It’s been more than a month since Hurricane Harvey blew
through the Texan coast, destroying cities and towns, including Houston, Corpus
Christi and the smaller Victoria (among others). Still, federal, state and
local officials don’t know how or when housing relief will play out. Victoria,
specifically, has seen incredible damage: there’s still nowhere for people to seek shelter or temporary housing in
the entire county! A couple weeks back, federal and state agencies introduced
some new programs that would pay for temporary housing through mobile homes as
well as more permanent home repairs, but nothing has helped the Victorian
Residents so far (besides the 200 or so families who are living in hotels paid
for by FEMA due to unlivable conditions in their homes).
In the past, FEMA has paid for limited repairs caused by
natural disasters, but never really aimed towards permanent fixes. After
Harvey, several new programs were developed by federal and state officials,
including one specifically that will fix apartment buildings and another to
repair homes on a more permanent basis. Since the hurricane, FEMA has received
18,500+ applications for financial support and has inspected about 7,500 homes
in Victoria County alone. Now the residents are becoming impatient because
local government officials still don’t have details around the timeframe when
housing relief would become available. Hundreds have been evicted from damaged
apartments while others are not financially stable enough to pay for home
repairs.
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