New report from a workshop on Developing Resilience Indicators and Measures, from the National Academy of Sciences (50 pages).
“Developing Resilience Indicators and Measures” – from the NAS
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Audit in NYC Reveals Big Problems with Housing Repair Program Post-Sandy
Here is a second posting on the topic of post-disaster housing, this one focusing on the post-Sandy housing repair programs. Considering how much money is being spent on post-disaster housing programs, clearly the time has come for better oversight and some reform!
An article about the audit appeared in the NY Times, but here is the actual source document:
COMPTROLLER STRINGER AUDIT OF BUILD IT BACK REVEALS MILLIONS PAID OUT FOR INCOMPLETE WORK, DOUBLE-BILLING & UNDOCUMENTED TRAVEL COSTS. Frustrated homeowners forced to contend with over 100 procedural changes in the course of a year. Same subcontractors that bungled earlier work still on the job, working without legally enforceable controls. Some excerpts:
New York City’s recovery effort following Superstorm Sandy was a boon for consultants who failed to do required work and left thousands of victims without help long after the storm ravaged the City—and problems continue to this day, according to an audit released by New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer.
The Comptroller’s audit revealed the City’s Office of Housing Recovery Operations (HRO) failed to properly monitor contractors and paid $6.8 million to them for work that that was flawed or incomplete – contributing to extensive delays in the delivery of aid to more than 20,000 people seeking help.
“New York City’s response to Sandy was a case study in dysfunction,” Stringer said. “During the course of this audit, I went to affected communities to hear first-hand the stories of the recovery from hundreds of City residents — from the endless delays, to the lost paperwork and the maddening lack of progress. With this audit, we present a new level of detail about how the City allowed consultants to run amok and what must be done to ensure these mistakes are never again repeated.”
The audit examined the Build it Back Single Family Program – which focused on owner-occupants of properties with one-to-four units affected by Sandy – from June 1, 2013 to August 1, 2014. The findings were enhanced by testimony from six public hearings that Stringer’s office held in areas hardest hit by the storm, which were attended by hundreds of New Yorkers. The audit included detailed reviews of a random sample of 70 applicants, plus reviews of program design, management and operations by HRO and its contractors.
This is not the first example of housing repair program problems. They occurred after H. Katrina in LA as well. The Diva hopes to have more posts on the topic of the use of CDBG-DR funding for post-disaster home repair in the future.
The High Cost of Disaster Recovery
Is it any wonder that even the federal government is worried about future costs of disaster recovery? Here is an article about one element of housing repair costs post- Sandy, compensation for damage to public housing:
From the NY Daily News: FEMA to give $3 billion to NYCHA for Hurricane Sandy repairs in 33 developments. Some details:
- A $3 billion bonanza from the Federal Emergency Management Agency — the disaster bureau’s largest grant ever — will go to repair and upgrade city public housing projects damaged by Hurricane Sandy.
- The money will flow to 33 NYCHA developments in Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens, Mayor de Blasio and Sen. Chuck Schumer plan to announce Tuesday.
- “When Sandy hit, it brought weeks of cold and darkness for thousands of NYCHA residents – and too many are still feeling the impact,” de Blasio said. “This investment of $3 billion, the largest in FEMA history, won’t simply bring NYCHA developments back to pre-Sandy conditions. It will allow us to fortify buildings and utilities so that they’re resilient.”
Some Articles on Business Recovery and Resilience
I happened to be going through some older papers in my save file, and then found free copies to download from the Create Homeland Security Center. Two recent papers are worth reading, in my opinion. See:
- An Economic Framework for theDevelopment of a Resilience Index for Business Recovery, by Rose and Krausmann (2013); and
- Toward a Theory of Economic Recovery from Disasters. (2012) by Rose and Chang
“The National Strike Force”
The current issue of the Coast Guard’s Journal of Safety and Security at Sea. Proceedings of the Marine Safety and Security Council features articles on the National Strike Force, but there are a host of other great articles on related topics in the issue. For a free copy (and a free subscription) of the Proceedings click here.
