Jill Schramm/MDN Urban engineer Michael Johnson with the North Dakota Department of Transportation speaks to members of local government boards at a joint meeting about developing a Metropolitan Planning Organization. MPO coordinator Wayne Zacher with the NDDOT listens at left.

Elected officials from four area boards met Thursday to talk through the process of forming a Metropolitan Planning Organization for the immediate Minot region.

The U.S. Census Bureau identified a population of 50,000 in the area from Burlington to Minot to Surrey, creating a requirement for an MPO. As a policy entity, the MPO will be tasked with creating a regional transportation plan and then prioritizing and coordinating the planning of transportation improvements in that region.

Presently, government entities have worked together informally – such as in developing plans for a transportation corridor around south Minot. The MPO will be a separate organization with representatives from the governing bodies and its own staff members who will handle those planning functions.

The MPO will receive funds from the federal government. Because federal funds will cover only 80% of planning costs, the MPO also will have dues or other means of collecting local government money.

Urban engineer Michael Johnson and MPO coordinator Wayne Zacher with the North Dakota Department of Transportation’s Local Government Division met with commissioners and council members from Ward County, Minot, Burlington and Surrey to outline the next steps.

“This is a new and exciting adventure for all of us,” Johnson said. “The North Dakota DOT hasn’t welcomed a new MPO since the 1970s.” Minot is the fourth MPO in the state.

The MPO area as identified by the Census Bureau includes the cities of Minot and Surrey, making planning efforts in those communities eligible for MPO funds and assistance. Burlington falls outside that map but within an area that gives it a voice at the table in the planning efforts for the region and on projects that will impact its immediate area.

Several phases lie ahead, including getting an MPO designation signed by the governor. The first step will be establishing a steering committee that will determine the structure of the MPO. Each of the government boards at Thursday’s meeting will select two of its members by June 15 to serve on the steering committee, along with its county or city engineering representative.

“We have two things that we have to deliver by the end of the year to get designated as an MPO. We have to approve a map,” Minot city engineer Lance Meyer said. “We also have to set up the policy board.

“We have a lot of work to do and not a lot of time. But it’s important that we get this work done soon,” he said.