ANNAPOLIS, Md. — When you walk past the sandbags and through the front door, you smell the salt water. The carpet is still damp, but slowly getting drier.
"We just found everything soaking wet," said Kate Wilkerson, owner of Annapolis Memorial Art Gallery, "and we knew we had to get started cleaning up."
On Friday afternoon, the Dock St. family business in Annapolis was still recuperating from Tuesday's big storm. It's been three straight days of cleaning.
Now, they're in line for another potential round of flooding Friday into Saturday.
"My daughter and I have a huge family," Wilkerson added, "and they've all reached out to see what they could do to help. So we have extra fans and dehumidifiers from relatives, so that's been great."
Fortunately, all the paintings there are safe from last time. And last time, it was a big one. WMAR's camera captured the rising water in Annapolis earlier in the week.
On Friday, officials there announced money to help with the floods.
"We will offer up to $50,000 for businesses that have damage due to flooding so it can be used for things like equipment, property damage and some income loss," said Amy Gowan, CEO of the Anne Arundel Economic Development Corporation at a press conference Friday.
Flooding early this week hit waterfronts elsewhere, including Fells Point in Baltimore. The city handed out more sandbags on Friday to prepare.
Back at the business in Annapolis, Wilkerson hopes the nighttime storm is more tame, so she can reopen tomorrow.
"When we get to 3.9, that's when I know that we're going to flood," Wilkerson said. "So we have our sandbags, still, that we have from the city, we're going to go ahead and put those back up. We're not putting any of our art back on the bottom part of the walls, we'll keep that out of harms way, and just hope for the best."
