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LESSONS of RECOVERY' A REViEW of TltE 1997 COLORAdo Flood DisASTER In Weldona, the Salvation Army assisted every household in the community with food, cleaning supplies and other provisions and established a "convenience store" to allow residents to walk in and pick up supplies as needed. The Intermountain Divisional Headquarters in Denver shipped approximately 18,000 pounds of emergency supplies to Morgan and Logan Counties. Salvation Army volunteers from the two counties unloaded the palleted shipments and distributed the goods in Weldona, Atwood, Sterling and to families in unincorporated areas. f1w',,1>yl;'''1l~: mfl.... 1'\")'9; >-'lE..la.~<!.';M Salvation Army store in Weldona (photo by Gary Adler) FEMA Housing Program I F EMA provides direct-payment grants to disaster victims for temporary housing or for emergency repairs that are needed to restore a home to a "livable" condition until more permanent repairs can be made, Eligibility is limited to homeowners and renters whose primary residences are uninhabitable or . inaccessible as a result of the disaster. FEMA housing assistance cannot duplicate insurance payments covering living expenses and/or home repairs. The three primary types of FEMA housing assistance are: (1) transient accommodations reimbursement, for short-term lodging (applicant must provide paid receipts), (2) home repair assistance, for homeowners who can return to their homes with minimal repairs, and (3) rental assistance, for people who are displaced while repairing or replacing their disaster-damaged primary residence, In 1997, FEMA housing assistance was applied in concert with housing programs available from the American Red Cross, local housing authorities and the State of Colorado. This allowed victims to maximize the amount and duration of assistance for alternate housing by combining the help available from different sources. In general, only one form of FEMA housing assistance is provided per household. FEMA rental assistance is provided for up to three months for homeowners and up to two months for renters, although extensions can be granted on a case-by-case basis. Home repair assistance is intended only to make the home "minimally habitable," or safe and secure, and is limited to the maximum grant limit of $1 0,000 per household. A total of $3.5 million in temporary housing assistance (rental assistance for people displaced from their homes and repair money for flood-damaged homes) has been provided by FEMA to 1,831 families in the first year following the disaster, I ColoRAdo OffiCE of EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT 28