The Galveston County Daily News

TEXAS CITY — City commissioners last week approved a $700,000 engineering contract that is the first step to rebuilding the Texas City Dike, which was heavily damaged by Hurricane Ike.

The contract with HDR Engineering is contingent on more than $5 million in funding from the federal government to show up in the city and county’s bank accounts. While the Federal Emergency Management Agency has committed the funds, the dollars actually have to flow through the state first before the city, which owns the dike and the county, which has jurisdiction over the dike road, receive the money, FEMA spokesman Brad Craine said.

As of Friday, neither the city nor the county had official word from FEMA or the state as to when the funds would be available. The earliest reconstruction will begin is January, city officials said.

Given when the money is likely to be available and how long it will take to get construction going, city officials estimate the dike won’t reopen until the fall of 2010, about four months later than had been hoped.

The city will not open the dike in sections, project director Tommy Maris told city commissioners. Reconstruction work will begin at the end of the 5-mile-long pier and work inward, Maris said.

The city and county, too, now must figure out how to come up with the local matching dollars to fund the dike’s repair.

For the county, that comes to about $100,000, while Texas City will have to find at least $300,000 for its portion of the repair costs. While Texas City will manage the reconstruction, FEMA awarded $1.302 million to the county for road repair and $3.2 million to the city for other dike repairs. The local taxing authorities must come up with a 10 percent match for each funded project.

While there are some federal funds for boat ramp repair, reconstruction of the First Lady Pavilion and the replacement of the picnic areas and trash barrels, none of the funds earmarked for the dike’s repair will go to rebuilding the shrimp boat docks or bait camps, Mayor Matt Doyle said.

“We are not going to see the dike of old with the bait camps and shrimp boats,” Doyle said. “We are going to have to think real hard before we make any plans to let anyone rebuild (a business) along the dike.”