NJ passes storm relief bill more than 3 years after Hurricane Ida ravaged homes
After three years of waiting, the New Jersey survivors of Hurricane Ida may get some relief from the state Legislature to help with the financial ruin they faced following the monstrous August 2021 storm.
Both houses of the Legislature on Monday passed legislation that will grant survivors a one-year pause on their mortgage payments. The money owed will be tacked onto the end of the mortgage period.
Survivors say this will allow them to pay off thousands of dollars in debt and help them repair destroyed credit. In some cases, displaced people who have been paying a mortgage on damaged property will get relief while they reside elsewhere in second apartments, hotels or even RVs.
But the optimism from the survivors is cautious. A similar piece of legislation was passed unanimously by state lawmakers last June, only to be conditionally vetoed by Gov. Phil Murphy. In his veto, the governor said the way the bill was crafted opened it up to potential fraud.
State Sen. Troy Singleton, one of the authors of the new legislation, told Gothamist he believes this version meets Murphy's “biggest sticking points” and he thinks the governor will sign it this time.
“I'm very optimistic that we will finally be able to put this behind us and help those families who are in such dire straits,” said Singleton.
The bill passed both houses unanimously on Monday, with a vote total of 75-0. Murphy’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request to comment on the passage.
What’s new in this law?
The bill passed last year allowed survivors to get a pause on mortgage payments by simply sending a written notice to their mortgage provider. In his conditional veto, Murphy said the lack of a “verification process” opened it up to potential fraud.
Heeding a suggestion from Murphy, the new bill passed this week directs survivors to apply for relief to the state’s Department of Community Affairs, which will review applications and grant a “Certification of Eligibility for Forbearance.” This process closely mirrors what the state did after Hurricane Sandy.
According to the bill, the Department of Community Affairs will be tasked with creating an online portal within 90 days of Murphy signing the legislation into law. Survivors will then have 30 days to apply.
But lawmakers didn’t incorporate all of Murphy’s requests into their new bill.
In his veto, the governor had asked that only people currently enrolled in existing state relief programs would be eligible for the benefit. The bill lawmakers passed says anyone who occupied a property as their primary residence during the storm and received federal disaster assistance for Ida damage would be eligible. Homeowners who applied to a state program to raise their homes above flood levels but were denied due to their property being in a flood zone would also be eligible.
Debby Josephs, who was displaced from her Manville, New Jersey, home for more than a year after the storm, said Murphy’s previous veto was a “slap in the face.”
“That hurt really bad,” she said.
Singleton, the bill author, said he was empathetic to survivors’ complaints that relief has been too long coming. “I feel pretty confident as to where we're at in this journey that they will not have to wait much longer,” he said.
Some survivors can’t wait longer for help
Bob Simpson, a resident of Manville in his late-70s, said the flood water that engulfed his home the night of the storm reached his chest before he and his wife were rescued.
Since then, Simpson has resided in a hotel while trying to raise the house and rebuild the inside that was completely gutted due to the damage. While the couple was in the hotel, his wife Deb died suddenly. Simpson said he wants to hold onto their home, which has been in Deb’s family for two generations, but he’s not sure he’ll be able to.
“I'm almost ready to give it back to the bank … because I've been paying the mortgage and rent at the hotel that I've been in for three years,” he said.
He said he’s emptied his retirement savings and is tapped out of insurance money to get himself out of the hotel and back home. But the concrete to raise his home more than 10 feet off the ground is still incomplete and the inside of the house is just “framing” with no walls, electrical or any appliances. He said he needs about $75,000 to complete the job.
Simpson said he’ll immediately apply for a pause on mortgage payments, which would give him both some financial and mental relief. But he said he can only “hold on economically” for a few more months.
“It's really rough, because you don't want to give up everything that was part of … that whole concept of what home is,” he said.
Debby Josephs said she needs to pause her mortgage in order to catch up on $40,000 in debt she built up after the storm. She said that after FEMA didn’t send her enough money to cover what she needed, she took out a small business loan available to survivors. Along with this loan, she said she’s still facing mountains of credit card debt she incurred because her home insurance didn’t cover repair costs, like the purchase of new appliances.
Josephs said all of these costs have caused her to fall behind on her mortgage, and now she’s in danger of losing her home.
“While the actual storm was over, I just felt like the waves just kept coming," she said. "The huge waves … of things that needed to be done." With her debt, she said she felt she was “just left in more raging waters.”
Leanna Jones, a resident of Milford, New Jersey, which was also ravaged by Ida, said the mortgage forbearance could help her catch up with tens of thousands of dollars in recovery debt. But like Simpson, Jones said she needs relief fast.
“I don't know whether I'll be able to keep my house if it doesn't come through,” she said.