BRIAN BROWN, SERVICE MANAGER FOR SOUTHEAST INDUSTRIAL SALES IN TAMPA, does routine maintenance work on the motors for the water control gates on the Kehl Canal weir off Bonita Grande Drive on Friday morning.
Aside from some localized street flooding, the unusually rainy summer of 2003 has barely caused a ripple in Bonita Springs.

That's in sharp contrast to 1995, when flooding chased nearly 1,700 East Bonita residents from their homes for up to 10 weeks.

The differences between this year and 1995 are twofold. First, while rainfall for the year so far is about 7 inches above normal, it's not nearly as much as the amount that fell in 1995, when Bonita Springs was hit with more than 85 inches of rain by year's end. Second, an array of improvements have been put into place over the past few years to minimize the impact of high wat