FOX 21 News, KQDS-DT

CARLTON - Carlton County got some help from a Minnesota city that was also devastated by a natural disaster.

The Wadena Otter Tail Recovery committee visited Carlton County Monday to help them transition into recovery mode.

"We have a lot of work to do," Carlton County Commissioner Thomas Proulx said.

"It is possible to recover in a significant way," Wadena Otter Tail Recovery committee chair Del Moen said.

Carlton County is moving from its emergency stages to the long term recovery process.

"We're just getting started and this is going to be like I said a long term recovery process," said Proulx.

They’re calling on Wadena, which was hit by a tornado in 2010 that devastated the town, to guide them through the transition.

"We really like the Wadena Otter Tail County Plan that they had,” said Proulx. “We thought we could use some of their expertise of what they did right, what they did wrong."

"We are available, what we've learned we wanna share," said Moen.

Primarily Wadena committee members will help Carlton County put together their own long term recovery committee.

"Their job is to help individual citizens recover from the disaster rather than the public infrastructure," said Moen.

The committee will help in the areas of fundraising, case management for individuals, volunteers and gathering resources.

"We gotta do this united, we gotta be together,” said Proulx. “It's gotta be community driven, not driven by politicians."

The recovery committee will also identify unmet needs after federal and government funds have come through.

"There's gonna be some things that are taken care of by insurance or by other people, people are gonna take care of themselves,” said Proulx. “But there's gonna be a whole ton of unmet needs."

Wadena officials say creating a sense of community is the best advice they can give Carlton County.

"A sense that we're in this together and we'll recover together as a group," said Moen.

Wadena Recovery Committee members say they will help Carlton County whether that be over the phone or a visit to the town as much as they need it.

Carlton County officials say they hope to have a recovery committee put together in the next couple of weeks.