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Benton County judge signals conditional support for regional drainage manual, seeks $5,000-a-year contribution
Summary
Leif Kinberg of the Illinois River Watershed Partnership asked Benton County to provide a letter of support and a $5,000-per-year contribution for three years to help fund a $400,000 regional drainage criteria manual; the judge said he would sign a contingent letter and staff would return with a resolution and appropriation if awarded.
Leif Kinberg, executive director of the Illinois River Watershed Partnership, asked the Benton County Finance Committee for a letter of support and a modest financial commitment to help produce a regional drainage criteria manual.
Kinberg said the project aims to standardize stormwater and drainage criteria across Northwest Arkansas, addressing stormwater quality, flooding and developer confusion. He described the request as a $5,000 annual contribution from each participating jurisdiction over three years toward an estimated $400,000 project and said the grant application will be submitted at the end of January. "We are trying to create some standardization around how stormwater is managed throughout the counties in Northwest Arkansas," Kinberg said.
The county's judge (speaking for the committee) clarified the county's existing relationship with IRWP and said the requested $5,000 is per year for each of three years, not a one-time $5,000. The judge said the letter he would sign is explicitly contingent on later legislative approval: "The letter that I've been asked to sign does indicate that it is contingent upon passage by the legislative body," the judge said. He added staff would bring a resolution to the Quorum Court and an appropriation ordinance if the grant is awarded.
Committee members asked how the remainder of the project would be funded and how vendors would be selected. Kinberg said roughly 56% of the project budget is expected from a state Natural Resources (319) program and that the project would use an LOI/RFQ process managed by regional planning for vendor selection. Staff estimated a draft of the manual could be available in the second quarter for local review.
There was no formal appropriation tonight. The judge said he would sign the contingency letter now and asked staff to return with a resolution and appropriation if the grant is successful; committee members registered no strong objections to that approach in a straw poll. Letters of support were noted as due Jan. 15, with the grant to be submitted by Jan. 30.
What happens next: the judge will sign a contingency letter of support and the county will consider a formal resolution and appropriation only if the grant application is awarded.
