1. (a) General provisions. Urgent need assistance is contingent upon the availability of funds for activities that will restore water or sewer infrastructure whose sudden failure has resulted in either death, illness, injury, or pose an imminent threat to life or health within the affected applicant's jurisdiction. The infrastructure failure must not be the result of a lack of maintenance and must be unforeseeable. As an initial step, TxCDBG undertakes an assessment of whether the situation is reasonably considered unforeseeable. An application for urgent need assistance will not be accepted by the TxCDBG until discussions between the potential applicant and representatives of the TxCDBG, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), and the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) have taken place. Through these discussions, a determination shall be made whether the situation meets TxCDBG urgent need threshold criteria; whether shared financing is possible; whether financing for the necessary improvements is, or is not, available from the TWDB; or that the potential applicant does, or does not, qualify for TWDB assistance.

2. (b) Threshold requirements. In addition to the threshold requirements set forth in §255.1(h) and (n) of this title (relating to General Provisions), each of the following requirements must be satisfied in order to be eligible for funding under this fund:

   1. (1) The situation addressed by the applicant must not be related to a proclaimed state disaster declaration or a federal disaster declaration.
   2. (2) The situation addressed by the applicant must be both unanticipated and beyond the control of the local government (e.g., not for facilities or equipment beyond their normal, useful life span).
   3. (3) The problem being addressed must be of recent origin. For urgent need assistance, this means that the situation first occurred or was first discovered no more than 30 days prior to the date that the potential applicant provides a written request to the TxCDBG for urgent need assistance. The urgent need fund will not fund projects to address a situation that has been known for more than 30 days or should have been known would occur based on the applicants existing system facilities.
   4. (4) Each applicant for these funds must demonstrate that local funds or funds from other state or federal sources are not available to completely address the problem.
   5. (5) The distribution of these funds will be coordinated with other state agencies.
   6. (6) The infrastructure failure cannot have resulted from a lack of maintenance.
   7. (7) Urgent need funds cannot be used to restore infrastructure that has been cited previously for failure to meet minimum state standards.
   8. (8) The infrastructure failure cannot have been caused by operator error.
   9. (9) The infrastructure requested by the applicant cannot include back-up or redundant systems.
   10. (10) TxCDBG will consider whether funds under an existing TxCDBG contract are available to be reallocated to address the situation.
   11. (11) The urgent need fund will not finance temporary solutions to the problem or circumstance.
3. (c) Start of construction. Construction on an urgent need fund project must begin within ninety (90) days from the start date of the TxCDBG contract. The TxCDBG reserves the right to deobligate the funds under an urgent need fund contract if the grantee fails to meet this requirement.
4. (d) Matching funds. Each applicant for urgent need funds must provide matching funds. If the applicant's 2000 census population is equal to or fewer than 1,500 persons, the applicant must provide matching funds equal to 10 percent of the TxCDBG funds requested. If the applicant's 2000 census population is over 1,500 persons, the applicant must provide matching funds equal to 20 percent of the TxCDBG funds requested. For county applications where the beneficiaries of the water or sewer improvements are located in unincorporated areas, the population category for matching funds is based on the number of project beneficiaries.

Source Note:The provisions of this §30.5 adopted to be effective December 23, 1991, 16 TexReg 7008; amended to be effective September 11, 1992, 17 TexReg 5951; amended to be effective October 13, 1993, 18 TexReg 6641; amended to be effective October 31, 1994, 19 TexReg 8107; amended to be effective July 30, 1996, 21 TexReg 6779; amended to be effective August 5, 1997, 22 TexReg 6937; transferred effective October 31, 2001, as published in the Texas Register August 2, 2002, 27 TexReg 6835; amended to be effective January 26, 2003, 28 TexReg 537; amended to be effective May 4, 2003, 28 TexReg 3712; amended to be effective May 4, 2004, 29TexReg4144;amended to be effective March 4, 2007, 32 TexReg 829; amended to be effective September 11, 2011, 36 TexReg 5676; transferred effective October 1, 2011, as published in the Texas Register December 23, 2011, 36 TexReg 9011.