Texas state governor Greg Abbott said the $7.8bn ‘downpayment’ requested by the White House will not be enough to repair the damage in Texas

It will cost more than the $120bn it took to rebuild New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina to carry out a similar restoration of the areas of Texas devastated over the last week, according to state governor Greg Abbott.



Abbott said the $7.8bn “downpayment” requested by the White House would not be enough to repair the damage caused by Hurricane Harvey, which has displaced more than one million people, resulted in at least 44 deaths and damaged 185,000 homes in Houston alone.

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The Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) has said it will have to work for several years to help Houston and surrounding areas to recover and Abbott said the eventual bill for the federal government would exceed the $120bn required after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The situation is exacerbated by the fact that most homes in the path of Harvey did not have flood insurance.

“Listen, the population size and the geographic size is far larger than Katrina and, I think, [Hurricane] Sandy combined,” Abbott told CNN on Sunday. Sandy hit the north-east in 2012.

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“We have over five million people who were affected by this,” the Republican governor said. “It’s not just the flooding in Houston, it’s the hurricane swath all the way from Corpus Christi over to Beaumont. And so it’s going to require even more than what was funded for Katrina, which was about $120bn.

“When you look at the number of homes that have been mowed down and destroyed and damaged, this is going to be a huge catastrophe that people need to come to grips with. It’s going to take years for us to be able to overcome this challenge.”

On Friday, Abbott said he did not want Texas to dip into its $10bn “rainy day” fund in order to pay for Harvey’s cleanup.

He said that people were beginning to clean up their homes and return to work – “typical of Texas fashion” – but warned that the dangers to public health were not over even as the flood waters receded.

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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has said water contamination is the greatest threat to human health now that Harvey has weakened and passed through to the north. On Sunday, the EPA said that 166 drinking water systems affected by Harvey have boil water notices, with a further 50 shut down. Residential wells are currently being tested for pollution.

The regulator warned residents that floodwaters contained “many hazards including bacteria and other contaminants” but insisted there was no issue with air pollution, despite the spike in toxins released following the hurricane.

Abbott said that the remaining floodwaters posed “real health hazards”. The governor added: “And so we caution everybody, as you begin the rebuild and cleanup process, understand that your homes, your buildings in areas – any area where the flooding waters have come across your property, there is potential very dangerous dirt and grime left behind.”

Abbott said the EPA had been “very aggressive” in monitoring Superfund sites – toxic areas in need of federal cleanup – that were deluged in what was the heaviest rainfall event recorded in the US. An Associated Press report found that several Superfund sites were inundated and hadn’t been inspected by the EPA.

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In response, the EPA said the story was “inaccurate”, adding that of 13 sites that have been flooded or damaged, only two had been inspected due to the challenge of reaching the rest.

Sylvester Turner, the mayor of Houston, said that despite the ongoing problems the city is “open for business” and encouraged people to visit as normal.

“The city of Houston, just like the surrounding region, were seriously hurt and it is going to be expensive proposition,” the Democratic mayor told NBC. “And we are going to take it day by day, week by week. But at the same time, this is a ‘can do’ city. We’re not going to engage in a pity party. We are going to take care of each other.”

Turner said removal of debris and repairs to housing remained particular challenges, particularly for low income people, and that he had requested extra help from Donald Trump during his visit to the city. He added that around 12,000 people in Houston are still without electricity but that the airport and transit systems were now fully up and running.