"My major question to you all is, should I stay in UND and start the commercial aviation major to get all the desired ratings? Or some place closer to home where I can keep my job (NYC area), or anyone know places that allow A&Ps to work for flight time? Or even cost and time effective flight schools/FBOs to recommend?"
If you NEED to take one of the classes to graduate, you should take the flying one. That price is pretty reasonable, even though I don't know how that can say it is $9,253. Usually the prices vary by each student because some learn slower and need more flight time to reach the standards.
Once you graduate, come home to your job complete with a ppl and earn your ratings locally. There is probably no place that advertises "if you are an a&p youy can work here and we will pay you with flight time" but if you ask around I bet you could get some postive results