West-side diversion plan gets support

In a significant show of support, Cass County’s joint watershed board has thrown its backing – and its broad taxing authority – behind a Red River diversion around Fargo.

Board member Tom Fischer said a North Dakota-side diversion does everything a Minnesota-side diversion would do and more, including protecting people in the Maple River and Sheyenne River watersheds from the kind of overland flooding that deluged areas west of West Fargo last spring.

“While we have difficulties to get through, the will is there amongst this board,” Fischer said during a meeting of the joint board Wednesday in West Fargo.

Officially known as the Cass County Joint Water Resource District board, the five-member body consists of two board members from the Southeast Cass Water Resource District and one member each from the Maple River, North Cass and Rush River water resource districts.

A week ago, joint board members voted unanimously to support a North Dakota-side diversion and to support being the local sponsor for its construction, operation and maintenance, said Fischer, chairman of the Southeast Cass district board.

The joint watershed district is unique in that it can create a tax assessment district for a flood control project based on the benefit individual property owners will receive.

Property owners would get to vote on the tax. More than 50 percent of the returned ballots must approve creating the assessment district, Fischer said.

A similar process has been used to determine benefits for Fargo’s Southside Flood Protection Project, which is on hold as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers continues to study F-M flood control options and waits for locals to indicate which option they prefer.

Jeffry Volk of Moore Engineering, which designed the southside project, said the beauty of a water resource district is it can collect money to maintain a project even as it’s being paid for.

“So you’ve got that long-term viability of an entity that can continue to generate a revenue stream to operate,” he said.

A water resource district also can reassign benefits – for example, as diversion-protected property is developed and valued higher, it could carry a larger share of the district’s tax burden.

The corps has said it needs an answer by Dec. 1 from the Metropolitan Flood Management Committee on whether it wants a North Dakota or Minnesota diversion, or levees.

Five of the six Minnesota diversion options, estimated to cost $962 million to $1.26 billion, meet the corps’ standard for federal funding, while two North Dakota options, estimated at $1.34 billion and $1.36 billion, come close.

On Monday, the Dilworth City Council voted unanimously to oppose plans for a diversion channel on the city’s east side. Rural landowners also have expressed concern about a Minnesota-side diversion.

Fischer said there’s optimism a North Dakota diversion will meet the corps’ cost-benefit ratio once flood impacts to transportation – including closing the I-29 trade corridor north of Fargo – are factored in.

Fischer said he has faith in the joint board’s ability to see a diversion project to fruition, noting that the board sponsored the Maple River Dam project completed in 2006 near Enderlin.

Members of the metro flood committee also attended Wednesday’s meeting. Discussion ranged from what size of diversion might be feasible to how to fund the local share of its cost, to the need for upstream water retention.

The committee meets next at 3:30 p.m. on Nov. 5 at Fargo City Hall.

The joint water board will make a presentation on flood control options during the Cass County Commission’s meeting at 3:30 p.m. Monday.

Readers can reach Forum reporter Mike Nowatzki at (701) 241-5528