Up to $8.8 million will go to 14 groups to repair levee damage caused by record floods last spring.
The Arkansas Natural Resources Commission approved the grant funding at its meeting Thursday, committing most of Gov. Asa Hutchinson's $10 million emergency funds that were recently released.
Despite higher estimated damage along the Arkansas River, all 14 applications received totaled only $8.8 million. Levees along the Arkansas River that were damaged during historic flooding in May and June were eligible for the money.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimated getting non-Corps-owned levees along the Arkansas River repaired and into good enough shape for future Corps assistance would cost $95 million. Half of the organizations awarded grant money Thursday are eligible for Corps assistance already, meaning the Corps is paying for 80% of the work required to repair them. The others are either not in good enough shape for the Corps assistance or weren't on the Corps' radar.
That's a consistent reality across Arkansas. Statewide, about half of the levees that are known to the Corps and have been assessed by the Corps have been deemed "unacceptable." Often, the rating is because the levee board is inactive or is not sufficiently maintaining the structures.
Levee maintenance problems prompted Hutchinson to create a task force last summer to examine ways to improve the state's levees. That task force presented its final report to Hutchinson recently. He said he wants lawmakers to start a grant program for levees and for levee districts within the same levee system to consider consolidating to ensure active and consistent maintenance.
[INTERACTIVE MAP: Grant-awarded levees » arkansasonline.com/117map/]
Commissioner Roy Reeves noted a lack of funding and deterioration from neglect for many levees.
"I hope in this process we get a fix but also have a method of providing funds so that 10, 15 years from now, we won't have this issue," Reeves said Thursday.
Arkansas Natural Resources Division Deputy Director Ryan Benefield said the division intends to ensure that the levee owners that receive money would remain active and attempt to work with the Corps to get their levees into better condition. The division will work with levee owners on determining a tax assessment that would adequately support maintenance.
But Natural Resources Commission member Bruce Leggett questioned whether a tax assessment would necessarily work, because it would require a small group of locals to raise their own taxes. He said he has sat on local boards that didn't have the money to carry out their mandates "and they're not going to raise their taxes."
The money committed Thursday is a maximum amount for the work specified, Benefield said, and the organizations will be reimbursed based on verified work done. So $8.8 million may not actually be spent on the work. However, two of the projects approved come with $750,000 in extra funding contingent upon additional commitments by those organizations to get their levees into even better shape and properly maintain them.
Benefield said two additional levee districts have applied for the funding since learning that not all would be allocated.
The biggest grant allocated -- $1.6 million -- is for Riverdale Harbour Property Owners Improvement District No. 1. That's in Little Rock, in the Canal Pointe area, near Winrock International. Work there will improve the damaged marina wall and remove stones that were placed there during the flood.
The second-biggest grant -- $1.5 million -- will go to the Dardanelle Drainage District, which was not actively maintaining its levee before it breached last year. Yell County leaders, who applied for the grant on behalf of the district, have been working to consolidate and reactivate levee districts in the county. The project funded Thursday will fill in a 30-foot hole and above-ground gap in the levee caused by rushing waters.
All other grants were less than $1 million, with one as low as $20,000.
Two levee districts -- Old River Drainage District in Pulaski County and Plum Bayou Levee District in Lonoke and Jefferson counties -- must complete System Wide Improvement Framework plans for addressing Corps-identified levee deficiencies. The process allows levee districts to be eligible for Corps assistance, despite "unacceptable" inspection ratings, "while they correct unacceptable operation and maintenance deficiencies as part of a broader, system-wide improvement to their levee systems," according to the Corps.
Active participation in the Corps' Rehabilitation and Inspection Program is what allows districts to get at least 80% of damage covered by the Corps. The framework planning allows the levee district to eventually transition into that program.
Those two levee districts, according to the Natural Resources Division, requested small amounts that cover only the cost of putting together the plans, not the cost of executing them. The Old River Drainage District requested $20,000, and the Plum Bayou district asked for only $40,000.
However, division administrators determined that if the districts commit to carrying out their plans, they will get additional money to execute them -- up to $250,000 and up to $500,000.
Levees not eligible for Corps assistance may qualify for some federal dollars through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where they are required to put up a local match, or, in the event of a disaster, through Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster funding.
A Section on 01/17/2020