County Board asks U.S. President for help

Talk about it

The Carlton County Board of Commissioners formally petitioned the President of the United States to declare the county a major disaster area on Thursday afternoon.

“Our preliminary estimate of public infrastructure damages is just a little over $30 million,” County Economic Development Director Pat Oman told the board. “That includes public infrastructure for county, townships, school districts, cities, non-profit agencies and certain districts like fire and hospital that are government affiliated.

Oman said Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) respresentatives said in a Thursday morning meeting that the Carlton County damages “easily meet” the requirements for FEMA aid.

After the board passed the formal resolution requesting the President declare the county a major disaster area, they heard from Carlton County Emergency Management Director/Chief Deputy Brian Belich, that the request would go from Minnesota to FEMA Region 5 in Chicago, which would then forward the request to FEMA offices and the President in Washington, D.C.

“They estimate it’s a two- to three-week process,” Belich said. “It’s in their ballpark now. It’s a little bit of a waiting game.”

County Commissioner Tom Proulx also attended the morning meeting with FEMA officials. He said the emergency management personnel were impressed with how Carlton County had handled the flash flooding and its aftermath.

“I believe they said we were their new ‘poster child,’” he told his fellow commissioners.

Oman said the first priority of the FEMA group that visited Thursday is public infrastructure.

“Every single government unit [in Carlton County] that I mentioned had damage except two townships,” he said. “There’s a lot of damage.”

Tags: flood 2012, news, updates, flood, fema