Over 30 property owners in Hannibal express flood buyout interest

A total of 31 property owners in Hannibal - 24 residential and seven commercial - expressed interest to the city about participating in a flood buyout program. The registration period ended Sept. 26.
“I didn’t know what to expect. I’d not been through a great flood before,” said City Manager Jeff LaGarce about the level of interest.
Some of the property owners actually have multiple parcels of property which might be eligible for the program. The process of researching the location of each property is ongoing, according to the city manager.
“I need to talk to the property owners for some clarifications. I need a map of those properties,” said LaGarce. “Some are vacant lots and I’m not sure how eligible those are from a FEMA standpoint. I need to speak with a couple of the property owners and get clarification.”
The next big hurdle in the process is coming up with a ballpark figure regarding the value of the local properties.
“To let the state know what we’re dealing with in terms of magnitude they need to know what the valuation is we’re talking about,” said LaGarce. “I don’t have all the values yet. I’ve got probably 75 percent of the values.”
While he has a value estimate on some properties, LaGarce said he cannot project a total value amount at this point.
“If I were to extrapolate it would come out to about $1 million, but I’m not sure you can extrapolate. Any one property can throw the whole projection out of whack,” he said.
While the bulk of the commercial properties on the buyout list are located along Bear Creek, the residential properties are not as centralized.
“They’re kind of scattered around. For some we need to pull out a map and determine whether they are in a flood plain,” said LaGarce.
In the near future, LaGarce hopes to have a representative from the state in town to meet with the properties owners who are on the buyout list.
“I’m glad we had all the enrollees that we had,” he said. “Now we’ll get together with everybody in a large group and explain what has to happen, how we go about this and move forward.”
Property owners expressing interest in participating in the buyout program are not obligated to take part.
According to LaGarce, the residential buyout program is through FEMA. For each buyout property, the federal government will pay 75 percent. The city is hopeful of obtaining a Community Development Block Grant to cover both its match for residential properties and supply funds for commercial buyouts.