Hurricane Harvey Buyout Process Was as Murky as the Floodwaters

Nearly Seven Years After Storm, Final Demo Set in La Grange 

Fayette County Commissioners signed a contract last week to demolish the last buyout home that was flooded by Hurricane Harvey in 2017. This closes a major chapter of the years-long recovery saga following the storm that devastated La Grange seven years ago.

The final home to be demolished is located at 376 S. Brown St. in La Grange. It is the only buyout home within the La Grange City Limits. Most of the others were located along Country Club Dr. between Buckners Creek and the Frisch Auf golf course.

They County’s buyout project was aimed at preventing future development in the most flood-prone areas near the confluence of the Colorado River and Buckners Creek. “Back when this whole project started, I know there was a lot of miscommunication,” said Fayette County Emergency Management Coordinator Angela Hahn. “In all honesty, all buyouts are voluntary.”

The buyout project started under former County Judge Ed Janecka and spanned three different county leadership administrations. Hahn took over as Emergency Management Coordinator last year, and she is the third person to hold that post since the project began.

“I don’t know how that came about on Country Club Dr.,” she said. “I’ve heard a lot of different things.”

Just a few weeks before Hurricane Harvey, in July of 2017, the Commissioners Court approved a new floodplain rule for unincorporated areas of the County. The rule required all new structures located in floodplains to be built at least three feet above the base flood elevation (BFE). Before that and since 2006, the rule was two feet. Before 2006, there was no county rule regarding the BFE, although mortgage lenders sometimes stipulated their own height requirements.

In July of 2017, when Commissioners imposed the more stringent rule, they had no idea a historic flood would wreak havoc on the County just a few weeks later. The rule change was aimed at lowering flood insurance costs for homeowners. Commissioners may not have foreseen it, but the rule change prevented many property owners from rebuilding their flooded homes.

The Record heard from multiple homeowners in the weeks after the flood about County officials who showed up at their homes and stopped rebuilding work. The property owners would have had to raise their homes many feet in the air. Most of the homes sat on concrete foundations. Raising them would have been unpractical and cost-prohibitive. They were left with little choice but to accept the buyouts and wait years for their money.

Unlike the County, the City of La Grange did not pressure homeowners to accept the buyouts. Hahn said a few homeowners in the City were initially interested in buyouts. But only one of them stuck with it as the years dragged on.

“The City residents had to apply through the County for the buyouts,” she said. “My understanding is that there were four or five houses whose property owners were originally interested in it. But as the process went on, there were less and less. So it came down to this one house.”

County Commissioners held a special meeting last Thursday, May 30, at which they hired Straight Line Services of West Point to demolish the home and other structures at 376 S. Brown. The contract is for $31,487. Once demolished, the property will be transferred to the City of La Grange under the stipulation that it remains undeveloped in perpetuity.

Money for the buyouts and demolition work came from a grant administered by the Texas General Land Office (GLO). Hahn said the GLO is currently conducting a routine audit of the grant program in Fayette County. She expected that to be complete and the buyout program closed by the end of this summer.