Duluth volunteers setting up flood recovery fund

While the state and federal bureaucracies slowly creep toward getting financial help to flood victims, a group of volunteers in the Duluth area is taking a do-it-yourself approach. Volunteers organizing a recovery fund for flood victims have raised $1 million. They say loan centers opening soon around the region will help residents who qualify get loans of up to $200,000.

Author:: BMTN Staff
Updated:: Mar 8, 2018
Original:: Aug 16, 2012

While the state and federal bureaucracies slowly creep toward getting financial help to flood victims, a group of volunteers in the Duluth area is taking a do-it-yourself approach. Volunteers organizing a recovery fund for flood victims have raised $1 million. They say loan centers opening soon around the region will help residents who qualify get loans of up to $200,000.

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Only about 100 more applications are needed to get $3 million in federal loans for residents suffering from flood damage in the Duluth area. For every 100 homeowners that apply for assistance, $1.4 million is awarded from the U.S. Small Business Administration. The deadline for low-interest recovery loans is October 15th.

Everybody's pitching in to get flood-damaged Duluth back on its feet, including the city's younger residents. KAAL-TV reports that some local kids have set up a stand to sell lemonade and Rice Krispie treats at 50 cents a piece, and so far they've raised $50. The Lake Superior Zoo lost several animals in the recent flooding.

One of the state officials who accompanied federal inspectors on their tour of flood damage says Minnesota will have no trouble passing the $7.1 million threshold to qualify for aid from FEMA. A state Senator from Duluth says the feds typically cover about three-fourths of the cost of repairs to infrastructure, with state and local governments paying the rest.

The Duluth City Council convened a special meeting to take up a measure that would lighten the financial burden on flood victims who need to make repairs to their homes and businesses.

After the floods in Duluth, an army of volunteers has stepped in to fill a gap between when emergency workers leave and more long-term help arrives. Race routes have been altered, but the events will go on. Biking and hiking trails are open. And the zoo plans to reopen on Friday with most of the park's 483 animals on display.

Gov. Mark Dayton has floated a proposal to spend a lot more state money than Republican lawmakers were expecting on recovery and rebuilding after devastating June flooding. A special legislative session to deal with flood relief issues is tentatively set for Aug. 24.

The same type of flood damage to streets and sewers occurred in many of the same places forty years ago. 1972 even had its own version of a boy carried by floodwaters into a culvert drain. in each case there was ten inches of rain, although in '72 it fell in three separate storms rather than all at once.

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