Letter to the Editor: On the Recent Floods in Twentynine Palms
A call to residents to organize for the future
By Tom Ingram
On July 14, 2024, we had the big storm where a lot of homes and businesses in Twentynine Palms were flooded. The City Council declined to get FEMA involved, without asking the residents what they thought.
We were told it was a “once every 60 years” event. I did not believe them and spent a lot of money to make sure my house did not get flooded again, and in the more recent storms I have had no issues. Everything I did worked to stop my house getting flooded.
After that storm, the City Manager said he would come and see me. He did not. Other City employees have also said that they would contact me about things to help the City. They did not.
Ongoing flooding 2024-2025
We have had more storms — in August 2024, June 2025 and then Monday, August 25, 2025. My property again was OK, but many homes on my block were again flooded — this is Sunnyslope Drive down to Highway 62 between Encelia and Morongo. So why does this area get hammered so much? There are a number of reasons:
Land to the northeast of Sunnyslope and Encelia: privately owned land. The water runs off it north and south, straight into the backyards of Sunnyslope to the south and then on through the streets.
The land northwest of Sunnyslope and Encelia: again privately owned land. It acts like a funnel sending all of the water to the junction of Sunnyslope and Encelia. A tidal wave crosses the street and straight into the back and front yards of Sunnyslope. I told the owner of this land about it. He came and looked and did nothing. This water is made worse by the wall around the houses to the southeast of the junction. That wall helps push the water to the junction.
The walled estate to the southwest of Sunnyslope and Encelia causes even more issues. The drains appear to go into a big fenced bowl at the southeast corner of the estate. This bowl fills up and then overflows sending another tidal wave of water down Encelia and into the homes along that street. Who approved how the drainage was dealt with here? I think we need to know if a proper study was done to see how this estate’s water runoff would affect residents on the other side of Encelia.
The large swath of undeveloped land between El Paseo and Highway 62. This again sends a ton of water into homes on Encelia. I do not know who owns this land.
So all this water gathers at the bottom of Encelia, floods properties there, and blocks Highway 62.
Steps taken in my own home
Each home has its own issues and may need different solutions. In my home, near Sunnyslope and Encelia, the water comes from one side and the back, from the two different undeveloped parcels of land. We put up a steel corrugated fence made with extra thick steel, with 6 x 6 inch uprights and along the length of it and 12 inches of concrete into the ground. For internal fences, and fences on the other side of our property, we cut 3 – 4 inches off the bottom, to allow water out and down to the street.
On the side with the most flooding, up to two feet of water, there are now 12-inch horizontal flaps to let water out. On the other side of the yard bordering our neighbor, we dug a ditch that takes the water down to the street.
Finally, we got rid of the whole house A/C with the underfloor ducts and vents about 10 inches off the floor — that is where most of the water (and sidewinders in the water) came in. All ducts are now filled in and replaced with split A/C units.
Is there a solution?
What does the future hold? People can only suffer getting flooded so many times. In the end people will abandon their houses because they will not be able to sell them due to the regular floods. Twentynine Palms will end up with a load more derelict buildings to add to the many it already has. Even more businesses will close because too many people move out of Twentynine Palms.
Meanwhile, the City does nothing. Here are my questions for everyone:
Do we get an attorney to represent the residents and see what legal action we can take?
Can we take legal action against the owners of the land where the water comes from?
Shall we all have a meeting to help each other and find organizations that could help with flood control?
Are there grants from the County, State, or the Federal government that the City could apply for?
If the City Council chooses not to help, let's start finding people who will stand against them at the next elections — people who will work for the residents of Twentynine Palms.
Please feel free to post your flood experiences in the comments here, or you can email me at tom@vivalasvegas.net. This letter is about helping the people of Twentynine Palms, so please do not start posting political stuff blaming politicians.
Originally from the United Kingdom, Tom Ingram is a two-year resident of Twentynine Palms. In addition to occasional acting and producing, he organizes the longest running music festival in Las Vegas, Viva Las Vegas, and will soon partner in a new streaming video service. He is also an ex-owner and manager of 51 apartments.
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I appreciate the difficulty this flooding puts you in, but I'm not sure I agree with the overall tone you are adopting here. 29 Palms, like all of the Mojave, experiences major periodic flash flooding.
Drainage culverts, storm drains, and other civil infrastructure should, I agree, be used to address problem areas. Private land, if undeveloped, is very unlikely to be the problem, since the very fact of it being undeveloped actually improves infiltration and reduces water runoff. Of course, the nature of the desert geology makes it so water can pour off of impervious soils in sheets. Decomposed granite, especially if compacted (roads, walking paths, impacted areas) will not absorb water, but act almost like concrete, sloughing it off. However, I can see how unnatural barriers like large walls, especially if they are not built with drainage, can exacerbate the problem.
You are right to go to the city seeking redress, especially if there isn't proper infrastructure in public rights of way to address the flooding. But understand any civil engineering project is a huge endeavor that costs huge amounts of money and make require years of planning. My advice is to be relentless in your lobbying, but patient. Organize your neighbors and continue to make a stink, but only resort to legal action as a last resort!