By Krista Duhon
news@joplinglobe.com
MIAMI, Okla. — The Ottawa County Commission has secured all funding for the buyout of nine flood-prone homes and is preparing to close next week on the real estate transactions.
County officials announced Monday that the Grand River Dam Authority has presented the county with $57,000. The funding represents the GRDA’s promised 10 percent match of Federal Emergency Management Agency grant funding that will be used to purchase homes in the Eastgate and Fountain East subdivisions near Miami.
The homes set for purchase by the county were flooded in July 2007 and determined by county flood plain officials to be substantially damaged and uninhabitable. County leaders approached the GRDA more than a year ago about providing the matching funds needed to satisfy requirements of the $1.4 million Severe Repetitive Loss grant that will pay for purchasing, demolishing and removing the damaged homes.
Jo Montana of the Grand Gateway Economic Development Authority said Monday that the GRDA’s participation in the buyout was critical.
“This would not have happened without GRDA,” Montana said.
GRDA officials have agreed to provide up to $142,000 in support, according to Montana, who said the authority will match 10 percent of costs related to demolition and removal of the homes.
Mike Payton, flood plain administrator, said his office has phoned homeowners to notify them of a planned Nov. 5 closing.
“We will be mailing registered letters this week to the property owners,” Payton said. “And, hopefully, we will be mailing more in the near future.”
Payton said he hopes that efforts to secure more federal funds to purchase more than three dozen additional homes destroyed in Ottawa County’s record flood of 2007 will be successful.
County officials, with assistance from Grand Gateway, have applied for a Repetitive Flood Claims grant through FEMA. The county is seeking $4.6 million of $10 million in federal money set aside for those grant appropriations.
The grant, if approved, would be used to purchase and demolish 37 additional homes in the Eastgate and Fountain East housing additions.
