Hurricane Harvey exposed the gap between people who could afford to rebuild — and everyone else
The bleach fumes make
Wearing athletic shorts and a teal T-shirt, the 30-year-old splashes a gallon of bleach onto baseboards in what used to be her children's play area -- a room, now covered in water stains, where a fan dangles precariously from the ceiling. The mother of three doesn't like using the harsh chemicals, but she learned the hard way that a normal cleaning routine isn't enough.
This summer, her doctors diagnosed her then 6-month-old baby, Jasmin, with a respiratory infection -- an ailment blamed in part on organisms that infested the walls and floors after Hurricane Harvey soaked her home in
After a course of antibiotics, Jasmin is healthy again. But her mother can't stop worrying: Was the mold also the culprit behind her toddler, Tiana's, allergies? And almost 10 months earlier, was the stress from ripping out soaked walls and floors the reason Castaneda went into early labor four times, then eventually delivered Jasmin a month and a half early?
Sometimes, she feels anxious just thinking about it. So more than one year after Harvey, fans blow in every room of her home -- all day, every day. The kitchen and playroom floors are mopped with bleach at least twice a day, and sometimes again about
"It's been pretty bad," says Castaneda. "But we're trying to do the best we can."
The mother, however, didn't always spend half of her waking hours cleaning. Her home didn't always smell like a mix of newborn baby, bleach and mold.
That was before Hurricane Harvey slammed the
More than one year later, no one is tracking exactly how many families are whole again. No one knows how many people are still fighting with insurance companies or how many still need help. But one fact is clear: Along with toppling mobile homes and blowing roofs off houses, Hurricane Harvey revealed a deep divide between the people in
A survey conducted in Harvey's wake by the
Across the nation, the gap between the richest and poorest Americans has grown dramatically since the late 1970s, a phenomenon that experts warn will slow economic growth, according to the
By no fault of their own, many people are born into poverty -- but hard work isn't always enough to push them out. People working low-wage jobs often find it nearly impossible to pay monthly bills, let alone save for retirement. Pay for typical workers has stagnated, and debt -- mortgages, student loans or credit cards, for example -- is rampant.
The problems that come with wealth inequality are long-entrenched in the
In
Then Harvey struck. Natural disasters, researchers find, often widen the economic gap between those who have the resources to rebuild and those who don't. A recent study by researchers at the
In contrast, less-privileged people are more likely to lose jobs, be forced to move and pay higher rents because of housing shortages, according to one of the study's authors. Vulnerable families -- especially people of color, renters and those who are less educated -- often lose wealth in the long term, making the gap between the people who can afford to rebuild and those who can't even wider.
HARVEY'S WAKE
It's not even noon, but Castaneda already has vacuumed her entire three-bedroom house; mopped the kitchen and former playroom; scrubbed the bathroom; and started a load of laundry. At least today, she doesn't have to clean the black-colored mold from the air vents -- she finished that the day before.
Her toddler, however, is growing impatient. Tiana, wearing a sparkly princess dress that her mother bought off Facebook for
Castaneda tries her best to put her children first because she knows what it's like to have a mother who wasn't always there. As a teen, she regretfully left school in
More than a decade later, she credits her rough upbringing as the reason why she has coped with the stress of Harvey's aftermath. When the water heater stopped working, for example, she wasn't bothered by taking cold showers for weeks. Even when she was pregnant, her belly growing and feet swelling, she didn't mind ripping out moldy flooring and wall paper. When she went into early labor four times, she was calm enough to drive herself 48 miles along a rural highway to the doctor when her husband was busy working.
"All my life, I've been busy, busy, busy," she says, broom in hand while standing in her kitchen. "So when (Harvey) happened, it didn't get to me like it got to my husband because I'm used to cleaning up, getting up, falling down, then getting up."
Although her husband,
Castaneda's family got roughly
The mother of three doesn't know how her family will scrape up roughly
Her family's financial future, however, didn't always seem so bleak. As she nurses Jasmin from a bottle, she explains that she always donated used clothes and toys to other families in need. But this summer, scraping up enough money for diapers, baby wipes, medication, food, utilities, gas and school supplies is more than she can handle.
She isn't alone. After Harvey, many people, particularly those who are black, Hispanic or have lower incomes, reported having problems paying for food or borrowing money from friends and relatives to make ends meet, according to the survey conducted a year after Harvey. One-third of affected residents also say they fell behind in paying rent or mortgages.
That situation is all too familiar for Castaneda. Desperate, she called 2-1-1, a resource line that links families in need with resources. That's when she was told about a local group working to help
She was told that, maybe, the group would be able to help her.
