Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Grants And Federal Recovery topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Commissioners pressed for projects as FEMA, CDBG and other grant windows approach
Summary
Court discussed multiple grant programs including SS4A, CDBG-MIT and FEMA DR-4781, warned of fast-approaching submission deadlines and asked staff to identify projects by the county's stated internal deadline.
County staff updated the Commissioners Court on the status of several federal and state grant programs and urged officials to identify candidate projects quickly so the county can meet application deadlines.
The court discussed an SS4A application window that is closing soon and noted one previously included $500,000 projects that have been dropped; staff asked any commissioner with a candidate project to notify the county engineer (Mister Latham) no later than the internal Friday deadline so projects can be vetted and submitted.
On CDBG-MIT (community development block grant - mitigation), staff reported outstanding items needed from the state program manager, including required fair-housing documentation that county staff said they have supplied multiple times. Commissioners and staff also discussed the DR-4781 FEMA reimbursement process related to last May's floods: staff described repeated changes in FEMA personnel and project coordinators, multiple re-inspections and the county's effort to maintain continuity of records (inspection photos, GPS coordinates, site reports) in FEMA's portal to avoid restarting reviews.
County staff and a visiting state official discussed options to escalate or coordinate with FEMA personnel at the regional level to break through a backlog and personnel turnover; the official asked for a written chronology of the county's interactions with FEMA so the state office could press for continuity and help move outstanding files forward.
The court also reviewed FEMA's large-project threshold concerns, noting that several road-and-bridge projects are near the threshold that would trigger additional procurement and oversight requirements if consolidated into a single large project; staff asked whether the court wanted some projects split to avoid the large-project procurement rules.
No formal votes were required on the grant updates; staff were directed to collect project recommendations and submit materials for vetting.
