The NLIHC-led Disaster Housing Recovery Coalition convenes and supports disaster-impacted communities to ensure that federal disaster recovery efforts reach all impacted households, including the lowest-income and most marginalized people who are often the hardest-hit by disasters and have the fewest resources to recover.
Learn more about the DHRC’s policy recommendations here.
Reporting
The Washington Post reports that in Black-majority sections of the Deep South, FEMA regularly rejects up to a quarter of applicants because they cannot document ownership of their homes. In Hale County, Alabama, FEMA has denied 35% of disaster aid applicants due to title issues since March. More than a third of Black-owned land in the South is passed down informally rather than through deeds and wills, a custom dating to the Jim Crow era when Black people were excluded from the Southern legal system. The NLIHC-led DHRC has urged FEMA to address its onerous title document requirements, which have impacted low-income disaster survivors since for decades, but FEMA has failed to resolve this issue. NLIHC President and CEO Diane Yentel testified before Congress earlier this year, highlighting how FEMA’s title requirements, rigid interpretation of rules, and convoluted processes bar the lowest-income and most marginalized survivors from accessing critical assistance. The DHRC continues to urge Congress to enact the “Housing Survivors of Major Disasters Act,” which would address the title documentation challenges that have resulted in tens of thousands of eligible disaster survivors being wrongfully denied FEMA assistance.
NPR reports that thousands of households in Oregon and California that applied for disaster aid due to last year’s wildfires were denied help by FEMA. During last year’s wildfire season, FEMA rejected roughly 70% of claims in Oregon – that is after FEMA says it filtered out applications it deemed potentially fraudulent. In California, FEMA rejected 86% of claims. Despite repeated requests, the agency has not said how many of those applications it believed were fraudulent or if denial rates indicate people are being wrongly denied. A joint investigation by NPR, Jefferson Public Radio, and the California Newsroom reveals that the tools FEMA uses to screen out fraudulent claims prevent people who did lose their homes or suffer damage from getting aid.
Wildfires and Heat Wave
More than 60 wildfires are burning across at least 10 states on the West Coast. The Bootleg Fire, which began more than a week ago, has destroyed more than 20 homes and is threatening thousands more. The Associated Press reports that the wildfires in the Pacific Northwest are threatening Native American lands already struggling to conserve water and preserve traditional hunting grounds. Hundreds of people in the town of Nespelem on Colville tribal land were ordered to leave because of “imminent and life-threatening” danger as the largest of five wildfires tore through grass, sagebrush, and timber and burned seven homes.
The dangerously high temperatures in the Pacific Northwest this summer have already killed hundreds of people, with people experiencing homelessness making up a significant portion of the death toll.
Politico reports that Latino residents in western states face the greatest danger of wildfires, largely due to the lack of affordable housing that has pushed many individuals and families into less expensive, remote areas that are more susceptible to fires. The threat of wildfires to Latinos has grown in the past decade, and they are twice as likely to live in areas most threatened by wildfires relative to the overall U.S. population. These data are the latest evidence of the disproportionate harm communities of color and low-income communities face from climate change.
Flooding
Governor Gretchen Whitmer on July 13 formally requested that President Biden declare the recent flooding in Michigan a “major disaster,” which would pave the way for impacted individuals to receive federal disaster assistance. According to Governor Whitmer, many homes in southeast Michigan were impacted by flood water, and some were destroyed and are uninhabitable.
Winter Storm
The Housing Authority of Travis County, Texas announced on July 13 it will withdraw termination notices issued to the nearly 90 residents of the Rosemont at Oak Valley apartment complex in south Austin who had been told they had 30-days to leave. Property management at the complex cited winter storm damage in a notice to residents as the reason they needed to relocate. Residents told KXAN that any damage to their apartments stem from ongoing issues before the winter storm and noted that the complex had not provided any specific information about what damages were making the homes uninhabitable.