“It could have been worse for the Guadalupe River congregations in Texas, but FEMA [the Federal Emergency Management Agency} can make their recovery much better,” A Journey through NYC religions reported to FEMA on September 14, 2017. After New York City faith groups and others asked us how they could help the survivors of the hurricane, we decided to do a journey everywhere through the neighborhoods along the flood plain of the Guadalupe River into which Hurricane Harvey veered after coming ashore on August 25th with 130 miles per hour winds at Rockport, Texas.
Because of our editor’s background, we had a pretty good knowledge of where to go and whom to see. A Journey through NYC religions based its report on interviews and personal examination of 44 of the African, Hispanic, and Vietnamese American churches that were damaged.
As Hurricane Harvey entered Texas, the forecasters expected a rise of over 50 feet along the Guadalupe River. The hurricane indeed went down a path that followed the Guadalupe River and stalled about fifty miles inland outside of the little town of Cuero, Texas. The disaster planners expected that the wave of water from the backup of the hurricane winds and rain would reach or exceed the greatest height in history. Imagine a 54-foot wave surging down on the African, Hispanic, and Vietnamese communities and congregations along the Guadalupe River. It would have been catastrophic, worse than the Great 1998 Guadalupe River Flood, which swept away houses and churches.
Historically, the African, Hispanic, and Vietnamese American communities in Texas settled along the river bottoms. Partly, this was a result of discrimination and segregation, and partly it was the result of economics. This is where their churches are. These communities seldom get much attention.
As noted in a local paper, The Victoria Advocate, these particular communities were almost invisible to relief efforts. Additionally, in light of the concentration of problems in the richer and more populous Houston, Texas, the problems of Guadalupe River Valley communities were overshadowed, and yet they are even less able to respond. Most disaster relief groups have not usually aided church rebuilding. Their focus has been on homes and distributing supplies like food and water. Because of a long-standing policy, FEMA does not provide aid in rebuilding churches, though it does do so for other community groups (mainly through low-interest loans through coordination with the Small Business Administration). Yet in a lot of these poorer communities, the religious groups are central to the community and to recovery.
Although there was indeed a flood along the river that cut off knowledge about the fate of some of these communities, the river rose only 31-34 feet. This still posed a threat to some of the churches and many of the people. However, we discovered that most of the damage was due to wind. Some poor churches were severely damaged, but mostly they still stood repairable. However, those congregations with smaller finances will have a more difficult recovery hard, though still doable in most cases.
We discovered churches that could be vastly helped by aid groups and FEMA. We passed along the information to New York churches, who started to mobilize thousands of dollars of donations.
We did a comprehensive census and an in-depth evaluation of the churches along the Guadalupe River Valley, determined who were wise and trusted local advisors, and developed criteria for investing the donations in reconstruction. Journey itself donated all of the overhead support and invested all of the New York City church donations into the local church repairs.
In most cases, the churches had insurance, but often their congregations were not able to pay the deductible or for damages not covered by insurance. Also, the pastors, like most people, were not always sophisticated in dealing with insurance adjusters and contractors.
The churches shared their insurance adjusters’ estimates, and local contractors also gave advice. Over time, we built complete profiles of the churches and some useful insights into their strengths and abilities to utilize aid and recover. Many congregations had skilled craftsmen.
There may be others that we could not find, make contact with, or couldn’t determine the internal damage during a cursory visit.
We discovered that the congregations were meticulous in taking care of their property. Each church served as a family for local worshipers. The pastors and their flocks knew each other intimately and lovingly. They knew each others’ foibles and great strengths, both of which were the subject of humorous affection. We heard about grandmothers and great-aunts. We found out who were the best cooks and benefited from that knowledge! There was a lot of knowledge and wisdom in these congregations. Pastors could tick off the state of each congregant after the hurricane. each church leader was like our own personal directory of local members and churches.
As we stood in the middle of a swampy forest of fallen trees, we saw one guy sawing away at the debris. He had a big old mosquito hat with nets and corks on his head. He looked at us wondering who we were. We were wondering how were we going to get in touch with any of the church leaders. It turned out that he was one of the pastors and the city councilman to boot. He knew where every leader was at that moment!
After we got acquainted and a few mosquito bites later, he told us that we should get on the road right away so we could catch the leader of Macedonia Baptist Church. He advised, “Deacon Green is at home right now. You can catch if you go down three blocks, turn right, go two blocks, and say hello to the guy on the porch of his home. That’s him.” Signs were down, and addresses were uncertain, but his local knowledge got us there. And the deacon then introduced us to a leader of another church Deacon Griffin. And so forth. You really should see the video at the end of this story to get a flavor of the fountains of blessings that we received.
And there was a lot of love. We were treated more warmly than anyone had a right to expect in the midst of a wretched disaster. We were so amazed by their resilience and came to recognize that the church communities along the Guadalupe River would be a key part of any recovery.
So, Journey recommended to FEMA’s that its support should likely re-orientate some public and relief organization attention. We had previously worked with the Director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood partnerships on a project to evaluate the willingness and capabilities of African American churches to process federal aid. So, FEMA leaders were familiar with us.
We also went with the same message to the leaders of Franklin Graham’s Samaritan’s Purse, We had previously done multiple personal interviews with Graham on the site of disaster areas. We also talked with the leaders of Convoy of Hope, and other faith-based first responders.
