City Hall makes $6 million progress on FEMA appeals

CEDAR RAPIDS - City Hall once had thought the Federal Emergency Management Agency said it would give the city about $9 million in disaster funding for flood damage to the city-owned former Sinclair meatpacking plant.

FEMA's regional office then shifted gears, concluding that the city did not qualify for any disaster funds for Sinclair damages, prompting the city to appeal to FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

On Friday, Joe O'Hern, the city's flood recovery and reinvestment director, reported that FEMA has informed the city that FEMA will pay $1.9 million in replacement funds for the former plant, far short of the $9 million the city once expected, but better than nothing, O'Hern acknowledged.

In addition, FEMA also agreed to cover an additional $1.1-million portion of the demolition costs of the Sinclair buildings, which the FEMA regional office earlier said it would not pay.

O'Hern called the $3 million in new FEMA funding tied to the Sinclair plant a "positive" development for the city.

Nonetheless, he estimated that the gap between what the city has paid for demolition at the site and what FEMA has agreed to reimburse the city remains at about $10 million.

On a separate city appeal to FEMA, FEMA's regional office agreed to $3 million in additional funding to help the city pay for repairs at its flood-damaged incinerator at the city's Water Pollution Control Facility, O'Hern reported.

However, this is just a start in meeting what the city has said was an initial FEMA decision to pay the city a total of $63 million to both repair the existing incinerator and to allow the city to build a replacement incinerator.

For now, FEMA has approved a total of $11 million for incinerator repairs, though O'Hern noted Friday that the city is already committed to making an initial $16 million in repairs to the existing incinerator.

The city can appeal the decision of FEMA's regional office on the incinerator to FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C., he noted.

O'Hern updated the City Council's Flood Recovery Committee on Friday on the city's FEMA appeals. He told the committee that he believed that a City Hall delegation's lobbying trip to Washington, D.C., in June played a role in FEMA taking action on the city's languishing appeals.