Staff recommends that City Council approve the MOA with Billings Bench Water Association BBWA for the FEMA HMGP Grant.

The City of Billings and the Billings Bench Water Association (BBWA) are applying together for a FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program to address flooding mitigation along the BBWA Canal. FEMA has requested that the City of Billings and BBWA combine grant applications for the proposed BBWA Headgate Upgrade and City of Billings Stormwater Unloaders built to mitigate flooding along the canal. As a branch of local government, the City of Billings is the only eligible entity on the application to apply as a subrecipeint of the grant.   As the subrecipient of the grant, the City has liability to ensure the BBWA Headgate Upgrade project is done in accordance with FEMA requirements or grant funding for the entire proposal could be revoked.  This Memorandom of Agreement (MOA) between the City of Billings (subrecipient) and the Billings Bench Water Association (stakeholder) serves to limit the city's financial liability by ensuring the BBWA carries the financial burden of the Headgate Upgrade.  In the event the BBWA does not perform the Headgate Upgrade project to completion and provide the required financial match, the City should be absolved of repercussions from the grant. The MOA only addresses the BBWA Headgate Upgrade project because the BBWA will receive payments for their project through the City of Billings. The Stormwater Unloaders will be the responsibility of the City and are not included in the MOA between the BBWA and the City of Billings. 

The City of Billings will be the sub-recipient of the grant and will be responsible for documentation and requesting reimbursement from the FEMA grant. If the BBWA complies with the agreement, the City will pay grant funds to the BBWA for construction of the Headgate Upgrade. The MOA requires the BBWA to provide all documentation for their project to the City. The MOA will also require compliance with all Federal and State statutes that apply to the grant and then require the BBWA to cover the 25% match required for the Headgate Upgrade project including covering any overages for the Headgate Upgrade project above the grant match and request. 

The entire application for the FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program will include the following projects:
The BBWA proposes automating and modernizing their headgate located in Laurel, Montana to improve the response time to close the headgates in the event of a flood, breach, or other event. The City of Billings proposes to install stormwater unloaders along the BBWA canal at Canyon Creek, Lillis Park, 17th and Parkhill, and Virginia and Poly. These locations have the most capacity for stormwater diversion within city limits. The headgate automation and stormwater unloaders will work together to divert water from the canal in the event of an emergency. 

City Council may:

• Approve the MOA with the BBWA; or,
• Not approve the MOA.

Signing the Memorandom of Agreement will not affect the budget and no portion of City funds will cover the BBWA Headgate Upgrade.

If the FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program is awarded, the City of Billings project match for the Stormwater Unloaders will be funded by $1,182,000 in Water Funds and $283,750 from the General Fund.