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Hot Topic Alerts |
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SPECIAL
DISASTER INFORMATION FOR ALL TOWNSHIPS
Across the state, the recent weather events have raised
havoc on rural roads. Many townships and counties have been
overwhelmed by the damage. There are not enough “ROAD CLOSED”
signs in the state to deal with this disaster.
Do what you can to protect the public from washed-out roads and
culverts! Any marking is better than nothing, a couple of T
posts with orange snow fence, or barrels and boards, be
creative. Anything you can add for night visibility will help,
driveway markers or even old license plates will help.
If you are not a township officer but you notice something that
indicates a road is about to give way or has already, please
notify the township or county. If you have the means to safely
place some kind of warning on the site please do so. Very often
a small hole, perhaps a foot across, will fall in over a
culvert, that is a warning sign that the culvert has likely been
mined out and a complete cave-in is possible. Cave-ins can occur
even weeks after a flood event.
Townships are also held responsible for public safety on
unimproved section lines. So, if you find out that a washout has
developed across one of your unimproved section lines or prairie
trails you must provide a warning to the public. You would not
necessarily have to make repairs, but you must provide a warning
of the hazard.
Whether it is a well-traveled township road, or an unimproved
section line your effort to warn the public may save a life and
prevent weeks of legal nightmares that would result from an
accident.
If your township has damage from this event, please contact your
county emergency manager so it can be added to the cumulative
damage in the state and help to qualify the state for FEMA
assistance. The Township Transportation Funding Program Grants
will not replace the FEMA process.
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Township Grant Program Open for Applications (TTFP)
The North Dakota Department of Transportation (NDDOT), in
partnership with the NDSU-Upper Great Plains Transportation
Institute (UGPTI), has launched a website and application form
for townships to apply to the Township Transportation Funding
Program. The 2021 ND Legislature directed the NDDOT, through HB
1015 Section 13 Paragraph 2, to seek at least $10 million
dollars in federal funds to match an equal amount of state
dollars for township transportation projects. Depending on
obtained matching grants, up to $20 million dollars could be
available through the program. State funds are released as
matching grants are secured.
The program has a 06/30/2023 funding end date. Funding
beyond that date is not guaranteed.
NDDOT is soliciting applications for these funds through the
webpage, and the application form must be completed online in
its entirety. Each application must also include an area map
showing the location of the project. Townships do NOT have a
matching funds requirement for the federal grants. However,
NDDOT and UGPTI are working to establish the extent of the
funding needs for township transportation projects. The
application asks for “amount of local funds contributed”. This
information is not a factor in approval of individual projects,
yet it will be valuable in establishing the township needs in
reporting back to the ND Legislature.
Each project must be applied for separately. Projects that
involve multiple TYPES of projects can explain that fact in the
project narrative. For example, a project may resurface a
stretch of road, as well as take care of drainage issues.
If a project has or potentially has other partners involved,
please identify that information in the project narrative toward
the end of the application, including multi-jurisdictional
partners (two townships) or private partners.
Townships are encouraged to submit projects regardless of
funding amounts requested, whether the project meets the initial
project priorities, or the township anticipates approval.
Applications are due by May 31, 2022, at 5
p.m. All applications should be submitted
electronically through the NDDOT website Applications will be
reviewed and processed by NDSU-UGPTI. For technical assistance,
please call
Kenneth Steiner at 701-318-6320 or email at
kenneth.steiner@ndsu.edu
For more information, go to
www.dot.nd.gov/ttfp
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FAQ for
the township grant program
click here
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NDTOA 2022 - 56th Annual Meeting and Convention - Baymont
Inn, Mandan, N. D. - December 12th & 13th 2022
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2021 NEW
ROAD NEEDS SURVEY:
Click Here
The information gathered from
previous surveys has been valuable in our efforts for more
township road funding. Please take the time to complete this new
survey so we can continue to show the legislature the needs.
