In a statement on the floor on October 16th, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas noted that the $36.5 billion supplemental appropriations bill that passed the House last week “will not move through the Senate until it meets the needs of Hurricane Harvey victims as defined by the state’s governor. Apparently the Speaker has assured Gov. Greg Abbott that Congress will take up the State’s request by November. You can read more about the Texas governor’s request here (as well as his anger at the state’s congressional delegation) and then read more about Sen. Cornyn’s remarks here (search for the word “flood” to find the relevant portion of the webpage).
Congress has to act by Dec. 8th on extending (and perhaps making changes to the National Flood Insurance Program. While my bet is that they’ll kick the change can into 2018, here’s just one of several articles that have appeared in the last week questioning the NFIP’s future. I’d like to know what you think. All comments sent to me on this or any subject or anonymous and won’t be published unless you tell me to publish (with our without your name and affiliation).
As you know, we track Federal legislation. In addition to the recent passage on the House side of a second supplemental, we’re hoping our readers can suggest how long it may take before we see a supplemental request that has Corps funding. The Disaster Tax Relief Act was signed into law by the President on Sept. 28th as was a bill providing educational relief post-disaster.
Is your project on the list to be deauthorized? That’s one of the alerts on the WaterLog website, along with information about the Corps’ post-disaster rehab fund to be empty.
Finally, I’ve posted recent tweets about Puerto Ricans having less power this week than they had a week ago; Trump wanting to curtain flood insurance in certain flood-prone areas, and the NFIP running out of money. It needs $1.4 billion plus debt forgiveness by the end of this month.
