Several North Dakota hazard mitigation projects have been selected by the Federal Emergency Management Agency for further review under the federal Flood Mitigation Assistance and Pre-Disaster Mitigation programs.
The projects have a combined price tag of around $18 million. They include flood protection for Fargo’s water and wastewater treatment plants; storm shelters at Tobacco Gardens Recreational Area in McKenzie County and in Beulah; riverbank stabilization projects in Jamestown and south of Bismarck; and 11 other projects around the state.
"By doing those projects, we're going to save money," said North Dakota Department of Emergency Services recovery and mitigation chief Justin Messner. "We're helping to prevent damages, and reducing risk to human life and safety."
Messner said he also looks at the number of people who will benefit from those projects.
"A lot of the projects will be used for years," Messner said. "And the number of people who will benefit from them could be in the hundreds, to thousands, to hundreds of thousands."
Messner said, for example, the projects in the city of Fargo will benefit the entire population of Fargo, as well as surrounding cities that use the treatment plants.
"The programs are not only cost-beneficial, they're community-beneficial," Messner said.
Messner said those projects were applied for in the 2018 grant round. He said he expects FEMA to have its 2019 grant round open sometime later this year.
More than 75 local, state and tribal governments submitted applications in 2018.