The Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund delivered a $21,000 check on Labor Day to the Alex and Addie Wheeler family for the loss of their Berlin home in the July 2023 floods. The Wheelers have a new home in East Montpelier. L-R: VDRF Vice Chair Patti Komline, VDRF Treasurer Mike Yantachka, Addie Wheeler, Alex Wheeler, CVOEO Case Manager Sofia Benito Alston. VDRF photo.
Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund has approved $1 million in grants to help flood survivors.
The money went to 71 cases in seven counties providing grants ranging from $151 to the maximum VDRF grant of $25,000.
“This is just the beginning,” said Chris Graff, the VDRF chair. “We know there are many more cases coming to us, both from last year’s flood and from this year’s multiple flooding.”
The Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund, created in 2011 following Tropical Storm Irene, provides help to disaster survivors after they have exhausted other sources of assistance, such as from FEMA, homeowner and flood insurance, and grants from local and regional disaster funds.
VDRF Treasurer Mike Yantachka said the money for the latest grants comes from both individual donations and from the Vermont Flood Response and Recovery Fund organized by the Vermont Community Foundation.
In addition the Waterwheel Foundation, created by Phish in 1997 to oversee the band’s various charitable activities, has donated $600,000 to VDRF to provide direct assistance to flood survivors.
“Phish has been incredibly generous, both following Irene and last year, in holding benefit concerts to raise millions for flood relief,” said Neale Lunderville, a VDRF board member and former Irene Recovery Officer for the state of Vermont.
Patti Komline, the vice chair of the VDRF, said that she expects several hundred more requests for funding. “This is a slow process and is slower than what we saw following Irene,” she said. “In addition to the July 2023 cases we expect to see many from this year’s floods.”
Komline said that many of the requests for funding involve flood-damaged mobile homes, which, unlike stick-built homes, usually can’t be rebuilt.
On Labor Day Yantachka and Komline delivered a $21,000 grant to the Alex and Addie Wheeler family for the loss of their Berlin mobile home in the July 2023 flooding.
Flood waters reached the top of their kitchen counters, damaged all of their furniture, medical equipment, toys and appliances. The Wheelers had flood insurance but incurred thousands of dollars of out of pocket expenses as they bought a new mobile home and located it on a new site in East Montpelier.
Sofia Benito Alston, the mobile home program flood recovery assistance specialist for the Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity, served as the case manager for the Wheelers.
Laurie Kozar, the Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund’s allocations director, said that many of the cases to date – 28 of the 71 – came from Addison County, with 21 coming from Washington County. Other cases were in Lamoille, Orange, Orleans, Rutland and Windsor.
“Our grants reflect the wide range of difficulties that people have struggled with,” said Kozar, listing some of the items the VDRF money has funded, including heating systems, roof repairs, foundation work, septic work, mold remediation, appliance replacement, new floors, and utility repairs.
Graff said that it has become apparent that with climate change disasters are coming faster and stronger, inflicting more damage on the state. “When we created the fund following Irene we were responding to the worst disaster to hit the state in 84 years,” said Graff. “Twelve years later we were hit again and now – a year later – we have been knocked flat again.”
He noted that the July flooding in St. Johnsbury exceeded what would be expected once every 1,000 years. “What stands out about that event is that the flooding was neither forecast nor expected,” Graff said.
Disaster survivors access the Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund working through case managers with the regional long-term recovery groups or community action agencies.
For more information email [email protected]
Source: 9.3.2024 MONTPELIER, Vermont – The Vermont Disaster Recovery Fund
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