Date: 2016-04-27
Speaker: AL GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Speaker. I thank the gentleman for sharing the time with us tonight. I especially thank him for coming in to the Ninth Congressional District. his neighboring district. and being of assistance to my constituents because. as we do this. we really assist each other. I would want to. if I may. magnify. amplify what the gentleman said about this not being partisan. That wasnt his exact terminology. but this really is not a partisan effort. This is something that impacts people. Democrats and Republicans have been impacted by these storms. Rich and poor alike have been impacted by these storms. It doesnt matter what your gender is. It doesnt matter what your nationality is. If you have been in Houston. Texas. when these storms have hit. you have been impacted by these storms. Tonight. Mr. Speaker. I do think it is appropriate that we say more about these storms to give some indication as to what we have to cope with in Houston. Texas. Houston. we do have a problem. but. again. we also have a solution. H.R. 5025. So lets say just a bit more about the problem. Lets talk about the damages in terms of cost. In 2015. we had the Memorial Day flood. and in 2016. we had the tax day flood. I am going to compare the two. and in so doing. you can see not only do we have damages occasionally. it appears that we are starting to have these damages quite regularly. The damages and costs for the 2015 Memorial Day flood: Approximately $3 billion in damages. Mind you now. this bill will cost $311 million. We had $3 billion in damages just for the Memorial Day flood alone in 2015. A billion is still 1.000 million1.000 million. So we had 3.000 million dollars worth of damages from this Memorial Day flood in The tax day flood of 2016 brought us $5 billion as an estimate of damages. $5 billion. All of these are estimates. Nobody knows the exact number. There was $5 billion in 2016. another $3 billion in 2015. That is $8 billion. Mr. Speaker. the $8 billion happens to be about 25 times25.72 timesthe $311 million. The point is. why dont we spend the money upfront? You have heard the phrase "pay me now or pay me later." Why not pay the cost to prevent some of this flooding as opposed to the cost of repairs after the floods have taken place? It is interesting to note that these appropriation dollars that we are talking about are going to be spent. These are not dollars that will never be spent on these projects in Houston. What we are trying to do is not allow the projects to be prolonged such that other things are impacted in our city. We want the projects to be completed as expeditiously as possible. and there will be many more reasons why I will call that to your attention in just a moment. One will be deaths. With the Memorial Day flood. our research indicates that approximately four people were killed. Four people lost their lives in floodwaters or as a result of flooding. In 2016. with the tax day flood. that number doubled to eight people losing their lives. We have an opportunity to do something to save lives. There are other things that can be done to help us save lives as well. but these things. working with these projects that the Corps of Engineers already has on its docket. has on its agenda. is working on. finishing these projects can indeed help us to save lives. Lets talk about the rainfall so that you can get some sense of how much water inundates our city. In 2015. we had 11 inches of rain. That is a lot. In 2016. we had 17 inches of rain. In 2016. that amounted to about 240 billion gallons of rain. That is a lot of water in one place at one time. The rescues. My colleague alluded to people being rescued. In 2015. we had 531 water rescues. In 2016. 1.200 highwater rescues took place. This is a good point for me. Mr. Speaker. a good place for me to commend the newly elected mayor of Houston. Texas. the Honorable Sylvester Turner. who is doing an outstanding job. a stellar job. He just arrived on the job. but he has really done well with the circumstances that he has had to deal with. so I commend him. I also would like to mention now the homes that have been damaged. In 2015. the estimate is that about 6.000 homes were damaged with the Memorial Day flood. With the flood in 2016. the tax day floodcalled tax day because it was the last day to file your income taxes. In 2016. on tax day. we had 6.700. Seven hundred more homes approximately were estimated in 2016 than in 2015. As you can see. we have a problem in Houston. Well. lets talk about vehicular damage. In Houston in 2015. the Memorial Day flood. we had about 10.000 vehicles damaged. 10.000. Imagine being on your way home and you have this water to inundate the city. That means that you cannot continue to traverse the city. You have to take shelter. You have to stop. You try to get your water into a place wherein you have high terrain. Unfortunately in Houston. most places are at sea level and a good many are below sea level. As a result. when we have these types of conditions. we will have damages that will occur. and many cars will be a part of these damages. In 2015. approximately 10.000 vehicles. In 2016. approximately 40.000 vehicles damaged. In 2016. 40.000 vehicles. Now. if it takes about $10.000 per vehicle to repair these vehicles or to replace the vehicles. $10.000 per vehicle. that is approximately. in a hypothetical sense. $40 million. So the cost. Mr. Speaker. for vehicle repairs alone exceeds the amount that we need for the bill to take preventive measures such that we wont get as many cars in this condition. I say as many simply because I will reiterate what I said earlier. we will never eliminate all of the flooding. We can never do enough. but we do have a duty to do all that we can. We can spare a good many people from being stranded in vehicles. a good many who lose their lives. I might add. as well. Loss of power. meaning electrical power. In 2015. we had 88.000 customers lose power. That is a lot. 88.000 people without power. Surely we have had more than this in many other places. I am not saying that this loss of power would in any way compare to some of our other circumstances that we have had to cope with in different places in our country. but I do want you to know that this happens whenever we have these conditions. So year after year after year. the number adds up because while we had 88.000 customers in 2015. in 2016 we had 123.000 people lose power. We had 88.000 the year earlier. 