Flood protection progress

MINOT, N.D. – Ryan Ackerman, administrator for the Souris River Joint Board (SRJB), said funding is in place to advance flood protection in Burlington. Construction on levees on the south end of the community began last year and the next phase will start soon. It includes about 3,200 feet of levee, seepage cutoff, utility modifications and river bank and levee erosion protection.

Funding also is in place to construct a portion of the Tierrecita Vallejo levee, which will serve as the western tieback for the city of Minot.

“We’re just working through some final acquisitions on that to clear the right of way,” Ackerman said last month.

Within Minot, completion of a major stormwater pump station is expected soon at the intersection of Broadway and Fourth Avenue Northwest. Efforts to push forward with more construction on the east side of Third Street Northeast, or Phase MI-5, rest on appropriations coming out of the current legislative session.

The goal is to have MI-5 ready to be bid by late fall. Ackerman said the project may be split into multiple phases. Potentially a pump station and ponding area can be built first because the land for those features has been acquired and demolition of the industrial properties has occurred. Flood wall construction would be the next phase, Ackerman said. Residential acquisitions by the city are continuing for that portion of the project.

“Additionally, there’ll be some work on the south side of the tracks in the Ben’s Tavern neighborhood to basically remove some of the infrastructure that’s not going to be used anymore after all the acquisitions are complete,” Ackerman said. That area will serve as an open floodplain area that could be beneficial as a public use area, such as a park, he said.

“The critical path for those projects is really twofold. One is funding. We need to get the appropriation in the current session, and then number two is the acquisitions. So, as critical masses of acquisitions get completed, then we’ll basically move forward phases of that project to complete the work,” Ackerman said.

MI-5 work is expected to continue through 2022 and possibly into 2023.

“We should be completing the design of the Maple Diversion within the next year or so,” Ackerman added. “When we get into the next biennium, it’s very likely that our approach will be to fund the construction.”

That piece of the flood protection project has been federally authorized, but Congress has appropriated no money at this point. There could be some tension between the desire to construct the Maple Diversion at the earliest opportunity and the desire to wait for federal dollars. The federal share would be about $60 million, or more as adjusted annually for inflation.

While it is financially sensible to wait, a delay would prevent the completion of the western portion of the project, which would protect 60% of residents in the floodplain, Ackerman said.

“It’s a critical piece of the project, and if we want to get the first milestone within Minot completed, to get 60% of people out of harm’s way, we need to complete that piece. So waiting around an indefinite amount of time is definitely not going to be palatable,” he said.

He said the SRJB is working with the state’s congressional delegation to ensure the diversion project is a funding priority.

An attempt also is being made to enter a Project Partnership Agreement that would allow for work to start on the promise of reimbursement later by the federal government, Ackerman said. However, it is not possible to enter an agreement unless Congress has indicated its intent to fund by appropriating at least a token amount to the project, he said.

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