Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Rural Water Funding topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Rural water leaders ask for $172 million in grants; say carryover and contractor capacity shape timing
Summary
North Dakota rural water representatives told the committee a prioritized list seeks about $172 million in state grants to leverage federal money and loans; they reported $52 million already funded, roughly $10 million carried over from ARPA/Fiscal Recovery sources, and a remaining near‑term shortfall of roughly $28 million on pending projects.
North Dakota Rural Water Executive Director Eric Volk told the Appropriations - Education and Environment Division that the rural and regional systems submitted a prioritized list of water projects totaling about $172 million in potential state grant requests for the next biennium.
Volk summarized the sector: roughly 20 rural water districts, four tribal systems, two state‑owned regional systems and other operators collectively serve about 167,000 rural residents through 71,000 connections and roughly 42,000 miles of pipe, he said. The systems deliver wholesale water in many places and do not have taxing authority; operating and maintenance costs fall on customers and on system revenues.
Volk said the industry originally assembled a longer list (about $269 million) and then worked with systems to prioritize projects that could reasonably move in the next biennium; the resulting prioritized construction and grant need is about $172 million. He told the committee that roughly $52 million of rural water project requests were funded in the current cycle (including allocations and some carryover) and that about $10 million of carryover came from the federal fiscal‑recovery allocation that lawmakers previously set aside for water projects.
Volk said systems face the same contractor‑market and bidding constraints discussed elsewhere in the hearing — some projects must be given extra time for bidding and contractor availability — and that the commission will make allocation decisions in February on pending requests. He pointed to a set of ongoing projects and said he tracks obligations and estimated completion dates with Department of Water Resources staff; many projects anticipate construction seasons in 2025 and 2026.
Ending: Volk offered to provide the committee additional trend data, including typical pipe sizes, cost changes and other items that would help lawmakers understand rural delivery costs and contracting challenges.
