The Kansas CW | Homeowner Wants FEMA Buyout After Consistent Flooding
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By Denise Hnytka (BELLE PLAINE, Kan.)
The Sumner County Commission calls it 'a problem that's bigger than all of us'. They're responding to a homeowner's concerns about consistent flooding in a neighborhood in Belle Plaine. Ponderosa Estates lies along the Ninnescah River. It overflowed it's banks again last week.
Flood waters have forced Bob Kierzek from his home for the last time.
"It's done," he said. "I have no place to live. The mold is already growing, and you can't go in there without a mask on."
After three floods in ten years, Kierzek has 11 reasons for going before the Sumner County Commission Monday morning.
"We have made it clear to Sumner County officials that we want a FEMA buyout," Kierzek told them. "But there is no follow-up on their part, and its almost as though we are being deliberately excluded from the help we qualify for."
A FEMA buyout would get Kierzek out of his mortgage. He hoped the commission could help speed up the process. But Emergency Management Director James Fair says it isn't that simple.
"It is not something that we can fill out an application for and then 30 or 60 days later we have an answer," explained Fair.
First, the county needs a mitigation plan approved by FEMA to be eligible. That's still in the works in Sumner County. Then, they have to analyze whether buying the property is better than paying to fix it over and over again.
"The surveys have to be paid for locally," said Fair. "The counties and townships struggle to find those dollars."
Kierzek left the meeting without any real answers about what will happen to his property. The house is unlivable, but he's hoping he won't have to take a complete loss.
"I believe this is going to happen sometime," he said.
Until then, he promises to be as persistent as the flood waters themselves.
The county hopes to have the FEMA mitigation plan set by the end of the summer.
FEMA did buy out some properties in the Ponderosa Estates area in the 1990's but haven't bought any since then.
