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CITY (NewsDakota.com)–The prospect of permanent flood protection for Valley City took a step forward today, as Valley City and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers formally entered into a cost-sharing agreement for a flood risk management study.
The event was attended by members of both Valley City and Barnes County government, and by the Corps staff from the St. Paul, MN, District, which manages the Sheyenne River.
According to the Corps, the study is in response to the “extensive emergency efforts” that were required in 2009 and 2011 floods, when, as the Corps explained, “large-scale damages were barely avoided.”
The study has already advanced through the first phase of a five-phase process, where reconnaissance of the area was done. The second phase, funded in equal parts by the city and federal government, is a feasibility anaylsis, which will center on a new hydrology study for the area.
Other phases include a preconstruction engineering and design phase, a construction phase, and an operation phase, all of which have different funding formulas between local and federal contributions.
Colonel Michael Price, speaking on behalf of the Corps, says his directive to his staff is to follow a “3-3-3” format, meaning the project can be finished in three years, cost less than $3 million, and “occupy a binder no more than three inches thick,” a comment that drew humor from the small crowd that gathered at City Hall Tuesday.
Price commented on how it was ironic that the project was being talked about under conditions that are drastically different from a year ago, when the city was in the midst of perhaps it’s worst and most dangerous flood fight in history.
Valley City mayor Bob Werkhoven commented that he was pleased to be working with Price, who was a helpful resource a year ago.
Barnes County commissioner John Froelich said this step represented what he felt was logical based on what other North Dakota communities have received after monumental flooding.
The complete study will cost about $1.5 million, with the Corps and the city each paying half. It is scheduled to be completed in 2.5 years. The upland hydrology study is scheduled to be completed by December.