Trump is right, America needs more walls.

Of course, Trump is proposing the walls in the exactly the wrong location – not in places where is going to do much good. We need more walls and levies along our river banks and streams to protect our cities, villages, towns and farmlands from increased storm surge and flooding from increasingly severe storms that are all but certain in future years.

The fact is the climate is changing, and we are having more flooding. Appalachia, with it’s steep slopes and deep river valleys has always been prone to flooding. Past storm control projects – like Mount Morris Dam at Letchworth State Park has protected the Geneseo Valley and Rochester from flooding after Hurricane Agnes, as have many smaller storm control projects across our country.

All the evidence points to the need for more levies and storm control dams needed in the future. We need, bigger, better sewage control plants to deal with increased water flows. Weather records are showing increasing rain falls across most of the eastern half of country, water that has to be carefully moved into streams in ways that minimize damage to infrastructure and our lands.

We need to prepare, because climate change is not only something in the distant future, it’s something that is impacting our communities with increased flooding risks now.