Trump has made big promises to Texas, but can he deliver?
The president says 'it's going to go fast,' but it's taken several years to clean up after Katrina and Sandy.
By STEVEN SHEPARD 08/30/2017 07:48 PM EDT
President Donald Trump has made bold promises on Texas’ recovery from Hurricane Harvey, saying that the state will come back “bigger, better, stronger than ever before” and that Congress will deliver “rapid action” on an aid package to meet all of the state’s needs.
Following through is another matter.
Rescue efforts and recovery from Harvey — expected to come with a multibillion-dollar price tag — are likely to be far more complex and laborious than Trump’s rhetoric lets on. The floodwaters in and around Houston are only just starting to recede. And it’s still raining in southeast Texas, where rainfall totals are just as high as in Houston.
The Trump administration can look at the nation’s last two major weather disasters as examples of how long the process can take. New Jersey is still trying to recover five years after Superstorm Sandy roared ashore. And after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, it took the city nearly a decade to get back on its feet.
“The whole rebuilding process — it’s not going to happen overnight,” said former Rep. Joseph Cao (R-La.), who represented a New Orleans district during part of the recovery. “It’s going to take place over the span of years. After Katrina, it took [New Orleans] around eight years in order to recover on a sufficient level.”
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http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/30/hurricane-harvey-trump-recovery-texas-242190?lo=ap_a1
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