Texans take to FEMA’s quick repair program

Few homeowners opting for agency’s extensive assistance

To state officials’ surprise, the Texas General Land Office is seeing higher-than-anticipated interest in a quick-hit home repair program it had de-emphasized over worries about funding and potential homeowner dissatisfaction.

Five months after Hurricane Harvey, more than 13,000 Texas homeowners have signed up for a program that provides up to $20,000 in temporary repairs to return flood-damaged homes to austere but livable conditions.

More than 500 of those repairs have been completed, according to the GLO, roughly 120 of them in Houston.

“Initially, to be honest with you, at the local and county level, there was hesitance with respect to this program,” Texas Land Commissioner George. P. Bush testified during a state House Urban Affairs Committee hearing Thursday in Houston. However, he added, “This program is emerging as one of our most successful out of the six that we manage.”

While Texas waits on federal money for permanent rebuilding, its land office is managing a variety of short-term housing programs funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Those options are designed

to be temporary and include trailers, apartment rentals and home repairs.

State officials initially put the $20,000 repair program, known as Partial Repair and Essential Power for Sheltering, or PREPS, on the back burner, not finalizing an agreement with FEMA until Nov. 30.

Unlike FEMA’s other housing programs, this one required the state to pick up 10 percent of the tab. Additionally, prior use of the program in Baton Rouge had left many homeowners dissatisfied. People were unwilling to live in homes with missing walls and bare floors, and said they eventually had to redo much of the contractors’ work.

“There are a lot of YouTube videos out there of people who were dissatisfied with the product they were given, so part of what we’ve been doing is getting those other programs up and operational, and, frankly, trying to set expectations for what PREPS can do and cannot do to a home,” Heather Lagrone, deputy director for the Texas General Land Office’s community development and revitalization program, said in December.

Despite the delayed rollout of PREPS, however, more than 13,000 of 79,000 potentially eligible families have opted in. About 4,100 of those are in Houston.

Among those participating is Braeswood Place resident Todd Link, whose home contractors started working on Wednesday.

“I can see where it could be frustrating if you’re expecting them to do more, but really I didn’t expect them to do this,” said Link, 53. “It’s all free, besides your tax dollars, so I don’t know why you would ever complain about it.”

Meanwhile, only nine homes statewide have been completed through Texas’ more extensive FEMA-funded home repair program, called Direct Assistance for Limited Home Repair, or DALHR.

That initiative provides up to $60,000 in repair work on severely damaged homes and had been the option state and local officials preferred. However, Bush said Thursday, many homeowners have been reluctant to participate because the program affords them little say in the repair process.

Of nearly 1,200 potentially eligible homeowners statewide, just 319 expressed interest, according to the GLO. Nearly two-thirds of them eventually dropped out or were found not to qualify.

“We’re finding that a lot of constituents don’t like government-grade construction materials,” Bush said, adding that his agency is in talks with FEMA about allowing flood victims greater flexibility. “To the extent that we can allow the constituent to modify the work order so that they’ll stay in the program instead of opting out and coming back into the pool of eligibility, that would help to expedite the process substantially.”

As for the state’s other shortterm housing programs, more than 1,400 Texas families have been able to move into a manufactured housing unit or recreational vehicle, and six have secured apartments.

Houston rules prohibit trailers on private lots in most circumstances, but Mayor Sylvester Turner has pledged to bring an ordinance to City Council this month temporarily lifting that prohibition.

“I’m not a big fan, but when the delay on the funding is taking so long, you have to have some sort of transitional plan,” Turner said.