ELIZABETHTOWN — Through tears, a group of residents from the Kelly area pleaded for better aid, better user-friendly processes and somebody being held accountable for a breached dike in the wake of Hurricane Florence’s impact on Bladen County.
The county commissioners heard from them Monday ahead of their regularly scheduled meeting when gathered for an update specific to the storm. Florence made landfall near Wrightsville Beach about 7:15 a.m. on Sept. 14, then stayed pretty much parked between Wilmington and Myrtle Beach for about three days. The rain inundated the county, including 35.93 inches measured in Elizabethtown with flooding along the Cape Fear, South and Black rivers throughout the county.
Particularly hard hit were Bladenboro, Kelly, Clarkton and White Oak.
Bradley Kinlaw, director of the county’s Emergency Management, led the meeting attended by several entities — county, state and federal — and stakeholders in the process. Representatives from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the federal Small Business Adminstration were chief among them and addressed a number of questions and issues.
An update on the breached dike that had protected Kelly since the historic flood of 1945 wasn’t particulary encouraging. Still unknown, at least publicly to commissioners, is who is to be held accountable for the intentional damage that over many years led to the breaches, and who has oversight of the dike — be it local, state or still with the Army Corps of Engineers as it was originally. Commissioners Chairman Ray Britt said the board is seeking to hold responsible those who damaged the 14-mile earthen barrier in addition to finding a way to make repairs and restoration.
The Kelly residents joined several county commissioners in expressing frustration with FEMA. A particular sore spot was the process where applicants receive a letter that may say “denied” when the document has any issues, though the FEMA representatives confirmed it didn’t mean an actual denial of their application. In some cases, it could be no more than an incomplete form.
Commissioners Michael Cogdell and Dr. Ophelia Munn-Goins said they had heard from several people about application denials, but they were now unsure if there was more to the letter. Commissioner Ashley Trivette also questioned the difficulty with the process, as did Beverly Parks, the county’s register of deeds.
Parks explained that residents are being asked to handle processes that might typically fall in line with paid counsel. One example she cited was an individual needing four tries to get the requisite forms, and at better than $60 each.
“They need someone to help them, and we can’t do that,” Parks said.
Britt expressed understanding and compassion toward the county’s citizens in dealing with the complexities of the paperwork. Even the FEMA representatives agreed, saying they had made requests to their organization such as with the form letters stating “denied” for just about anything, all to no avail.
“A lot of these people, they see that and they don’t read any further,” Cogdell said. “I’m trying to find out what they can do next.”
The representatives said reading letters in full, even those appearing to state rejection at the outset, is the first step. In many cases, they said, more information is all that is needed.
Several voices — storm victims and agency representatives — spoke to the point of storm victims not wanting to do loans, such as the SBA offers. Going back into the FEMA process was one of the few options left, they were told.
Kinlaw said numbers may change, but 153 homes had major damage or were destroyed.
“I know that number is not finalized,” he said. “We’ll be well over 200 once we get this data finalized, maybe even 300. Some of the moderate damage will turn major, especially as mold continues to grow.”
There were 581 homes listed as moderately damaged, and another 1,002 minor, Kinlaw said.
Kip McClary, director of General Services, said the county’s insurance carrier had been with him surveying remediation and recovery.
Few estimates in terms of dollars have been offered, but the courthouse tab is expected to top $100,000, he said.
The Rowan solid waste site was completely destroyed, McClary said, but did reopen Saturday on a limited scale. The Kelly rescue building was completely flooded and a communications site went under water, destroying a generator.
Capt. Jeff Singletary of the Sheriff’s Office said a significant amount of communications equipment was lost in the Kelly area. A tower owned by Four County Electric Membership Corp. and used by the county is OK but it will be serveral months before power is replaced, he said.
McClary said 1,156 tons of vegetative debris, 302 tons of brown goods and 178 tons of construction materials have been picked up thus far. Residents and reporting officials assured there was much more to be picked up, with some inquiries as to how to keep people from going through roadside piles.
Due to the process necessary to secure companies making those pickups, Britt and commissioners were told it will be into November before all of it is picked up. That news elicited more than a few groans.
Bladen County’s last shelter to be open, at the former Booker T. Washington Primary School outside Clarkton, closed on Oct. 3. Most of those there eventually went with family, Kinlaw said.