(Spencer)– Residential properties heavily damaged or destroyed in the 2024 flood in Spencer and other northwest Iowa cities that are eligible for buyout funds remain caught up in federal red tape.
In Spencer, City Manager Kevin Robinson says applications for that city were submitted in November and December of 2024. He told the city council earlier this week the last he knew the paperwork was still sitting on a desk at the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Regional Office in Kansas City waiting for property reviews…
“We’re told that spring is a comfortable timeline to know the acceptance of properties and then a good time window to realistically begin the acquisition process for those properties. It’s a long process. Once the approval happens we need to do inspections on the properties from an asbestos mitigation standpoint. We need to schedule demolitions, we need to schedule the disposal, the actual real estate transaction. There’s a whole lot of things that need to occur, but in general terms, spring, which could mean early summer.”
Robinson expressed some hesitation when asked for an update at Monday’s City Council meeting, saying the city had been given a number of anticipated dates previously that didn’t pan out.
