New WNC Helene recovery website, dashboard is now live

A new website focusing on Hurricane Helene recovery efforts in western North Carolina launched on Tuesday.

WNC Recovery, part of the Governor’s Recovery Office for Western North Carolina (GROW NC), provides an overview of the work being done and includes a progress dashboard with the latest updates.

“We want the people of North Carolina to know how the progress is going, and it’s going to be long, hard, slow work, but we are committed to doing that work as quickly and as well as we can, and that dashboard is insight into how we’re doing because we want folks to be able to evaluate our work,” Democrat Gov. Josh Stein told Carolina Journal at a press gathering after Tuesday’s Council of State meeting.  “I talked about urgency, focus, transparency, and accountability, and those are the values that are driving our approaches to hurricane relief.”

During the meeting, he said that while there will be a lot of information on what has been done, the flip side of every data point of the work that has been done is the work that hasn’t.

“Eighty-four percent of impacted roads are fully reopened,” Stein said. “That’s 1300 roads that have been reopened since the beginning of the storm. That means 16% of the roads haven’t been reopened, and I tell you, if they haven’t been reopened yet, that’s because the damage is massive. So, it’s the hardest, most expensive jobs left to be done.”

He added that 5,720 households are in temporary housing programs, meaning they have safe and warm shelters, but their homes have not been permanently restored. Thousands of cubic yards of debris have also been removed, but it is just a fraction, possibly as small as one-third of the total debris. He also thanked the NCDOT for reopening I-40 to two-way traffic near the Tennessee line on March 1 and noted that half of all state parks and cultural sites have fully reopened.

“The state has made a request to our federal delegation of $19 billion and we have a request of the General Assembly of $1 billion,” Stein told Council members. “The House moved its bill, and last night, the Senate introduced its bill. All of it is a good start that they will work out in conference what makes the most sense, but the underlying message I want to leave the people is, we’re making progress, but it is just the start.  This work is long-term, and it’s going to be hard, and we all have to be there together.”

Stein also told CJ after the meeting, when asked about HB 222, which is proposed to fully fund the rest of the homes needing completion after Hurricanes Florence and Matthew, that he was pleased that both the House and the Senate appear to be giving funding so the state can finish the job in eastern North Carolina because the people need to have their homes restored as well.

He also told reporters after the meeting that he is honored to be named co-chair of the National Governor’s Association Council of Governors and to work with fellow governors and the federal government.

“Obviously, the fact that we have such desperate needs in western North Carolina, I thought the more relationships that the state of North Carolina can have with the federal government to help us do this work, the better,” Stein said.

In an unrelated matter, he was asked about SB 153, North Carolina Border Protection Act, which requires local and state officials, including law enforcement agencies, to cooperate with federal immigration officials regarding the 287(g) Program to enforce immigration laws.

Stein said his office is studying the bill, but the clear point is that the people in North Carolina have the right to be safe.

“And to the extent there are people committing violent crimes who are not here lawfully, they will be held accountable to the full extent of the law and deported, and that’s what I want folks to know,” he told reporters. “The federal government has to do a better job coming up with a comprehensive immigration bill that not only secures the border, but also gives folks who have been here for many years, and have developed deep roots and have not committed crimes a pathway to permanent residence or citizenship.”

The post New WNC Helene recovery website, dashboard is now live first appeared on Carolina Journal.