New Pattonsburg thrives after relocation

An infusion of millions of dollars in federal aid included a $3.24 million grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to Missouri’s State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) for local use in buying out or relocating 235 properties in Pattonsburg to higher ground three miles away.
“New Pattonsburg,” as the city is now known, continues to grow more than a decade after the disaster.
“Most of the areas associated with flooding have been bought out and we don’t have to worry about them any more,” said Lance Rains, community developer for the Green Hills Regional Planning Commission, an 11-county planning organization which was involved in the rebuilding process.
Rains said the population in the area is growing to its pre-1993 levels, about 300.
“We’re getting more and more younger people now,” he said.
A few homeowners who declined to relocate suffered some flooding this year, Rains said. He said the irony is that homeowners who didn’t move and had damage also had other properties in Pattonsburg which they relocated.
The old town’s location in a geographic “bowl” made it susceptible to flooding from the Grand River, Rains said, noting the area had flooded 47 times since 1900. The threat of flooding has all been eliminated, but disaster preparation is still necessary because New Pattonsburg, as it is known now, is susceptible to tornadoes. Most of the homes have basements and a new energy-efficient, triple-dome school is designed to withstand a tornado’s strike, Rains said.
The relocation funds were provided through FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP), authorized under the Robert T. Stafford Act to pay for projects that have a long-term benefit in preventing repetitive damage. Projects must provide a long-term solution to a problem, and a project’s potential savings must be more than the cost of doing the project.
Independent studies conducted for FEMA by the National Institute of Building Sciences found that, on the average, a dollar spent on hazard mitigation saves $4 in taxpayer money that would have to be spent down the road to recover from new disasters. HMGP projects in Missouri are administered through SEMA. In Pattonsburg and elsewhere in the state, SEMA worked with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to use Community Development Block Grant funding to provide the required 25% matching funds and to increase the number of buyouts possible.
Block grant funding loses its identify as federal funds when it goes to a local community and is an exception to the rule that federal money cannot be used as a match for another federal project.
SEMA also provided technical assistance to Pattonsburg on all aspects of project development and relocation efforts, including co-ordinating and hosting community meetings to help citizens understand the process.
Danny Heldenbrand, current associate commissioner for Daviess County, said damage throughout Daviess County exceeded $15 million at the time, but as a result of measures taken after the flooding, the area has fared much better in subsequent storms. Bridges were rebuilt after 1993 to higher levels, roads were modified and a disaster plan reworked.
“Because of FEMA and Homeland Security, we work with disaster issues much more today,” Heldenbrand said. FEMA assistance comes when state and local resources are overwhelmed and the governor requests a disaster declaration. Funding for disaster recovery includes funding to address reduction of future disasters. Heldenbrand said his experience with FEMA is that it has always been helpful, “but you can’t expect the help to come without making the request. It always comes when you make the request.”
Old Pattonsburg achieved notoriety when it was used as a backdrop in 1998 for the Ang Lee film, “Ride with the Devil,” which used the site as a stand-in for an 1863 city in Lawrence, Kan. The infusion of film-industry capital on a “ghost town” helped to jump-start New Pattonsburg economically.