City Nearing End of First Buyouts - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

City Nearing End of First Buyouts

As 2012 nears its end, so to is the first round of voluntary home buy-outs in the Minot Flood Valley.

City officials say 57 properties have been closed on, or are scheduled to be closed soon.

The price tag, just for the acquisitions, tops seven-point-three million dollars.

That money was allocated earlier in the year by the North Dakota State Water Commission and from Federal CDBG Disaster Recovery Funds.

City Finance Director Cindy Hemphill says another round of voluntary acquisitions is expected in 2013 and the city is hoping that will include another 100 to 150 homes.

However Hemphill says the city has to be careful which homes are acquired with certain funding.

(Cindy Hemphill, Minot City Finance Director) There are caveats with the CDBG funds that have the same limitations as Hazard Mitigation Grant funds do that they can't have anything built on them in perpetuity. So we have to be careful as we move forward what funding source is used. State Water Commission Funds would allow us to build levees, dikes, flood walls and that type of thing Federal Dollars won't allow that."

The Governor has included 61 million dollars in his budget proposal to the legislature towards the Mouse River Flood Protection Project.

Hemphill says some of that money would be directed towards engineering work along with property acquisitions.