Housing study meeting Monday

Talk about it

A meeting to discuss tentative findings and progress of a housing study that encompasses 23 Southwest North Dakota communities is scheduled to be held Monday at the Dickinson Chamber of Commerce.

The study, conducted by Hanna:Keelan, a Nebraska-based community research and planning firm, was commissioned by the Southwest Economic Developers earlier last year.

The study focuses on seven counties: Adams, Billings, Dunn, Golden Valley, Hettinger, Slope and Stark.

The study will entail building a community consensus for housing development for the next 20 years, developing population, income and housing profiles that will provide a projection of population base for the next 10 years, provide affordable housing models and financing opportunities, among other services, according to the firm.

Monday’s meeting with the Southwest Economic Developers and a few representatives from communities involved in the study will discuss some tentative preliminary results of the study, which is about 50 percent completed.

Lonnie Dickson, Community and Regional Planner for Hanna:Keelan will be on hand to present information at Monday’s meeting.

“Lonnie will be going over the community observations, the survey results then he will be going over some preliminary statistical information that will entail population and household projections,” said Tim Keelan of Hanna:Keelan. “He’s going to have a big stack of stuff to go over.”

During the presentation, those attending will have an opportunity to ask questions about what has been done on the study so far, Keelan said.

“By the first of March we will be done for sure,” Keelan said. “We’ve got a lot of little towns and we got to put a lot of statistical information together.”

Total cost for the study is about $53,000. The North Dakota Housing Finance Agency will pay $24,000, the North Dakota Department of Commerce Division of Community Service will pay $5,000, Stark Development will pay $15,000 and the other six counties will pay the remaining $9,000.

Debra Walworth of Prairie West Development said the meeting is a step in the direction of finalizing the study.

“We are going to be discussing some more materials to finalize the study, but it won’t be the final results,” Walworth said.

The meeting is set to be held Monday at the Dickinson Chamber of Commerce beginning at 9:30 a.m.

Tags: housing, study