Cedar Rapids City Council Needs to Speed Up Demolitions

By Dave Franzman, Reporter

An excavator tears down the front porch of a 125-year-old cottage at 1207 Fifth St. SE that was damaged during the 2008 flood this morning, Tuesday, July 27, 2010. Seven of the immigrant cottages were built on the block in the 1880s. (Jeff Raasch/SourceMedia Group News)

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By Aaron Hepker

Story Created: Sep 3, 2010 at 4:17 PM CST

Story Updated: Sep 3, 2010 at 4:31 PM CST

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa - The city of Cedar Rapids is prepared to pick up the pace on demolishing flood-damaged homes considered an imminent threat to health and safety. That’s to avoid losing any Federal Emergency Management Agency funding for the demolition costs.

FEMA gave the city more time this week to finish the demolitions of the worst of the damaged homes near the Cedar River. The deadline was last Tuesday but will now be November 27th. The city is preparing to demolish 198 more homes under the program covered by FEMA.

The city is so concerned about getting the demolitions and paperwork done by that date, council members even met for less than a minute on Friday to save time. One item on a special meeting agenda was picking a new contractor to begin the next, and final round, of demolition work billed to FEMA. The original low bidder, Dore & Associates of Bay City, Michigan pulled out of the deal at the last minute. The council on Friday selected the next lowest bidder, Young’s General Contracting, Inc. of Poplar Bluff, Missouri to pick up the work. The council will spend about $40,000 more on the second lowest bidder. That bid was $948,941.28.

Mayor Pro Tem Monica Vernon said scheduling a special meeting for that change made sense because the council otherwise wasn’t scheduled to meet again until mid September.

“With a limited period of time, we had to get this group going,” Vernon said.

The next round of imminent danger demolitions will shift from the Time Check neighborhood of Cedar Rapids to Czech Village and other areas. And because of the need for speed, not all buyouts will be finalized before the homes get demolished.

That was a problem for council member Don Karr when the demolitions first began this spring. But Karr said he’s not so worried about that issue now with the need to get it wrapped up and avoid losing FEMA money.

“I agree with that. We’re in a little bit of a crunch right now. I’ve really been working hard to get these buyouts done and these buyouts are moving along,” Karr said.

City Flood Recovery Director Greg Eyerly said the council needs to make sure there’s no slowdown in the demolition work this close to the end because FEMA probably won’t authorize another extension for the city. Eyerly expects the new demolition contractor to start the job soon.

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