CHARLESTON, W.Va. –
West Virginia National Guard’s Adjutant General, Maj. Gen. James Hoyer, issues the following update on RISE West Virginia's case management status:
Progress continues to be made on the two stick-built home reconstruction projects underway through the RISE West Virginia program.
After breaking ground on a project in Kanawha County last week, crews with Appalachia Service Project (ASP) continued their work in Charleston, laying the home's foundation this week.
Crews with ASP also continue to put the final touches on RISE WV's other home reconstruction project, which is underway in Nicholas County. This week, crews connected the home's utilities and expect to finish hanging drywall over the weekend.
The number of completed cases remains at 43, with one home ready for final inspection that is pending homeowner scheduling.
The number of outstanding homeowner cases remains at 406. A breakdown of the nature of those cases is as follows: 170 cases require total reconstruction, 153 cases require some form of rehabilitation, and 83 cases require new mobile home unit replacement.
The ongoing partial government shutdown continues to limit the RISE program’s ability to draw down new federal dollars from HUD, which is needed to being new reconstruction and new mobile home replacement projects. While we have taken steps to ensure that work continues and our momentum with the program doesn’t stall, something needs to happen so that we can continue to move West Virginia families through the recovery process and get them taken care.
As of this week, there are 46 RISE WV reconstruction and mobile home replacement projects that will not be affected by the shutdown. In all those cases, the associated contractors have already received initial payment and construction work will be able to continue to completion.
Construction work will also be able to continue, without impact from the government shutdown, on all of the 153 cases that require rehabilitation work.
The WVNG and RISE WV management teams will continue to work through the case management and contracting processes in order to move forward aggressively when the shutdown ends and full federal funds become available once again.
WV VOAD's case management team has placed an emphasis on completing the necessary documentation to prepare as many of the remaining projects as possible for construction, so new work can begin immediately after the shutdown ends.
Nine homeowner agreement signings were completed this week, meaning those clients have finished the final step of the case management process and are ready to be transitioned into the construction process as soon as possible.
An additional 15 homeowner agreement signings are currently scheduled to take place next week. WV VOAD managers say their goal is to complete an average of 10 of these signings every week going forward.
WV VOAD's team also continues to connect with all of the clients in the RISE WV program, as case managers placed 384 calls to clients this week, with an additional 50 calls per day, on average, coming into the office.
We remain active in the process of identifying families who are living in the worst conditions. We encourage our partners in the media and general public to let us know if they identify people who are in severe need of assistance so we may follow up and help prioritize cases.
Any families who feel they still have any unmet needs or who are looking for an update on their case are urged to contact the new VOAD office over the phone at 304-553-0927 or through email at DisasterRecovery@wv.gov. A hotline is also available for anyone needing to report fraud with regard to the RISE West Virginia program at 1-866-WVWATCH (1-866-989-2824).