A year later, Harvey still distresses
Survey finds recovery is uneven, with many area residents still struggling
It’s been a year since Hurricane Harvey ravaged the region, and for many, the road to recovery appears to be mostly complete. They are back in their homes, and upended lives have been mostly righted.
Then there are the others: the overlooked, the still displaced, those who have been thrown into financial peril. They continue to suffer from unexplained medical problems, most likely the legacy of slogging through contaminated floodwaters. Others battle with an anxiety that does not ease.
Don’t tell them Hurricane Harvey is in the past.
That’s B.S., said David Lewis, a Meyerland father of three whose house took on 20 inches of water and now lives with his wife and children in a two-bedroom apartment as massive reconstruction continues. He is glad for those who have forged ahead smoothly, but wants people to know it is not universal.
“That may be for some people, but not for a lot of us. And the assumption that it is is offensive,” he said, adding that he has recently decided to seek help for sometimes-paralyzing depression.
A new survey released Thursday by Houstonbased Episcopal Health Foundation in partnership with the Kaiser Family Foundation shows that
even as long-term recovery across the region has been largely steaming ahead, there remain troubling gaps, with lives still in disarray.
Nearly a quarter of those surveyed said their financial situation is worse, and 1 in 6 report their overall quality of life has gone down.
Four in 10 also said that they are not getting the help they need to recover and rebuild their lives, according to the findings. The biggest needs are housing, finances and help navigating the different assistance systems.
Still, about 7 in 10 people affected by Harvey say their lives are now largely back to normal. At three months, only slightly more than half — 54 percent — could say the same.
“Progress has been made, but the progress is not spread equally over the population,” said Elena Marks, president and CEO of Episcopal Health Foundation.
The survey was the second of its kind, the first coming about three months after Harvey. Adults across the 24-county swath of the storm were questioned about their attitudes of recovery and their personal experiences. The new survey serves as a follow-up to measure progress and gauge attitudes of those affected.
A series of focus-group sessions were also held for low-income residents from Houston, Port Arthur and Dickinson who either had damage from the storm or lost income. Comments from participants were included in the report.
“When all is said and done, the groups that were disadvantaged before are, not surprisingly, the last to recover,” Marks said.
About 8 percent of respondents in the 24 counties whose homes were severely damaged are still displaced. That compares with 11 percent at the threemonth mark.
Difficult choices
But it is not always just low-income people who struggle. In Houston, for instance, middle- and upperclass residents are still out of their homes. Harvey has forced difficult choices.
Do they make repairs and hope their homes don’t flood yet again? Do they sell and become fulltime renters? Do they buy in an area that didn’t flood in Harvey? The last question is particularly thorny because some areas that experienced flooding had never done so before.
Often the very act of trying to reassemble is exhausting and financially debilitating.
“We are stalled, out of money and living in the second floor of our house since December,” said Donni Blair, whose house in the Barker’s Landing neighborhood of Houston was swamped with 36 inches of water for two weeks after a release from the Addicks and Barker reservoirs. “We can’t afford countertops, flooring and what we need to finish our renovation.”
Blair, who didn’t take part in the survey, discussed her plight during an interview with the Houston Chronicle.
“We wake up in the wee hours every night and begin fretting, wondering how we are going to make this work and wondering if we shouldn’t have just taken a loss and walked away,” she said on Wednesday.
In Meyerland, Lewis, the father of three, has spent $190,000 out of pocket to raise his house. He has a good salary in the oil and gas industry and a hefty savings, but it will not last forever. He filed suit against his insurer he says paid just half of what he said it would take to rebuild.
Both the survey and separate Chronicle interviews reveal that Harvey did more than take away walls. It also unleashed an anxiety harder to repair.
As the one-year anniversary approaches, 31 percent of survey respondents said their mental health has declined since the storm — almost unchanged from the three-month mark. In Harris County, the percentage is just under 1 in 3, or 32 percent.
The toll is showing up in ways both expected and unexpected. About 19 percent overall say they are having a hard time controlling their temper, 10 percent reported they are now taking a prescription drug to treat mental-health issues, and 8 percent said they are drinking more.
Yet only 8 percent in Harris County reported that they or someone in their house has received counseling or mental-health treatment.
“My girl is traumatized,” a Houston mother told the survey focus group. “Every time she saw it got cloudy she says, ‘Mommy, is it going to fill up again? It’s going to fill up?’ We had to move from there because I felt like I was already creating a trauma to the girl. She does not even want to see a pool. We have not even gone to the pool because she’s scared. She says she’s going to drown.”
Andrea Little lost virtually everything when her rental home in the Westbury neighborhood flooded. She told the Chronicle that she has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and is taking medication for anxiety and depression. “I know it sounds crazy, but when it rains, my left eye twitches. I have started having panic attacks.”
And Blair worries for her 11-year-old son, who now gets upset during rainstorms.
“He seems angry and sad,” she said.
Asthma, insomnia
Some answering the survey said they also had medical problems that were not there previously or have gotten worse since the storm.
The top complaint was asthma and respiratory issues. Insomnia, headaches, allergies and mold-related illnesses were also reported.
Sarathy Garcia, a community activist, worries that the lingering toll is being overlooked amid the eagerness of governmental officials to declare victory over the storm.
“That’s the problem,” she said. “They’re not being realistic. In reality, we have a lot of disenfranchised people.”
“We wake up in the wee hours every night and begin fretting, wondering how we are going to make this work and wondering if we shouldn’t have just taken a loss and walked away.”
Donni Blair, homeowner in Barker’s Landing neighborhood