But this year's different. The council got a working head start on the rainy season by removing unwanted waste and debris from the streets and cleaning the drains. The mayor and his team began their work at 7:30 this morning and Jomarie Lanza caught up with them a few hours after they got into their work. Here's more:

The Belize City Council put their hands and their heavy equipment to work early this morning, launching its city wide flood mitigation campaign. The council targeted known flood prone areas in the city and tunneled deep into long neglected drains with their sludge truck.

Along with the city's sanitation team they engaged in an intense clean up operation at these sites. The mayor said the focus is on six areas:

Bernard Wagner, Mayor, Belize City
"It's a part of our broader goals, really mitigation as you know through the efforts of our team at the Belize City Council we have been able to really identify like six flood prone areas in the city which is this area along this Freetown road in front of that gas station, and then we also look at, Berkley Street, we also look at Dean Street, Queen Street and the area in front of Pound Yard Bridge, we have been there as well. It is an effort not only for today but it has been going on from the beginning of the year. Our team in its preparation for the rainy season, hurricane season have been at work but today is just putting more hands on the ground right, working along with the team our city councillors, our shadow councillors, our administrative team are out here and it's a collaborative effort to really focusing on these six flood prone areas so as to mitigate during the flood season, rainy season and hurricane season."

The team worked on East Collet Canal, Freetown Road, King Street,Dean Street, Berkley Street and Queen Street. They labored in the punishing heat - but when the rains come in a few weeks - these areas usually look like rivers -meaning we'll know if the effort worked or not by mid June.