County begins razing flood-prone homes
Highland Shores residence is first of many buyouts
The backhoe clawed into Ronnie Pitkin’s home Friday on the banks of the San Jacinto River, turning the pastel yellow building where he’d lived for more than a decade into a pile of broken wood and rubble.
It didn’t matter that he’d spent $20,000 to add a new bathroom a few months ago or redone the floors and bedrooms over the years. Nor did it matter that the Highland Shores home was where Pitkin raised four of his five children, swimming in the San Jacinto or driving ATVs in the natural surroundings.
Pitkin and his family won’t go home again.
On Friday, Harris County demolished the home, the first in an escalating series of buyouts and demolitions for flood-prone homes left in Hurricane Harvey’s wake.
“A lot of hard work and sweat went into that house,” Pitkin, 68, said. “It was hard to watch it go down.”
His home was among more than 200 flooded during Harvey that have been identified by the county for buyouts, an effort to chip away at decades of risky development in floodprone areas. As many as 180,000 homes and other structures sit in flood plains across the county.
“People’s homes and a lot of time their memories and everything are de-
stroyed,” said John Blount, county engineer. “Getting them going on to a new life is important to us.”
More buyouts are likely. Harvey dropped more than 51 inches of rain across the county, causing billions of dollars of damage, flooding an estimated 136,000 homes and structures and killing almost 80 people across the state.
Harris County Judge Ed Emmett last month proposed a 15-point flood control proposal that included widespread buyouts, along with increased restrictions on development in unincorporated areas, a third dam and reservoir in the northwest part of the region to complement the Addicks and Barker reservoirs, and widening and straightening projects along the county’s network of bayous and creeks.
A bond package that could be upward of $1 billion is now under discussion to pay for flood control projects.
Four floods, 15 months
The storm has left homeowners like Pitkin asking for buyouts in numbers greater than ever. More than 3,500 people have volunteered, said Matt Zeve, director of operations for the Harris County Flood Control District.
The buyouts seek to address a legacy problem around Houston. The first comprehensive flood plain maps showing flood risk were not drawn until the mid-1980s, when some 2.7 million people already lived in the county.
The Harris County Flood Control District estimates nearly 180,000 homes and structures are inside “100-year” flood plains — areas that would flood in the event of a storm so severe that it has a 1 percent chance of occurring in any given year.
Harvey, the 2016 Tax Day floods and the 2015 Memorial Day floods all surpassed rainfall levels of a “500-year” storm — 0.2 percent chance of occurring in any given year — in at least some parts of the county.
For Pitkin, the decision to ask the county to buy out his home came after a series of storms flooded his neighborhood four times in the last 15 months.
Pitkin said his flood insurance does not pay for replacing septic tanks or driveways washed out by stormwater, a severalthousand-dollar cost he incurred with each storm.
Harvey was the first time, however, that water entered his home, which was raised about 15 feet off the ground.
Negotiations ongoing
The buyout of Pitkin’s home is part of an initial batch of 34 buyouts in Highland Shores and Banana Bend along the San Jacinto. So far, the county has closed on 12, and several more are under negotiation, Blount said.
Dozens of buyouts are expected to follow as the county seeks to use $20 million to purchase 206 homes across unincorporated areas that were substantially damaged during Harvey.
Clusters of homes also likely will be along Cypress Creek and Greens Bayou. Officials are targeting homes that have flood insurance so that payouts can complement the $20 million in county funds.
Pitkin declined to give the exact amount offered for his home. The county conducted an appraisal and offered what officials believed was fair market value. As of Jan. 1, Pitkin’s home was appraised at $232,133, according to the Harris County Appraisal District.
The county also will offer relocation bonuses up to $31,000. Since the negotiations for the bonuses have not yet been completed, the exact amount paid out to Pitkin so far remains confidential, Blount said.
A tedious process
Buyouts are typically a slow, grant-funded process, taking months or even years for local governments to apply for and receive federal grants.
Earlier this month, the Commissioners Court voted to ask the federal government for $17 million to purchase 104 homes at the highest risk of flooding, based on data from 2015 and 2016. The earliest the county could see those funds is in 2018.
That contrasts significantly with the county’s approach after Harvey, with the county closing and demolishing homes within three months of the storm.
Still, the need is much greater.
“We can’t obviously buy everybody out,” Blount said.