your outreach efforts on the videos that feel most relevant to your organization and your community constituents. The stories that will be promoted in Spanish are highlighted below in orange.

• October 4 – Jennifer Starkey – Columbia Slough Watershed Council Education Director
• October 11 – Mauricio Somilleda (Español)– Volunteer from Columbia Slough Watershed Council (CSWC)
• October 18 – Brian Eberhardt – Project Manager & Emergency Program Manager at MCDD
• October 25 – ABC (Andando en Bicicletas y Caminando) Group Members (Español)
• November 1 – Susan Barthel – Former City of Portland Employee & Former CSWC Board member
• November 8 – Sunny Simpkins – Former Deputy Director at MCDD
• November 15 – Ubaldo Hernandez (Español) – Community Organizer for Columbia Riverkeeper
• November 22 – Colin Rowan – Levee Ready Columbia Program Director & MCDD Deputy Director

As noted above, stories are told in a mixture of English and Spanish and are viewable on our project pages above or on YouTube (MCDD). Stories include captions in the language being spoken, but there are transcripts available in English and Spanish on the project pages.