It appears that the rebuilding of the 569 public housing in Galveston demolished in the wake of Hurricane Ike may be back on track. Sources tell me that the Galveston Housing Authority voted today 4-1 to accept the requirements of the Texas General Land Office concerning the rebuilding of public housing. Last week the Galveston City […]
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Tag Archives: Disaster recovery
Texas can act now to prevent the next industrial disaster in Port Arthur and Texas City
April 21, 2013 
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Bill Minutaglio, a professor of journalism at the University of Texas, Austin, the author of “City on Fire: The Explosion That Devastated a Texas Town and Ignited a Historic Legal Battle,” has a column in today’s NYT that Texas leaders should read and heed. Minutaglio examines the explosion of the fertilizer plant in West, TX […]
Read more Chrishelle Palay helps Houston’s poor and needy plead their cause
April 2, 2013 0 Comments
Open your mouth, judge righteously, and plead the cause of the poor and needy. – Proverbs 31:9 . Chrishelle Palay works to help the poor plead their own cause and she lends her voice to their cause as well. Palay is the policy analyst for Texas Low Income Housing Information Service in Houston. Her mission […]
Read more TxLIHIS policy analyst Josué Ramírez supports colonia residents’ search for solutions
April 1, 2013 2 Comments
Although only 24 years old, Josué Ramírez has taken on a leading role in working with grassroots community leaders to solve one of our nation’s biggest housing and poverty challenges — the impoverished colonias of the Texas-Mexico border region. Josué is a policy analyst for Texas Low Income Housing Information Service working out of our new […]
Read more State report: 29% of TX first round HUD disaster funds drawn down, 0% 2nd round
March 14, 2012 Comments Off
Recent stories in the Austin American-Statesman, the Texas Tribune and the New York Times have chronicled the slow pace of the Texas Hurricane Ike and Dolly disaster recovery program using federal funds. Let’s step back and look at a snapshot of the state’s entire disaster recovery effort to get some perspective. Here are the numbers […]
Read more Where Texas border housing and community development issues stand after the legislative session
July 17, 2011 Comments Off
Earlier this week I spoke to the National Association of Latino Community Asset Builders about developments during the last session of the Texas Legislature that impacted colonias. These are my prepared remarks. The situation faced by those of us who work on affordable housing and community development issues along the Texas Mexico border can be […]
Read more A “new sheriff” takes over Texas disaster recovery
July 6, 2011 Comments Off
(Photo: Texas General Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, from Texas Tribune) Readers will recall Governor Perry passed responsibility for the Hurricane Ike and Hurricane Dolly disaster recovery programs to Texas General Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson effective July 1. This afternoon I met with Gary Hagood, Deputy Commissioner of GLO and the new man responsible for overseeing […]
Read more Texas colonia self-help centers reauthorized by Texas Legislature
June 27, 2011 Comments Off
The Texas Legislature acted today to preserve a key program in the state’s efforts to address the substandard living conditions in Texas colonias. The Texas Senate passed SB 2 which allows the Governor authority to transfer administration of the CDBG program for non-entitlement jurisdictions and disaster recovery to an agency other than the current administering […]
Read more I woke last night to the sound of thunder
June 23, 2011 Comments Off
As other parts of the state literally burn and the Governor calls on Texans to implement a critical part of his disaster response program, prayer for rain, here in the Valley rain clouds are rolling in. As I’ve been writing this post, the lights in my downtown Edinburg office have gone out, interrupting my work. The city streets flood terribly with even ordinary rainstorms like today’s, but colonias have it much worse.
Read more Governor Perry switches agencies responsible for disaster recovery funds
June 20, 2011 3 Comments
Shakeups in the State’s troubled disaster recovery program continue. In the wake of the virtual elimination of the Governor’s designated lead agency for disaster recovery, the Texas Department of Rural Affairs and a veto of the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs, the Governor has informed HUD of his intention to change lead disaster […]
Read more Short term 2 year extension in works for Texas housing department
June 20, 2011 Comments Off
Well placed Capitol sources tell TxLIHIS that Governor Perry’s staff have indicated they will insist on only a short-term two-year extension of the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs. Last Friday the Governor vetoed the Sunset Bill for the State’s housing department, citing objections to requirements placed in the Sunset Bill at the behest […]
Read more Video of Houston Disaster Recovery Town Hall
June 2, 2011 Comments Off
Last week we highlighted a town hall on Disaster Single Family Home Repair in Houston, hosted by the Texas Organizing Project. Mayor Annise Parker spoke at that event, as did Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee. We’ve put video of their comments up at Youtube so you can watch them from the comforts of your own chair: […]
Read more Hurricane Disaster Spending–an opportunity to repair homes *and* create jobs in affected communities
May 27, 2011 Comments Off
Texas Low Income Housing Information Service is working with residents in Galveston, Houston and the Valley to make sure that under-employed and unemployed Texans get as much work as possible from the Hurricane Recovery dollars. Section 3 says that when HUD dollars are spent on housing or infrastructure projects and low-income people in the affected […]
Read more Houston Town Hall on Disaster Single Family Home Repair
May 26, 2011 1 Comment
On Saturday, May 21, 2011, Texas Organizing Project (TOP) along with other supporting organizations spearheaded a record attendance Town Hall meeting to address the City of Houston’s lack of attention to Single Family Home Repair due to Hurricane Ike. Over 300 attendants packed Jerusalem Baptist Church to receive information about the ongoing slow progress of […]
Read moreHUD Approves Phase I of Texas Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing
May 13, 2011 1 Comment
One of the conditions of the TxLIHIS – Texas Appleseed – State of Texas Fair Housing settlement on hurricane recovery is that the state would update its Analysis of Impediments (AI) to Fair Housing. (See our post Introduction to an “Analysis of Impediments” for discussion of what an AI is). Today, HUD approved the first phase […]
Read more John Henneberger Testimony at TDHCA Board Meeting on Disaster Recovery Housing Programs
May 9, 2011 Comments Off
John Henneberger, a Co-Director of the Texas Low Income Housing Information Service, spoke at the May 5, 2011 board meeting of the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs (TDHCA) regarding the status of and proposed changes to the Hurricane Ike Disaster Recovery Housing Programs in Houston and Galveston. Youtube videos of selections of his […]
Read moreJohn Henneberger Testimony at Senate Finance on TDHCA Budget
March 9, 2011 Comments Off
TxLIHIS co-director John Henneberger testified last week at the Senate Finance Hearing on TDHCA’s budget and Disaster Recovery funding in Texas. His testimony is available below via Youtube.
