County to seek buyout funds

$17M FEMA request would target homes with high flood risk

Harris County Commissioners Court on Tuesday voted to ask the federal government for $17 million to purchase 104 homes at the highest risk of flooding even as more than 1,000 residents have called the Flood Control District in recent days to request buyouts of their Hurricane Harvey flood-damaged homes.

The grant application for Federal Emergency Management Agency buyout funds is part of an annual application to Washington based on flooding in the previous two years, meaning it may not include homes flooded during Harvey.

If approved, officials plan to use the funds to continue the county’s slow, piecemeal process to buy and demolish some 3,300 homes located at least 2 feet below the floodplain, also known as “hopelessly deep.”

An estimated 136,000 homes and structures across Harris County were flooded as Harvey dumped more than 51 inches of rain in some areas, sending water into some homes for the third time in as many years and sparking increased calls for buyouts from property owners and local officials alike.

More than 1,000 residents have expressed interest in receiving buyouts of their flood-soaked

homes in recent days, adding to calls by top FEMA officials and Harris County Judge Ed Emmett to expand and speed up the buyout process.

“It’s absolutely, by far, the most significant and the most volume I’ve ever seen,” said James Wade, property acquisition manager for the Harris County Flood Control District. “And, of course, this is also the largest flood event to ever hit Harris County. I guess it goes hand in hand.”

Flood control district Executive Director Russ Poppe declined to divulge the exact areas targeted in the county’s latest application, saying he wanted to protect homeowners’ privacy. He did, however, say that the homes being targeted for buyouts are scattered across the county rather than clustered in one area.

Generally, the district has targeted watersheds along Greens Bayou, Hunting Bayou, Cypress Creek and the San Jacinto River, among other areas. Future buyouts, Wade said, largely would follow in areas the district has pursued in the past.

The flood control district has identified 65 areas and roughly 3,300 homes across the county — including in the city of Houston — that would be conducive to buyouts.

‘A lot more players’

To date, the county has bought out more than 3,000 homes since the 1980s, about a third of which were purchased with local funds rather than federal money.

The program is voluntary: homeowners register their interest with the district, which then bundles homes into grant applications to the federal government. Residents in targeted homes would have their properties appraised and are supposed to receive fair market value from the district.

Buying all of the homes in the area targeted by the county — before Harvey — would cost about $650 million, Wade said.

The city of Houston or other local jurisdictions also can buy out properties that flood repeatedly, but the flood control district by far has been the most active.

Roy Wright, FEMA’s deputy associate administrator for Insurance and Mitigation who runs the National Flood Insurance Program, said in an interview with the Houston Chronicle last week that FEMA wanted to accelerate buyouts of properties that have flooded repeatedly.

It is unclear where that proposal stands. Poppe said he was waiting to hear from FEMA on the next steps, and FEMA spokesman Peter Herrick said Tuesday the discussion involved several different participants, including the state of Texas, which forwards FEMA grant applications from local jurisdictions to the federal government.

“There’s a lot more players in the ball game here,” he said.

‘It isn’t enough’

On Monday, in a wide-ranging call to re-examine the region’s approach to flood control, Emmett floated the idea of largescale buyouts.

Emmett said a wish list of homes not already being targeted by flood control projects, such as the upgrades on Brays Bayou, could cost $2.5 billion.

He called Tuesday’s grant application a small step to address a far larger problem.

“When you’re talking about buyouts, it isn’t enough,” he said.

Officials estimate nearly 178,000 structures are in the county’s floodplain, most of them built before regulations were implemented in the 1980s. Only a fifth of the county’s 2,450 miles of bayous, creeks and drainage channels can contain a 100-year storm event.

Flood control officials estimate that providing 100-year-flood protection to all the homes in the county — through infrastructure upgrades or buyouts — would cost upward of $20 billion.

Wade said while the flood control district has asked for more than $17 million, it is possible it will be granted far less. The earliest the county could see funds from Tuesday’s application would be early 2018, he added.