Let’s take a step back and acknowledge a milestone in flood recovery for the Boundary. In May 2018 over $38-million in damage to agricultural operators, residential neighbourhoods, commercial areas, and industrial operations was caused by flooding. On January 11, 2019 The City of Grand Forks applied to Infrastructure Canada for $49.9-million worth of flood infrastructure through the Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Fund. The application involves a plethora of projects from re-establishing wetlands to building dikes. Successful applicants are to be announced in May or June.
Mayor Brian Taylor says the work has only just started in terms of recovery:
“This big grant for 49 million is not the only grant that we’re applying for there’s a whole list of other grants that we’re trying to put into place that will really cover some of the areas the DMAF grant is not going to cover. So there’s a very busy program at this point of looking at some of the other things we need to do and the other things we need to apply for or already have.”
Taylor says the next step for the city involves keeping the community informed:
“Keeping the community involved as much as possible and understanding this very complex recovery system is going to be one of the big challenges and so having media releases that contain enough information but not the kind of detail that will confuse people, so we’re trying to keep it as simple as possible and keep our communications clear with our community.”
Mayor Brian Taylor says they’re not taking any chances this year:
“There’s been a lot of work done in preparing for this year’s Spring runoff, and we’re hoping it won’t be a crisis event, it’s looking like snow-packs are down, but with the kind of unexpected weather you can get in this global warming situation we’re not going to be complacent here.”
Another funding opportunity is the National Disaster Mitigation Program which was applied for last Summer, and includes flood protection and storm water drainage improvements for downtown. For more information click here.