AMITY HALL, St James — As rain clouds hung low overhead Monday, residents of Amity Hall became increasingly worried that, unless the Montego River is cleaned, torrential rainfall — like those that lashed sections of St James Sunday — could mean a second- straight day of their homes being flooded.

“People life in jeopardy, we are in jeopardy. The water just going right around the house them; we need help!” resident Janet Dawkins told the Jamaica Observer Monday during a visit to the Gazer Road section of the community.

On Sunday, the river overflowed its banks and rushed through homes, bringing back terrifying memories of Hurricane Melissa’s wrath and leaving behind mounds of mud and debris for clean-up over the Easter holiday.

“Mi worried, mi worried,” said a frazzled Dawkins.

She explained that a bridge that links the Gazer community to the rest of Amity Hall also suffered damage and would still have been totally blocked if not for their efforts.

“A saw we use cut it up so we could come across. A we have to pack it up yesterday so that we can come out,” she said.

The flooding is being blamed on trees and other debris that was not cleaned out of the river since last October’s Category 5 storm. The debris piled up at the bridge, residents said, forming a dam for the water which then spread into their community, setting back already tenuous efforts to rebuild and recover. Dawkins told the Observer the flood waters took material she had been stockpiling to rebuild her shop.

“I had stone and sand and everything gone. Half the building blocks gone in the river, we get a big impact. I put back a stall about three weeks after the storm and yesterday now the river come down and knock it down,” she said dejectedly.

She is appealing for the river to be cleaned of the dangerous debris so they won’t have to worry about being flooded out again.

“We want help, we need help. I need help to put back my shop and we need help for the river [water] to move. The river can’t stay like this,” she declared.

Fellow resident Mark Samuels, who was not home on Sunday, said neighbours went to the aid of his partner and granddaughter when the flood waters rose to about two feet high in his house.

“A people have to come and help because I came in after 8:00 pm,” he revealed.

He came home to find a shop he operates out of his house — like the rest of the dwelling — filled with mud and debris. Like their neighbours, Samuels and his family spent much of Easter Monday cleaning muck from their property.

The situation, he said, has him under tremendous mental strain as the blocked section of the bridge is mere metres from his back door.

“I know that when rain a fall, I mustn’t sleep; keep looking, [ready] to just run all the time. I’m worried all the time for my family and we are human beings,” he said.

It has also been challenging for Tameika Brown, who also spent much of Monday cleaning even though her family began from the day before. She told the Observer she was at church when the rains started Sunday and she got home late to find a stark reminder of what they endured during last year’s hurricane.

“It’s not a good feeling because it brings back the whole trauma with Melissa and it just puts you back at a state where you’re traumatised all over again. It’s not a good feeling but it’s life,” she said resignedly.

Councillor for the Somerton Division Michael Allen told the Observer he has been calling for the area to be cleaned since the storm.

“From the aftermath of Hurricane Melissa, the whole river was blocked and families flooded out,” he explained.

“I came here and I found it was the National Works Agency’s responsibility. I talked to them repeatedly about it to get it cleared. I talked to the member of parliament [for St James East Central Edmund Bartlett], he sent a unit here but it was tractor; the tractor couldn’t do the work,” the councillor added

Allen said he has again reached out to the MP to get assistance in dealing with a problem that could get worse with time.

“I called him three weeks ago and tell him the tractor couldn’t do the work and the river course need to be cleared because if it not cleared the next rain flooding again,” he said.

Allen lamented damage done, during the flooding Sunday, to a section of Gazer Road he recently lobbied to have fixed at a cost of $3.5 million.

“Last week them finish up the front part,” he said wistfully of the roadwork.

Noting that 10 homes were impacted by Sunday’s flooding, the elected official joined residents’ call for the river bed to be cleaned before further damage is inflicted upon the area.

“If they had come when I called them then it would be free. However, when the water came it just push the debris come here so [the bridge] and then the residents got everything,” he explained.

Janet Dawkins shows her shop that was impacted by flood waters on Sunday.

Councillor Michael Allen makes a point to Janet Dawkins, Monday, after visiting the flooded out Gazer Road community in Amity Hall, St James.

A build-up of debris in the river at Amity Hall led to an overflowing of its banks, sending flood waters into the community.