'I'M NOT GOING TO STOP'
A woman with a long, blonde braid emerges from a white
Montalvo wears bright blue eyeliner that matches the color of her T-shirt that reads, "We will rebuild" -- a slogan that she came up with. With a warm smile, Montalvo, 51, asks Castaneda to show her the home, while asking a series of questions about mold, insurance payouts and government assistance -- the latter of which the family got very little of.
If you met Montalvo on the street, there would be no way of telling that just months ago, she was living out of the same SUV parked in front of Castaneda's light-blue home.
After Hurricane Harvey shattered windows and ripped off the roof of Montalvo's home in a town 6 miles away, she found herself sleeping in the bathroom, often with crippling anxiety because it was the smallest room to heat on cold nights after she gutted the moldy drywall and insulation. "I had two blankets ... I had to use blue jeans for a pillow," Montalvo recalls. "And that's how I slept."
Eventually, even that came to an end.
By early 2018, she was living from her car and desperate for help. One day, she was driving along
"I just broke down," Montalvo says. "And I said, 'I need help.'"
After their conversation, Montalvo decided to become a volunteer. Within weeks, she learned that helping others made her feel better -- her anxiety lessened, and for the first time, she felt comfortable talking with strangers. Two months later, she was offered a full-time job as a case manager.
Montalvo is now tasked with piecing together lives, like Castaneda and her family, that were fractured by Harvey. For Montalvo, it's personal -- she grew up in the 1970s in
It is in this town where Montalvo spends much of her time driving from home to home, photographing damaged houses and documenting their occupants' struggles. She knows many of the people she meets. Often, they went to the same high school.
She tries to give them hope by holding their hands, praying and laughing with them. But the stories are grim. In the office tucked away in a church where she works, there are hundreds of multicolored Post-it notes stuck to a wall, each representing a family who needs help.
"There's just so much to be done here," says Montalvo. "And I'm not going to stop."
Montalvo feels guilty she can't help all the families -- especially since she was one of the few lucky homeowners selected by a nonprofit that rebuilds homes. One of her most heart-wrenching cases is a 70-year-old
Those stories underscore the reality of life after Hurricane Harvey -- without something close to a miracle, people who didn't have the resources to begin with are not able to rebuild.
'AT LEAST WE'RE HEALTHY'
Baby pictures and a photo of Castaneda's wedding hang neatly from clothespins tied to a bulletin board in her kitchen, just below a Post-it note with Montalvo's phone number written on it.
The note serves as a daily reminder that weeks have passed since Montalvo came by the home, where she took notes about the damage and filed the information away with dozens of other tragic stories. So far, few volunteers have come to
Despite Montalvo's best efforts, that means many families, like Castaneda's, will see little help until more volunteers and funding arrive.
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Hurricane Harvey deepens income divide in
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Discolored blotches, caused by a respiratory infection, are barely visible on Jasmin's chest after a course of antibiotics. Angelica said the doctor told her the infection was caused by mold growing in her home.
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Raising an infant, toddler and preteen is exhausting, but today she feels especially tired. The night before, she was up past
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Hurricane Harvey deepens income divide in
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Angelica administers six different medications to her three children for ailments most likely caused by mold growing in their home. All five members of the family suffer from some sort of respiratory issue.
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This is her reality after Harvey. When she starts to feel overwhelmed, she reminds herself: It could be worse. She could have lost her entire home and all her belongings, as did many other families in
"I told my husband, 'Don't feel bad we're living paycheck to paycheck,'" says Castaneda. "At least we're healthy, and we're together."
But it's still hard, she says, no doubt. Every once in a while, she's been forced to borrow
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Hurricane Harvey deepens income divide in
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Various prescription and non-prescription ointments for Tiana, left, and Jasmin lie between them on the master bedroom bed after the girls' bath. Angelica gets the 2-year-old dressed while the 6-month-old waits patiently.
By
With every passing week, she's finding it harder and harder to believe that her family will get the help they need to rebuild. Because no matter how hard she cleans, it won't be enough to reverse the damage that Harvey caused. No matter how many hours her husband works, his paychecks won't be enough to pay for all the repairs any time soon.
Still, she tries to set a good example for her children, neatly making their beds and reminding them to finish chores, even if the walls around them are infested with mold. Because one day, she hopes, life for her family will return to normal.
Maybe one day, the American Dream will be in reach.
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About the series
This is the first of an ongoing series that explores inequality -- and how Hurricane Harvey exposed the gap between the people who could afford to rebuild and everyone else. This article was produced as a project for the
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