Hazard plan coming together

Officials from throughout Crawford County continued work on the Multi-Jurisdictional Hazard Mitigation Plan Wednesday, completing many of the last steps before the public will get their hands on the plan.
If approved by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the county would be eligible for the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, which provides 75 percent of the funds needed to reduce losses or remove structures in the event of future disasters.
The state has $89 million in federal money available for the grant program.
With city and county officials getting their first looks at the various submitted projects, there remained some bits of the plan to iron out, such as which projects the municipalities would actually like to pursue.
Since last month’s meeting, 27 projects have been identified by local officials, to add to the 20 projects already suggested by contractors on the hazard plan. During Wednesday’s meeting, another project was suggested by county officials — the need for generators in several locations.
AMEC, a Topeka company helping with the plan, will compile the projects and requests into a single plan over the course of the next month. The hope for the project is to have everything completed on all ends by Oct. 30.
On Sept. 23, from 6:30 to 9 p.m., the completed project will be presented to the public at the Frontenac Town Hall. Included with the hazard plan will be a resource fair and giveaways.
However, while many of the projects were ironed out and identified for local communities, there are a few that remain on the outside looking in.
Following Wednesday’s meeting, there remain a few groups that are not eligible to participate in the plan or the funding that would come with the plan. These groups are not eligible because no representative has attended and no one has filed any of the necessary paperwork.
Those three municipalities are the City of Cherokee, the Walnut Rural Fire Department and the Cherokee City Fire Department.
“If a group is not eligible, they are not eligible to submit projects to FEMA for pre-disaster mitigation,” said Susan Belt, with AMEC. “If a school district wanted a project or funding for the project, they wouldn’t be able to get either if they hadn’t become eligible for this plan.”
Belt also said there are other options; Namely, these groups can do their own hazard plan or they would have to convince the other officials to reopen the plan specifically for them. However, Belt said the first option seems unlikely “if they won’t do a single form, that they’d do a whole plan.”
Six other municipalities have the potential to be eligible by participating to some extent in the plan, but have not submitted a project as part of the hazard plan. Without submitting a project, these groups would not be eligible for funds, either.
These groups are USD 249, Walnut, Baker Township, Lincoln Township, Walnut Township and Rural Water District No. 1.
Oddly, there is a little hitch for what the funds can and cannot be used.
According to the rankings of local hazards, the biggest threat to the area is a loss of power or other utilities. The largest electricity provider in the county is Westar Energy.
Because of the way state funds are distributed, Westar can receive no money for improving utility infrastructure because it is a for-profit company.
“There is absolutely nothing for for-profit companies,” said Ida Kirmse, AMEC. “This simply puts them in touch with the other officials in emergency management. The longer power is out, the more calls they would get from these same officials. For businesses, it makes financial and business sense to want to do some of that mitigation as a business decision. They usually take mitigation policies as they arise because in outages no revenues are coming in.”

Andrew Nash can be reached at andrew.nash@morningsun.net or by calling 231-2600 ext. 132.