BUNCOMBE COUNTY, N.C. (WLOS) — $225 million is on the way to help the City of Asheville continue to recover from Helene.
The allocation comes after the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) secretary and Governor Josh Stein visited the mountains on Tuesday to announce the approval of the funds.
Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer said that this funding is a vital boost for the community to be able to build back stronger.
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Over the last few months, Manheimer said she has seen this community come together with nonprofits, small businesses, and residents in general stepping up to help each other.
While the city had little funds, Manheimer said they managed to do a lot with them.
For example, Buncombe County repurposed over $700,000 to support businesses, provide rental assistance, and help with home repairs.
The city was also awarded $1.7 million in disaster recovery funds that Manheimer said were designated for business stabilization grants, rental assistance, and homelessness emergency shelters.
This additional $225 million will address critical unmet recovery needs in infrastructure, housing, and economic revitalization, according to Manheimer.
Manheimer said it is important to note that these investments will extend far beyond Asheville as they work towards the recovery of all of Western North Carolina.
Bo Hess, Asheville City Councilmember said he has a lot of priorities he is focusing on.
“Making sure that we’re building resiliency and redundancy around our water system,” he said.
He said that they also need to increase capacity at the Mills River Water Treatment Plant and begin to look at the steps to build another water treatment plant, as well as take care of their first responders by building redundancy and resiliency in the community communications network and investing in the people here.
“Making sure we can bring the people back who have been displaced, making sure that we’re taking care of our workers in rental assistance, mortgage assistance,” he said.
Hess said that this is a long-term recovery process, and to allocate this to the best of their ability they need input from the community.
Manheimer added that the work is nowhere close to being done, but this is an important first step.
She said that receiving this money is emotional.
“I kind of can’t believe we’re here, I just get a little teary thinking about it, all the times we stood in the wreckage and the dark and it’s hard to believe it only happened a few months ago, that we’re here today talking about this kind of funding to help us rebuild,” she said.
Governor Josh Stein said that the funds will hopefully be available by this summer, but definitely by the end of the year.
Hess said that while the timeline for these funds doesn’t land in the city immediately, there is other funding to get by in the meantime.
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“We’re going to be looking at moving the $624,000 into a more expedited capacity so that it’s given to the people of Asheville faster,” he said.
He said that they’re constantly working for the people in this city, and they will continue to advocate for more funding from both the state and federal levels.
“We are really trying to lift up the voices of Asheville to make sure that we get everything we need,” Hess said.