SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY, Calif. — A day after San Joaquin County officials signed an emergency declaration due to a possible levee failure on Victoria Island, contractors hired to address the potential disaster say not much has changed.
A small trickle of water still squeezes through at the base of the levee.
"If this seepage were to increase, that would demonstrate to us that the four-foot blanket of earth and fill we placed underwater is either eroded or cracked," said Christopher Neudeck, president of KSI Inc., the firm tasked with the fix. "The likelihood of that happening is very, very high."
The emergency declaration, signed Wednesday, was aimed at opening the door to more financial support for a more permanent fix.
In the meantime, contractors say they are still looking into what caused the leak. Emergency officials are asking people living in that area to have supplies and a plan ready just in case the levee deteriorates, but the island is mainly agricultural and sparsely populated.
With storm season on the way, however, officials say they haven't forgotten about the hundreds of miles of other levees around the county.
"We've been working with the Army Corps of Engineers on a major repair on Mormon Slough. That's about 50% completed," said David Tolliver, deputy director of San Joaquin County's Public Works Department. "There's an erosion repair season guided by the state; that season is about to end."
Tolliver says that next, his crews will be ramping up levee inspections.
"We have daily inspections for vegetation control, pest control, and monitoring erosion control," Tolliver said. "When there's a storm event, we are doing more frequent inspections and coordinating with our Office of Emergency Services, Department of Water Resources, Army Corps of Engineers and also getting reports in the field from reclamation districts."
With decades of experience repairing levees, Neudeck believes that the people whose homes back up to levees in San Joaquin County don't have much to fear.
"When we look at an urban levee, we know what's in it. We know how it behaves. We model it and construct it to a standard — at least 100, if not, 200-year standard," Neudeck said.
Watch more from ABC10: San Joaquin County scrambles to fix collapsed levee
