City Of Houston : City Of Houston And Harris County Leaders Send Letter Asking State GLO Commissioner To Reconsider Flood Mitigation Funding

Press release from the City of Houston:

May 26, 2021

May 26, 2021 -- This morning, the State General Land Office (GLO) received a letter signed by Mayor Sylvester Turner, County Judge Lina Hidalgo and all members of Houston City Council and Harris County Commissioners Court.

The elected leaders for our community sent the letter to express their disappointment that the GLO denied flood mitigation funding (CDBG-MIT) for the City of Houston and Harris County.  They asked Commissioner Bush to reconsider the decision and "allocate the CDBG-Mitigation funding based on the proportionality of the damage caused by Hurricane Harvey."

After learning of the GLO's decision last week, Mayor Turner and Harris County Commissioner Rodney Ellis sent a letter to The Honorable Marcia L. Fudge, Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Mayor Turner spoke with Secretary Fudge this week to provide an overview of Hurricane Harvey's severe impact on the city of Houston. He also outlined the evaluation criteria and matrix that GLO used in determining the allocation of $1 billion, which left zero dollars to Houston.

"HUD should immediately halt the distribution of the $4.2 billion in flood mitigation funding pending its review," said Mayor Turner.

This press release was produced by the City of Houston. The views expressed here are the author’s own.