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Valley County Part Of Disaster Declaration

As flood waters receded in late August, Valley County Disaster and Emergency Services Coordinator Rick Seiler started working on figuring how much damage existed. Those numbers began to rise in Valley County, along with those in nearby Musselshell, Petroleum, Blaine and Carter counties and the Fort Belknap Reservation.

The preliminary assessment of damages in Valley County added up to almost $958,000. Combined all areas are at about $1.6 million in damages, with Fort Belknap reporting around $53,000, Carter County $37,000, Musselshell $55,000 and Petroleum $519,000.

Those totals are expected to rise as the final assessments are done on damages. FEMA assistance was granted to help with emergency repair work on public infrastructure, such as roads, reservoirs and culverts.

Seiler met with FEMA officials, including Bob Glassen, the project specialist for public assistance branch for FEMA Region 8. Their kickoff meeting took place on Monday to go over all the damage assessments gathered and to come up with more definite estimates of damage. Valley County had about 37 sites that were looked at for damages.

One of those sites was erosion caused by the 2011 flood and the flood in August along Whatley Road. That erosion damage has three different options that will cost between $600,000 to $900,000.

FEMA is helping to evaluate those alternatives that would be running long spikes in the ground and packing dirt, sloping the area to prevent further erosion, or moving the roadway.

“I appreciate FEMA coming and and helping out with estimates and looking for opportunities to help,” Seiler said.

They are also looking at ways to prevent further damages during future floods, which would create a more permanent fix.

The county commissioners approved an additional 2 mill raise to help cover county damages, which added up to about $44,394. That is the most they could raise without a vote from the public. Seiler explained that the large gap between what the county could raise and the estimated damages is what triggered help from the state. In turn, once damages continued to rise, it triggered the state to ask for federal assistance.

“It means that the amount of damages exceeds the ability of the county to deal with it locally,” Seiler said.

Randy Welch, external affairs from FEMA, explained that they are excited to see local, state and federal agencies work so well together and to have such a great working relationship. He said that repairs have already been made and that they are already in the process to fix things, but the program is set up to reimburse damages.

The federal aid would pay up to 75 percent of damages for debris removal, emergency measures, replacing damaged public facilities and infrastructure and approved hazard mitigation (preventing future damages) projects.

U.S. Representative Steve Daines sent a letter to President Obama requesting the area to be declared a disaster earlier this month. Senators Jon Tester and John Walsh requested FEMA to have a quick response on the request that Governor Steve Bullock sent. Bullock requested the disaster declaration at the request of Phillips County Commissioners.

The Presidential Disaster Declaration allowed FEMA to assist. Bullock also announced that the U.S. Small Business Administration would make low interest federal disaster loans available to small, non-farm businesses in Blaine, Fergus, Garfield, Petroleum, Phillips and Valley counties to help offset economic losses due to flood and hail that occurred Aug. 22-Sept. 24.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture also declared a disaster, naming Phillips as the primary natural disaster area and Blaine, Fergus, Garfield, Petroleum and Valley counties as contiguous disaster counties.

That declaration makes farmers eligible to receive assistance from the USDA Farm Services Agency. Impacted farmers can contact the FSA for more information and to apply for assistance.

 

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