The Proceedings is a nice, slick-paper magazine issued quarterly. The current issue is 98 pages long. Definitely a “keeper” for your library.
Lots of Activity re Pending Rise in Flood Ins. Rates
#1 – See this Wash Post article: Rise in government insurance rates to mirror rising waters, flood debt. Some excerpts from the article:
The government is slowly phasing out subsidized flood insurance for more than a million Americans with houses in flood zones who, in some cases, pay half the true commercial rate.
Some owners say they are angry because their houses near lakes, rivers, bays and oceans were much more affordable with cheap rates that will now increase by as much as 25 percent each year until the premiums equal the full risk of settling down on property mapped as a flood zone.
#2 – Check out the new report on flood insurance from the National Academy of Sciences:
The new report: Affordability of National Flood Insurance Program Premiums: Report 1 (2015)
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Abstract of the report:
The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) within the Federal Emergency Management Agency faces dual challenges of maintaining affordable flood insurance premiums for property owners and ensuring that revenues from premiums and fees cover claims and program expenses over time. A new congressionally mandated report from the National Research Council, the operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences, found that these objectives are not always compatible and may, at times, conflict with one another. The report discusses measures that could make insurance more affordable for all policy holders and provides a framework for policymakers to use in designing targeted assistance programs.
Although there are multiple ways to measure the cost burden of flood insurance on property owners and renters, the report found that there are no objective definitions of affordability. Where Congress or FEMA determine insurance premiums to be unaffordable, households paying those premiums might be made eligible for assistance through the NFIP. The report says that it will be up to policymakers to select which households will receive assistance, the form and amount of assistance provided, how it will be provided, who will pay for the assistance, and how an assistance program will be administered.
Problems in CO with FEMA Trying to Recoup Payouts
I have written extensively about the problems with post-Sandy flood assistance and insurance payouts, but now here is a similar problems in CO. The good news is the elected officials are working to get the problem solved without a lot of yelling and screaming and political rancor. See Protecting natural Disaster Victims from Unfair treatment.
MA Requests Pres. Declaration for its Record Snowfall
Massachusetts Governor Asks for Snow Disaster Declaration. March 27.
Gov. Charlie Baker formally asked the federal government on Friday to declare a disaster in 10 Massachusetts counties after a relentless series of winter storms brought record snowfall and frigid temperatures, causing 25 deaths and costing the state and its cities and towns an estimated $400 million.
The request was made in a 22-page letter to President Barack Obama, delivered through the acting regional administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.Citing an “unprecedented and disastrous pattern of severe winter weather,” the letter seeks 75 percent federal reimbursement for snow removal and other costs related to the storms, which Baker is asking FEMA and the president to treat as a single, monthlong disaster.
CA Earthquakes – guaranteed!
California nearly guaranteed to get major earthquake in next 30 years
The probability California will experience a magnitude 8 or larger earthquake in the next couple of decades has increased, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
CBS San Francisco reported the Third Uniform California Rupture Forecast, or UCERF3, sheds new light on where earthquakes will likely hit in California over the next couple of decades and how big they’re expected to be.
“The new likelihoods are due to the inclusion of possible multi-fault ruptures, where earthquakes are no longer confined to separate, individual faults, but can occasionally rupture multiple faults simultaneously,” said lead author and USGS scientist Ned Field. “This is a significant advancement in terms of representing a broader range of earthquakes throughout California’s complex fault system.”
Some Reflections on Digital Learning
In the Age of Info, specializing to survive.
“We are overloaded with junk,” said Daniel Levitin, a professor of psychology and behavioral neuroscience at McGill University whose books include “The Organized Mind.” “It’s becoming harder and harder to separate the wheat from the digital chaff. The problem with the Internet is anyone can post, so it’s hard to know whether you are looking at a fact or pseudofact, science or pseudoscience.”
Recovery Diva 