Samaritan’s Purse actually started its U.S. disaster relief efforts at Victoria, Texas in 1998 after the Great Guadalupe Flood. The fact that some well-known churches in New York were backing our effort caught the attention of the faith-based groups. We also had the support of colleagues at Columbia University, fellow journalists, non-profits, and local businessmen. Any time we had a need for special knowledge or connections, they came through for us with flying colors!
We told the major rescue groups that if they changed their policies it would help to encourage other faith-based disaster relief groups to think in terms of finding the invisible communities of the lowly and downtrodden. And It should emphasize re-establishing the community by rebuilding viable churches. T
here is strong scholarly evidence that replication of community of structures after a disaster leads to greater emotional health, quicker recovery, and long-term flourishing of community and spirituality. Various studies have also found that local organizations and neighboring communities are the most efficient at responding to disasters and recovering the sense of normalness and hope for individuals by restoring neighborhood structures and social networks like they were before the disaster.
In October, we started hearing about the problems that the churches encountered in their recovery. One problem was the very slow availability of insurance adjusters. Some roof repairers seem to be dishonest or exorbitant. Other problems were physical injuries while trying to do repairs. The pastor of a Baptist church in Cuero, Texas fractured his rib and dislocated his shoulder. His church’s damages were below the insurance deductible, so he was trying to do the repairs himself.
We went over the insurance process and construction process with each church. In some cases, we able to help the churches to obtain better settlements and to find better contractors If we or the church leaders didn’t know, we searched out experts for advice. That worked pretty well.
In December, we revisited every Guadalupe River floodplain church with which New Yorkers were in partnership. Often, we found that they needed help with the paperwork. Religious and non-religious people in New York had put up thousands of dollars, enough money to effectively help eight churches rebuild.
Some people at FEMA communicated to A Journey that the agency would be amiable to changing their criteria to include help in rebuilding non-profit structures. The criteria would be narrowly focused on extraordinary disasters and helping churches to rebuild facilities that serve their neighborhoods with relief efforts and social services.
The former head of the Obama White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Organizations agreed that this carefully focused aid would be acceptable politically. There were supporting lawsuits by Christian and Jewish faith-based organizations in Houston and Florida as well as some congressional action.
Atlantic Monthly is now reporting that “tucked among the provisions in the budget bill passed by Congress on Friday are new rules about how FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, works with houses of worship. According to the new law, religious nonprofits can’t be excluded from disaster aid just because of their religious nature, which had been the agency’s policy in certain contexts prior to January.
The move resolves a long-standing controversy over the agency’s policy on religious aid, mostly recently raised during Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, which damaged a number of houses of worship in the South.”
“Early on, it was clear that they had the White House on their side,” the Atlantic noticed.
“Churches in Texas should be entitled to reimbursement from FEMA Relief Funds for helping victims of Hurricane Harvey (just like others),” President Trump tweeted in September. From a legal perspective, time was arguably on their side as well. The hurricanes hit roughly one month after the U.S. Supreme Court decided Trinity Lutheran v. Comer, ruling that governments can’t discriminate against religious organizations in awarding grants simply because of their religious nature. The lawsuits relied heavily on that decision, reasoning that the disaster-aid exclusions were analogous to the situation presented in the case.
Under the new law, which was signed by Trump on Friday, houses of worship can’t be excluded from aid provided to other nonprofits, including schools, hospitals, and elder-care facilities, just because they’re led by people “who share a religious faith or practice.” This includes money for the “repair, restoration, and replacement of damaged facilities.”
Now, several thousand churches in the Texas area and up to 6,000 churches in Puerto Rico may be able to receive help.
The next step is for the Faith-based and Neighborhood Initiatives with the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, to set-up teams to go among faith-based groups after a storm in order to help them through the bureaucratic process..
During the research work with Harold Trulear that lead up to the establishment of the White House Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives (now called the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Initiatives) under John Diulio, we discovered that one of the greatest obstacles to cooperation to provide faith-based social services was that many churches found that the government’s bureaucratic procedures were strange to their normal work. They were also wary of Federal aid that might have strings attached that would limit the religious missions of the congregations and faith-based community groups. This was true among the Guadalupe River churches also.
Many of them had not utilized their tax id numbers very much. Some were small but well-known. So, they never had to file any paperwork with local businesses. Even the banks that we contacted said that those documents that were in their possession had long ago been lost in the shuffle. Before the storm, life was simpler. However, with thorough searches, we were able to establish the necessary paperwork foundation for completing the forms.
In one case, the Head Deacon of a Baptist church and a Journey visitor spent the early afternoon searching through their old files to no avail. However, later that night, the deacon recalled that maybe they had stored it in the big church Bible, which turned out to be the case. This was a curious case of the Bible swallowing the state.
Mostly, the churches are getting everything squared away. Construction is proceeding. One of the oldest African American churches in Texas, Macedonia Baptist Church, was putting the finishing touches on its front door, which had been blown out along with its frame by the hurricane. Money from a New York City church paid for the materials, and the church’s skilled craftsmen installed the door. The congregation has begun meeting again in their sanctuary. Blue skies, as Willie Nelson sang, are smiling again.
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