Council adopts budget amendment to accept EPA environmental justice grant for Butte Community Resilience Hub

Butte-Silver Bow commissioners on June 4 adopted a resolution amending the fiscal-year budget to appropriate unanticipated federal funds from an Environmental Protection Agency environmental and climate justice block grant for the construction of a Butte Community Resilience Hub.

Why it matters: A community resilience hub is intended to serve as a local resource for disaster mitigation, sheltering, outreach and community coordination during hazard events. Adoption of the resolution preserves the county’s eligibility for federal mitigation funding and affirms local commitment to hazard planning.

Emergency management manager Lisa Carey asked the council to adopt the 2024 Western Montana Region Butte Silver Bow County Hazard Mitigation Plan update; she said FEMA and the state reviewed the plan and that adoption would ensure continued eligibility for federal disaster-mitigation funding. Separately, a council resolution appropriated the EPA environmental and climate justice block grant funds to construct the resilience hub; the record did not state the grant dollar amount during the public reading.

The council held a public hearing on the hazard mitigation plan where one resident, Ray Frost, spoke in favor of updating hazard mitigation planning. Commissioners voted to place the resolution on final reading and adopted it; the clerk recorded the vote 11-0.

Ending: The county will move forward with the hazard mitigation plan adoption and with accepting EPA block grant funds for the resilience hub; staff will return with implementation details and budgeting information as project plans are refined.