Hurricane Matthew Relief Reaches $178M In North Carolina

Jan. 31--North Carolina households and business owners have received more than $178 million in low-interest loans and federal relief grants since Hurricane Matthew struck the state in October, according to state and federal officials.

Within 12 hours after then-Gov. Pat McCrory declared 45 counties disaster areas, FEMA had personnel assessing damage and sitting up disaster recovery sites. The last three sites, in Edgecombe, Cumberland and Robeson counties, will shut down Thursday.

Mike Wade, FEMA spokesperson, said the agency assisted 81,223 households statewide with $91,167,996 in grants.

"The majority of damage we were seeing was from storm flooding," Wade said. "A lot of people during this event did not have flood insurance. They were told they didn't need it because they were not in a flood zone."

Homeowners do not have to live in a flood zone to purchase flood insurance, Wade said.

"A lot of the claims paid out by the National Insurance Flood Program are from people who do not live in a flood zone," he said. "Most home policies do not cover flooding. I would say 99 percent do not cover it. I would suggest people strongly consider purchasing flood coverage."

FEMA has two funding programs available during disaster declarations, housing and repair assistance and also other needs, such as for vehicles, funeral expenses and medical equipment, Wade said.

Craven County had 618 households register with FEMA for assistance. They received a total of $633,759, Wade said.

Jones County had 225 applicants that received a total of $378,259.

Statewide, 81,223 households registered for assistance and received a total of $91,167,996, he said.

Four of the 45 counties declared a disaster received the majority of FEMA relief funds: Robeson, $23,910,982; Cumberland, $15,023,476; Wayne, $9,243,541; and Edgecombe, $8,843,691.

"We've approved a lot of things we've done over the years," Wade said. "Now it's just a matter of getting people on the ground. We transfer the money to their bank and that helps them get back on their feet a lot quicker. It really takes everybody coming together -- state, local and FEMA -- to make the declarations and set up the disaster sites so everything works well."

J.R. Sabatelli, New Bern finance director, said the city has applied for FEMA funds, but the total amount is unknown because the city is waiting on information from its insurance provider.

The city has also applied for mitigation money to do renovations in an effort to prevent damage in the future, Sabatelli said.

Those funds could be used to replace two boat docks at Union Point Park that were lost in Hurricane Matthew, he said.

When Hurricane Irene struck New Bern in late August 2011, one of the three docks at Union Point Park was damaged and it was replaced with a floating dock using FEMA mitigation funds, Sabatelli said. The plan is to install two floating docks to replace the two damaged during Matthew.

"It's a really good thing because if they are constantly paying for certain things, it's better to pay a little bit extra now for mitigating the problem," Sabatelli said.

The Small Business Association, or SBA, received a total of 7,306 applications from households and businesses in North Carolina for low-interest loans and 2,372 were approved for a total of $87,508,500.

Michael Lampton, SBA public affairs manager, said 6,223 of those requests were for home loans and 2,025 were approved with the agency paying out $64,125,400. The SBA received 987 business loan applications and approved 320 for a total of $22,412,500, he said.

The SBA also received 96 applications statewide from business owners saying they had suffered an economic injury because of the hurricane. Only 27 of those applications were approved for a total of $970,600, Lampton said.

Business owners have until July 10 to meet the deadline for any economic injury they suffered that does not include physical damage to the business, Lampton said.

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