“Myself and my daughter both lost our homes. … We would be so grateful for any assistance,” wrote another woman, explaining that there was no money to rebuild.
Every extreme weather disaster leaves a lasting mark, often displacing people in its path. But the biblical floods in Eastern Kentucky have highlighted a deepening reality that many communities face as climate change fuels catastrophes of greater intensity and frequency: a housing crisis that persists long after the immediate disaster has faded.
“I just don’t think people can grasp what a huge issue housing is,” says Roll, the chief executive of the nonprofit Foundation for Appalachian Kentucky. “People need housing now; they need a place to live now. They need to know there’s a light at the end of this tunnel.”
For many, that light has been hard to find.
Mile after mile, county after county, the hills and hollers of Eastern Kentucky are littered with reminders of the floods that unleashed sudden and staggering suffering, killing more than 40 people and leaving hundreds of families homeless.
Spray-painted orange X’s left by search teams are still visible on waterlogged, abandoned homes. Front steps still stand after the houses to which they were once attached were ripped away by the rushing water. Vehicles lie twisted and mired in mud. Tree branches are littered with pieces of lives upended — basketball hoops and tricycles, toilets and Christmas decorations, headboards and books and pieces of metal roofs.
Research shows that particularly in low-income rural communities with limited housing supply and a population that is often uninsured or underinsured, residents can end up in a perpetual state of limbo after disasters. That reality is unfolding in Eastern Kentucky.
Read more from Brady Dennis of The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/03/22/kentucky-flooding-disasters-housing/.
