County Board on Buyouts - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

County Board on Buyouts

Five homeowners in Ward County - who live outside city limits - have completed sales of their property to the county as part of the post-flood buyouts.

Another four dozen-or-so are still waiting to consummate their deals.

The slow speed of the buyout process was the topic of conversation at the Ward County Commission meeting today.

Commissioner Bruce Christianson stressed that county officials and the state need to make the process faster so that people waiting for buyouts get their money as quickly as possible.

Meanwhile, flood recovery coordinator Jason Zimmerman reported that the city and county must work to find programs that help flood victims with low and moderate incomes.

That's needed to meet requirements attached to federal Community Development Block Grant funds.

(Jason Zimmerman, Flood Recovery Coordinator) "We want to look at projects that are going to shine in a lot of regards and that are going to show we're using those dollars appropriately and that we're having the greatest level of impact with those dollars too moving forward."

Minot and Ward County received nearly 77 million dollars in CDBG funds to help with flood recovery.