1997 Red River Flood in The United States - Donations and Damages

Donations and Damages

The national attention of both flood and fire reached Joan Kroc, the McDonald's heiress, who anonymously (her anonymity was later revealed to the public by the Grand Forks Herald) donated $15,000,000 to be divided into $2,000 portions for each damaged household (though the amount some homeowners received was less due to the huge number of devastated homes; in all 7,500 households received funds). Additionally, another single anonymous donor gave $5 million which was distributed in $1,000 allotments. In November 1997, North Dakota Governor Ed Schafer reported that victims had been assisted by 50,000 relief agency volunteers who had served more than 2 million meals. Additionally, the communities received clothing and supplies that were donated from every U.S. state. During a concert in Fargo, the rock group KISS donated the money from sales of a special t-shirt to the Fargo and Grand Forks areas to assist in flood relief.

All told, there was $3.5 billion USD in damages to Grand Forks and East Grand Forks, making it the eighth most expensive natural disaster in the U.S. since 1903. Across North Dakota and Minnesota, there were 4,500,000 acres (18,000 km2) of land covered in water. Thousands of people were relocated after the disaster. In May 1997, the Red Cross conducted a damage assessment of 8,000 North Dakota homes. The report indicated that 519 homes, 53 mobile homes, and 73 apartments had been destroyed by flood waters while 701 homes, 69 mobile homes, and 175 apartments sustained major damage. Inspectors reported that 5,959 homes, 166 mobile homes, and 497 apartments received minor damage. Over 5,200 businesses had been destroyed, damaged, or somehow affected by the winter and spring blizzards and the flood. In Grand Forks alone, 75% of the homes, 315 businesses, and 16 of 22 local schools had been flooded. East Grand Forks had over 500 condemned homes, with only eight homes not damaged by the flood. Grand Forks, losing only 3% of its population from 1997 to 2000, did not fare as badly as its sister city, which lost nearly 17% of its residents. Not a single person was killed in the flood itself.