PA city, County bouncing back after Harvey
Published 3:40 pm Wednesday, September 13, 2017
Progress is being made in recovery efforts for areas hit by the catastrophic flooding from Tropical Storm Harvey.
Contractors are working to pick up the debris, housing assistance is on the way, schools are either open or scheduled to open and federal aid is here.
Port Arthur saw the worst of the flooding with an estimated 85 percent of structures affected. The hundreds of people who have been displaced — either to shelters in Garland and Dallas or housed at Thomas Jefferson Middle School, and those evicted from apartments, will be able to find a temporary home on one of two floating barges set to arrive from Houma, Louisiana within the next few days, Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman said. Displaced residents will have first preference on the barges.
A contract for the barges is for 30 days with an option to renew.
“And there may be some different options in the works to get folks out of the schools and back to town,” Freeman said.
Jefferson County was initially passed over for disaster housing assistance due to the amount of hotels in the area. But the federal persons who made the decision didn’t know that many of the hotels sustained major damage.
“We had to make them realize we don’t have that capacity,” Freeman said of available hotel rooms.
Freeman said he received help from Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee in getting Jefferson County designated for the disaster housing assistance.
“Now, when residents call FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) the information on housing will be in their computer and they can give assistance.”
The area is also working with Texas Health and Human Services and residents in the county will soon be able to apply for the Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
In addition, a disaster recovery center will be made available in the next few days where residents can get the assistance they need.
Emergency contractors for debris has begun the task of collecting the piles of sheetrock and other flood damaged items throughout the city. Currently there are 10 double trucks with another 15 double trucks expected to be here by the weekend, he said in his Facebook post.
Jefferson County Judge Jeff Branick said officials are doing damage assessment to public facilities and engaged the debris contractors more than a week ago working in the unincorporated areas with two trucks per precinct.
“The contractors will be pushing more trucks to us today (Wednesday),” Branick said.
The county has been working with FEMA and the Texas Division of Emergency Management to bring temporary housing menu here.
“We are also working with our own insurance company to assess damage to county structures and to file the appropriate claims,” he said.
The county courthouse saw water infiltration as well as Ford Park and some of the precinct buildings.
“Obviously, this is different than with Ike and Rita which were primarily wind events,” he said. “The public infrastructure with the exception of Port Arthur is better than after Rita. Residential damage was so much worse. This will be a more expensive event from property damage stance than either of these two storms.”
Funding for some of the projects planned will come down from the Community Development Block Grant program and likely be administered through the Texas General Land Office and the South East Texas Regional Planning Commission.
Branick sees the county recovering from Harvey.
“I think we’re an extremely resilient community and will bounce back,” he said.
In the future, hazard and mitigation program dollars will be put towards the prevention of future disasters.
Branick would also like to see the area band together as a region — Jefferson, Orange, Jasper, Newton, Tyler, Hardin and Chambers counties and come up with a regional drainage district to allow to more efficiently address flood water control across the entire region as opposed to just Port Arthur and just Beaumont.
“I’m extremely proud of our community,” he said. “When you get in deep water it’s important to put the paddle in the water and move forward and that’s what this community did. The outpouring of assistance and volunteerism the likes of which I’ve never seen restored my faith in humanity and I’m proud of the community and all of our volunteers and friends.”
Branick said the county saw help from people from 43 different states during the disaster.
Freeman is also proud of how the community is rebounding and of how people helped each other.
“It’s been an amazing thing to see neighbor helping neighbor, stranger helping stranger,” Freeman said. “If there has been a silver lining in all of this, it’s that it brought our community closer together and I’m appreciative and hopeful. It gives me strength.”