Puerto Rican Program R3 fails to Provide Homes to Hurricane Hit Citizens
Nearly three years after Hurricane Maria tore through Puerto Rico, tens of thousands of homes remain badly damaged. A federally funded program administered by local officials carried out relatively small repairs to some 108,000 homes the next year, while churches and nonprofits patched up thousands with private funds. A Puerto Rican government program known as R3 is the first major effort by the U.S. territory to carry out major repairs and rebuilding of damaged and destroyed housing. Nearly 27,000 homeowners have applied. But nearly 1 1/2 years after federal funding was released to local officials, not a single repair or rebuilding job has been completed. Puerto Rican officials say work is almost finished on the first 45 homes to benefit from the program, but it is not yet complete. But tens of thousands of homes in Puerto Rico remain uninhabitable by modern standards, with damage ranging from total destruction to missing roofs. In the central mountain town of Villalba alone, 43 families still live under blue tarps as roofs. R3, which stands for repair, rebuild or relocate, aimed to address the backlog by paying contractors to make repairs for households that earn less than 80% of the region's median income. The territory's government submitted its plans for using federal block grant money for R3 in June 2018. The first $1.5 billion for the program became available in February 2019, with another $1.7 million approved in February this year. Nearly 27,000 households applied for help between R3?s start date, July 31, 2019 through early January, when Puerto Rico's government stopped taking applications. Of the applications accepted, several hundred have been rejected and thousands remain in the preliminary stages. More than 900 people remain on a wait list.
Tags : INTERNATIONAL