Vicksburg officials on Monday will meet with several groups and residents to pull together ideas and resources in hopes of providing safer living conditions for about 25 families whose homes are under water due to Mississippi River flooding.

The river was at 50.8 feet Friday, down 0.1 foot from Thursday, but more than 7 feet above flood If you goCity officials and other agencies will meet at 8:30 a.m. Monday to design a plan to help flood victims. The meeting will be in the mayor’s office on the third floor of City Hall. Anyone interested in helping is invited.stage at Vicksburg, where the river crest a week ago, leaving about 71 houses affected.

Mayor Laurence Leyens said Friday he will meet with officials from agencies, including the Vicksburg Housing Authority, Habitat for Humanity, We Care Community Services, Mississippi Emergency Management Agency, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and local church-based groups.

“What we propose is an agreement from these organizations saying they want to help. Then, we will literally knock on doors and appeal to the people,” Leyens said. “The real crisis is coming.”

The meeting will focus on ways the groups can come together to either change the conditions of the affected homes, most of which are in the Ford subdivision, or move the families into higher and dryer homes.

“We’re spending a lot of (taxpayer) money in Ford subdivision on road maintenance and code enforcement,” he said. “We’re trying to maintain an area that Mother Nature’s not allowing us” to maintain.

Gov. Haley Barbour toured riverside counties Monday, a trip that was followed by his asking for federal assistance, which would allow local governments to apply for federal money to make repairs Mississippi RiverFRIDAY’S STAGE: 50.8 feetFELL: 0.1 footFLOOD STAGE: 43 feetSTEELE BAYOU FRIDAY:Landside: 91.0Riverside: 100.0through the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Individual Assistance. Leyens said it will take months before any financial assistance is granted. He wants to take action before a waiting pattern sets in and sees the flood victims moving back into their houses in post-flood conditions.

“We can come together to make 25 families safe. Some don’t want to move; they’ve been there seven generations or more. But, it’s a long-term expense – their morality,” Leyens said. “We need to either adapt their homes and help get them safe or move them.”

Creating a new development on higher ground that could house people living in low-lying, now flooded areas is an option Leyens said he’s willing to explore.

“It may be that city needs to get involved in a new development,” he said. “We could buy new, manufactured homes and put them on a lot and the city could help with access roads.”