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NDTOA
2021- 55th Annual Convention & Meeting:
Click here to join the
convention online
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NDTOA
2021- 55th Annual Meeting Registration Form -
Click here
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2021 -
Covid and Annual Meetings -
Click Here
NDTOA advice on Township Annual Meetings and Covid
Do your best to hold the township annual meeting on the third
Tuesday in March as NDCC currently has no allowance for holding at
another time. Postponing or rescheduling often results in a poorer
turnout than if held on the initially designated day. In order to
lessen the worries of the Covid issue, hold the meeting in the
largest meeting room you can find in order to allow distance
between attendees, such as a community center or other large
meeting room in the township or an adjacent township, or in a
large farm shop, or even outdoors (isn’t the weather usually nice
in March in ND?). Wherever it is held it should be announced that
state guidelines for Covid at the time will be adhered to. If you
are unable to hold the annual meeting on the prescribed day, a
special meeting will need to be called (see NDCC 58-04-02 and
58-04-19). There is talk of allowing participation via electronic
means but that is not legally allowed, yet. It may be possible for
someone to listen in via speakerphone and provide comments to the
meeting, but would not be able to vote on an issue that requires a
secret ballot, such as the election of officers. Remote electronic
attendance may not be so easy to set up in many locations.
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2020 -
“NDTOA 54th Annual Meeting ONLINE only” -
Click Here
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2020 -
“Meetings by Conference Call” -
Click Here
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2020 -
Covid-19 Concerns, Township Meetings -
Click Here
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2020 -
Open Meeting requirements during Coronavirus (COVID-19) National
Emergency -
Click Here
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2020 -
“Equalization Meeting Dates”
click here
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2020 - Road
Needs Survey - UGPTI
click here
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Equalization meetings April 8th, 2019
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2019 Annual Meeting of the Township-March
19th – NO EXCEPTIONS!
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Click here to Nominate
an outstanding Officer For Grassroots Leadership Award
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“Payroll
Record Requests” - Most all Townships in North Dakota have
received a request for payroll information. This request is
from Open the Books which is a "cost of government" website.
While nobody needs the extra work of digging up and producing this
information, this is a legitimate request and it cannot be ignored
by any Township. The request asks that any fees be waived
but you do not have to do this without charge! The template
link below shows that you can charge $25 an hour after the first
hour spent gathering the information. The template kind of gives
you a check sheet to help you get through complying with this
information request. For one thing, you can fill in the time
it will take to find all the information and compute the cost that
will be involved. The request says they have to approve any cost
in writing before any cost is incurred. So fill out the template
with the cost and send that to the email address provided. They
will have to pay for the search before you have to do it. If it
will take 5 hours to dig it up because your township doesn’t have
computerized records you can charge for 4 hours at $25, they may
not want to pay $100 to find out what you pay your officers.
Be careful that no personal data such as Social Security Numbers
are released. Here are a couple of items from the Attorney
General to help you comply with the law. Attorney General's
page on Open Meetings and Records:
https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/open-records-meetings/manuals-and-guides
Template to Use When Responding to an Open Records Request:
https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/sites/ag/files/documents/Open-Records-Template-For-Response-to-Request.pdf
The Open Meetings and Record laws are in NDCC 44-04 and are found
on pages 108 to 118 of the 2018 edition of the NDTOA Township
Officers Handbook. When you have put all this information
together, keep a copy, this may not be the only request for this
information we will see.
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NDTOA
Bakken Oil Tour - Because of unexpected delays for the printed
Grassroots Report, the Bakken Tour notice did not get out in time
for the sign up deadline so this tour has been
canceled. We
apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. NDTOA and
the ND Petroleum Council are working to set up a tour for a future
date.
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All
Annual Township Meetings - March 20, 2018
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January 5,
2018 - Township Officer compensation is a W2 item. 1099 is not the
correct form and the W2 must be filed for any amount, even if the
compensation is less than $600. There is a $530 dollar fine for
each W2 you fail to file. The deadline for giving W-2 to employees
and filing the IRS 941 or 944 is January 31. Jan 31 is also the
deadline for filing 1099 MISC to unincorporated
entities/individuals that the township paid $600 or more for
services during a calendar year.
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