Before Hurricane Ike, Sidney Lampman rented the first floor of her sister’s two-story house on West Hunter Drive in Old Bayou Vista. The hurricane flooded the house and, even though Lampman rented the property, rather than owned it, the Federal Emergency Management Agency gave her a mobile home while she looked for a new place to live.
This month, the agency sent Lampman a letter telling her she must move out of the mobile home because there are plenty of apartments and rental houses in the area.
The agency referred her to the federal Disaster Housing Assistance Program, which subsidizes rent for hurricane victims through March.
Although Lampman doesn’t want to move, she signed a contract with FEMA agreeing to “diligently seek and obtain permanent housing” as soon as possible. Since she hasn’t been looking for housing, FEMA can revoke her mobile home, the contract states.
Residents have to try to find a different living solution, Brad Craine, a FEMA spokesman, said.
Lampman, who is unemployed, argued that she can’t afford to rent an apartment in the area, especially after the federal subsidy runs out in the spring. She wants to buy her mobile home, but she can’t get a permit from Galveston County.
Last month, FEMA sent letters to the 1,786 Texas families still in mobile homes, reminding them the program ends in about five months. More than 350 of those families, however, are considered by FEMA to not be living up to the terms of their agreement, which requires they look for long-term housing or making significant progress in repairing their hurricane-damaged homes. Those people face possible eviction, some as early as next month.
Two weeks ago, 26 FEMA mobile home dwellers also got letters telling them they had 15 days to find another housing option or the agency would begin the process to evict them. An agency spokesman said 11 more letters will go out soon.
All of those letters went to residents who were renting homes before Ike, but FEMA said 15-day notices to 300 homeowners who are not compliant will be mailed soon.
Proving Ownership
Marty Rogers and his wife, Barbara Davis, have lived in FEMA’s mobile home community in High Island since Ike washed away their home in Gilchrist. They have been told to be prepared to move out by next month.
The couple is in a bind, mainly because they can’t prove they owned their home. While they signed a contract for an owner-financed sale of the property on Hamm Road, the paperwork transferring the deed never was filed.
Rogers said all the paperwork confirming the sales agreement and 10-year mortgage was washed away by the storm. He has an affidavit from the property owner, but that is dated after the storm.
Even so, housing options on the peninsula are limited, and Davis said she refuses the federal alternative to the mobile home.
“I don’t want to join DHAP,” she said, referring to the Disaster Housing Assistance Program.
She would rather wait for assistance through the county’s program to repair and rebuild damaged houses using $99 million from a federal community development block grant. But that program is months away from distributing money to homeowners, and the problems she and her husband have in proving they own the house will hinder them getting help.
The couple stedfastly refuses to look anywhere beyond the peninsula to live.
“I can’t afford the rent they want us to pay and I still have to pay for my house here,” Rogers said. “The storm didn’t wash my debt away, even though it took my house.”
18 Caseworkers
Rogers and Davis admit they are reluctant to meet with their FEMA caseworker. Rogers said if the caseworker shows up without an appointment, he sends her away. But he said the couple has had several caseworkers. He said he and his wife believe they “fall through the cracks” when their case is turned over to a new federal employee.
Charles Cook, FEMA’s individual assistance group supervisor, said the agency would do what it could to help residents but stressed that it all starts with the caseworker. There are about 18 caseworkers in the county, he said.
“If they tell us what they want or where they want to go, we work with them,” Cook said. “Tell us what you want and what you need.”
The caseworker is supposed to work with people to develop a plan for long-term housing.
“It has to be a viable plan,” agency spokesman Raymundo Perez said. “You can’t say, ‘I am waiting for Uncle Joe to die, and I’ll take his house.’”
When the personal plan is not feasible, FEMA has been pushing the disaster housing program as the best alternative. That’s because following reviews of the agency’s response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the U.S. Government Accountability Office found the agency wasted millions of dollars by depending on the mobile home program and touted the Disaster Housing Assistance Program, a pilot program administered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for the 2005 storms.
“Rental assistance administered through HUD’s existing network of local public housing agencies is an effective way to meet the long-term housing needs of displaced families following a disaster,” the GAO said in its report, which was released in August.
Other Options
Cook said when it comes to housing options, the agency uses a person’s workplace — or if the head of household is a student, the school — as the center of that person’s life. From that center, an area that is within 50 miles is considered as options for long-term housing.
For many in the county, that could include Houston. For Bolivar Peninsula residents, that could mean the closest available housing is in Beaumont.
And as hard as it is for some residents to swallow, when the housing in the immediate area is not available, the viable option may be to move to another community.
“No way,” Davis said. “I am not moving from here.”
Cook said he is sympathetic to the desire to stay in a community, but he also is blunt: Help from the federal government can only do so much.
When it comes to the mobile homes, the deadline to have them removed is March. Neither the county nor cities where the mobile homes are placed have indicated any willingness to extend agreements with FEMA beyond the spring.
“The program is going to come to an end,” Cook said.
Making Progress
The homeowners adhering to FEMA’s rules and making progress on repairing their houses will be allowed to keep the FEMA mobile homes until the repairs are done or until March, whichever comes first.
Frank Kaplan lives in a mobile home in front of his damaged house on Teal Street in Galveston. Kaplan had flood insurance and has been making repairs to the brick house and keeping detailed records of those repairs to show his FEMA caseworker.
He’s among the 70 percent of Texas residents in FEMA mobile homes who are making regular progress and don’t face early eviction, Craine said.
Kaplan still must finish the insulation, drywall and cabinet work, but he expects the house will be finished by December.
While he’s grateful for the mobile home where he’s lived since January, he’s ready to get out of the 840-square-foot space, he said.
One piece of burned toast sets off a set of fire alarms in the trailer.
“Even if you’re deaf, you can hear them,” Kaplan said.
The bedrooms are small and, since Kaplan’s daughter doesn’t like bunk beds, he has been sleeping in the tiny bed, while his daughter sleeps in a twin bed in the dining-living area. Thunderstorms are especially loud and scary in the metal mobile home, Kaplan said.
“My neighbors are like, ‘When are you getting out of that thing?’” he said.
Cook said Kaplan is an example of the progress made by most of those who are in the mobile homes.
“The message is pretty clear,” he said. “People understand what needs to be done. People are making a diligent effort.”
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FEMA Mobile Home Glance
City of Galveston: 171
Rest of Galveston County: 389
Total: 560
High Island community site: 42
Schreiber Field Galveston site: 21
Private property: 445
Commercial sites: 52 +
Other areas
Brazoria County: 10
Harris County: 70
Montgomery County: 5
Chambers County: 161
State total: 1,786
+ Commercial sites are existing RV or mobile home parks
All figures as of Oct. 9
SOURCE: FEMA
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The Costs
FEMA mobile home — FEMA was unable to provide a cost for the FEMA mobile home for Hurricane Ike. The $30,000 figure is the one-time cost of a 280-square-foot FEMA mobile home provided to victims of Hurricane Katrina. The figure includes $14,000 to buy the housing unit, $4,000 to maintain the mobile home and $12,000 to haul and install the unit.
Source: U.S. Government Accountability Office
Disaster Housing Assistance Program rental subsidy — The cost is for a two-bedroom house or apartment for 17 months, minus increasing monthly contributions required by the tenant. The figure does not include security deposits, or utility deposits, which are sometimes paid by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, depending on the tenants’ income.
Source: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