123.000 this year. It adds up. Houston has a problem. but Houston has a solution. The solution is H.R. 5025. a bill that would accord $311 million to complete projects that are already being worked on in Houston. Texas. money that is already going to be spent by virtue of the projects having been appropriated. So we have to do this. Why not do this now or as quickly as we can. save lives. save money. and create jobs? Lets now talk about FEMA assistance. On the Memorial Day flood of 2015. $57 million was paid out from FEMA to persons who suffered flood damages. For the tax day flood. we have yet to determine this because we are still in the process of getting FEMA into the city to assist us. If I may say so. I want to thank the President of the United States of America. the Honorable Barack Obama. I want to thank the Governor of the State of Texas. I thank the Governor for immediately responding and asking the President to declare certain areas in the State of Texas disaster areas. The Houston area has been declared a disaster area. Harris County is one of the areas so declared. Harris County happens to be. for the most part. within Houston. Texas. Houston is over 600 square miles. It literally almost consumes Harris County. So we have to realize that the Governor did a great thing. in my opinion. He is a Republican. by the way. And the President did a great thing. in my opinion. He is a Democrat. for edification purposes. These two peopleone Republican. one Democratworked to make sure that we get FEMA in. that we get all of the aid that we can into the area as quickly as we can so that people can receive assistance. There are people who are going to need shelter. It is estimated that out in the Greenspoint areathis is the area where my colleague. SHEILA JACKSON LEE. happens to be the representative from1.800 apartments have flood damages. 1.800. We have got some 400 workers at the time I received this intelligence out there helping to make repairs. These workers are going to be paid for the jobs that they are doing. That is additional cost. We had more than 150 families who needed accommodations. They will need these accommodations for perhaps as much as 3 weeks. This could end up costing us an additional $150.000. These are all costs that we can mitigate. that we can reduce. We may not eliminate them. but we can reduce these costs. In the Meyerland area. this is an area that was hit hard when we had the Memorial Day flood. and now when we had this tax day floodwe are talking about within a yearwe have people who are just moving back into their homesjust moving back into their homesand they are flooded again. This area and the people of this area have sent out a clarion call for help. They have sent the hew and cry not only to the Congress. but also to the Corps of Engineers. also to the county commissioners. They want the city council. the State to do something about this problem. Houston has a problem. but Houston has a solution. H.R. 5025 is that solution. In that Meyerland area that I am speaking of there lives a family. the Tice family. I want to express my gratitude to the Tice family because when we set out to visit with people in the area and call these problems to the attention on a citywide basis by publishing these problems. that Tice family opened the doors of their home to us so that we could come in and meet at their home. They didnt have to do it. but I am appreciative that they opened the doors of their home. I am especially appreciative as it relates to this family. Mr. Speaker. because this family. the Tice family. has a son who is being held captive in Syria as I speak. This family is suffering the problems associated with somebody that they love dearly. their son being held captive in Syria. and they get flooded. Fortunately. this time they barely escaped. but they had to do mitigation. They had to raise their floors. They had to do things so that they would not get flooded. I am calling on us in the Congress to please. lets help the many families who will suffer again. This is not going to be the last time that I will come to the floor with this bill if we dont get the help this time. I assure you that within the foreseeable future. we will have a similar circumstance. How do you know. AL GREEN? How do you know you are going to have a similar circumstance? Well. I know because between 1996 and 2014. we had 86 days of flooding and/or flash flooding in Houston. Harris County. That averages to four to five days of flooding each year. This is notN0Tthis is not a problem that is going away. We can resolve it this time with H.R. 5025 or I will be back to the floor. and I will be calling this problem to our attention again. we will be talking about more damages to homes. we will be talking about cars that have been flooded and in need of repair. and we will be talking about. unfortunatelyand I pray that I am entirely wrongwe will be talking about lives that have been lost. and we will be talking about how we could have then. how we could have now. how we could have done things to avoid some of these consequences. EH 2015 These consequences can be mitigated. and it is up to us to take the affirmative action to do so. Mr. Speaker. in closing. I want to thank the cosponsors of this legislation. H.R. 5025. Many have signed onto it. I think that. in a few short days. we have nearly 50 cosponsors. and we will be asking others to sign on to H.R. In thanking the leadership. I am asking that we have an opportunity to. please. let us. at some point. either bring the bill to the floor or let us incorporate it into some of the supplemental relief that we will be according persons in the immediate future. Houston has a problem. but H.R. 5025 can be a great part of the solution. Mr. Speaker. I yield back the balance of my time.