Read moreObserver Article on Disaster Recovery
February 18, 2011 Comments Off
“We had an expensive and painful learning process under Rita, and we didn’t apply those lessons to Ike and Dolly,” says Henneberger. The Texas Observer is running a cover story which outlines the frustrating state of affairs of Disaster Recovery in Texas. The article, which quotes Texas Low Income Housing Co-Director John Henneberger, can […]
Read moreTwo Reports from the HUD OIG on Texas Entities
January 31, 2011 Comments Off
HUD’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) released two audit reports on Texas entities last week. One report covered $503 million of the Katrina, Rita, and Wilma disaster recovery funds that flowed through TDHCA’s CDBG program, while the other report covered $725,546 in funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (the Recovery Act) […]
Read moreIntroduction to an “Analysis of Impediments”
January 10, 2011 1 Comment
One of the conditions of the TxLIHIS – Texas Appleseed – State of Texas Fair Housing settlement on hurricane recovery is that the state will update its Analysis of Impediments (AI) to Fair Housing. This piece by Elizabeth Nowrouz gives some basic background for readers about what an AI is. The 1974 Housing and Community […]
Read moreTxLIHIS Files Comments on Sunset Staff Report on TDHCA
October 5, 2010 1 Comment
We recently signed on to two sets of comments on the Sunset Staff report on TDHCA. The first set was submitted with Texas Appleseed, and focused on Disaster Recovery programs in the state. The second set was submitted in conjunction with a large set of TDHCA stakeholders and focused on many of the recommendations previously […]
Read moreAnother epic, preventable disaster strikes the poor
January 13, 2010 Comments Off
Somilia, Katrina, Rita, Ike, now Haiti. Another epic disaster strikes a population of desperately poor people. Poor physical living conditions, makeshift homes, substandard materials. no building codes all magnify human suffering and deaths in each disaster. God does not seek out the poor to punish with disasters, we are each responsible for accepting poverty and substandard […]
Read moreWhat the State of Texas must do to fix the Hurricane rebuilding plan (and what we plan to do to make sure it does)
November 23, 2009 Comments Off
People have asked me what we want from the Texas CDBG Disaster Rebuilding Plan that we have criticized and that HUD has asked the Governor to revise. The complete answer lies in the extensive comments that we have submitted on repeated occasions to the State of Texas and in our complaints to HUD. Here is […]
Read moreHUD denies Governor Perry’s Amended Recovery Plan
November 17, 2009 Comments Off
On November 10, HUD Assistant Secretary Mercedes Marquez issued a letter to Governor Rick Perry denying the State of Texas’s Amendment 1 of the Action Plan for CDBG Disaster Recovery Grantees. The proposed amendment would give the state $1.7 billion in supplemental CDBG funds for Hurricane Ike Recovery. Secretary Marquez cites the State’s proposed amendment […]
Read moreORCA’s public hearing for $1.7 billion disaster relief program crashes
August 13, 2009 1 Comment
Today’s web based public hearing conducted by ORCA to accept public testimony on the $1.7 billion Hurricane Ike/Dolly CDBG Disaster Relief Texas state plan crashed. Among others, I dutifully registered in advance and followed the participation instructions provided by ORCA to log into the meeting. Public hearings are required by the federal government as a […]
Read moreConfusion and delays plague temporary housing programs for Hurricane Ike survivors
October 30, 2008 Comments Off
I have been spending some time this week trying to understand the way the FEMA temporary housing assistance programs have been working for the victims of Hurricane Ike. Even as a person who has spent considerable time reading and studying the FEMA programs and guidelines I have found it difficult to comprehend what is going […]
Read moreAt least we are better off than Mississippi and Alabama
June 11, 2008 Comments Off
Watch my testimony before the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity of the House Financial Service Committee, or, better yet, watch the testimony of the panel of housing advocates from all the Gulf Coast states. I was invited to Washington to testify on May 8 before the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity of the […]
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