Mecklenburg County is now part of the federal disaster declaration issued in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, making more assistance available to homeowners affected by the storm.
Vice President Kamala Harris announced the appointment Saturday while in Charlotte to meet with state and local officials about the recovery of Helene, which made landfall in Florida last week as a Category 4 hurricane.
When the storm reached North Carolina, it was downgraded to a tropical storm, but it still caused widespread flooding, wind damage and power outages across much of the state, with areas in Western North Carolina bearing the brunt.
Mecklenburg was not initially among the 25 counties included in the federal declaration — meaning the federal government would not have helped with home repairs, temporary housing, property damage or other expenses in the same way as communities to the west.
That angered residents and leaders in north Mecklenburg, where flooding along the Catawba River at Mountain Island Lake damaged several homes.
“All the water from the mountains comes here, or a significant amount of it,” District Commissioner Elaine Powell said earlier. “I feel like a lot of people have forgotten, and that makes sense, there’s so much trauma in Western North Carolina…but this neighborhood was flooded and four houses flowed into the Catawba River.”
Now, individuals in that area and the rest of the county can apply for federal assistance. Additional government support will also be available to state and local governments.
“We are going to commit substantial resources to helping people,” Harris said Saturday.
Also announced Saturday: $100 million in federal funding to repair and reopen roads and bridges damaged by Helene in Western North Carolina.
But some counties in the Charlotte area — Iredell, Rowan, Stanly and Union — are still left out of the disaster declaration, according to FEMA’s website. These were among the counties Governor Roy Cooper included in his initial request that were not included in FEMA’s statement.
FEMA officials Harris inquired at a Charlotte National Guard base Saturday afternoon about their recovery efforts. She was joined by state and local officials, including the mayors of Charlotte and Asheville, Governor Roy Cooper, Attorney General Josh Stein and U.S. Representatives Alma Adams and Jeff Jackson.
Harris praised residents and leaders for their response, saying she had heard stories “about strangers helping each other and helping people in all the ways they need, including shelter, food, friendship and community.”
“I think these moments of crisis bring out the best of who we can be and who we are,” she said.
Harris also met with National Guard soldiers who responded to the storm and helped prepare care packages to send west with the NC Counts Coalition, a nonprofit organization that delivers food, water and hygiene supplies to some of the state’s hardest-hit areas.
Observer reporter Nora O’Neill contributed to this report.
