State Republican lawmakers’ years-long efforts to deregulate housing in North Carolina likely played a major role in the scale of Hurricane Helene’s destruction, a new report highlights.
At least 227 people have died as a result of the storm, with an unknown number still missing or unaccounted for. The storm is the deadliest to hit the country since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
A New York Times report from last week details how Republican lawmakers in North Carolina have repeatedly dismantled regulations on the construction of homes in flood and hurricane zones — resulting in increased devastation from Hurricane Helene.
The state GOP has controlled one or both houses of the North Carolina state legislature at numerous points during the past 15 years. During that time, Republican lawmakers have refused to limit construction of new homes on steep slopes, blocked a rule requiring said homes to be elevated above a certain height, and weakened protections intended to address potential landslides. Many of the regulation rollbacks also disqualified the state from receiving federal climate resilience grants, the report noted.
North Carolina Republicans’ attacks on regulation were driven in large part by housing and real estate lobbies in the state, critics said.
“The home builders association has fought every bill that has come before the General Assembly to try to improve life safety,” said Kim Wooten, an engineer in the state who serves on the North Carolina Building Code Council, adding that Republicans “vote[d] for bills that line their pocketbooks and make home building cheaper.”
In both 2009 and 2010, Republicans blocked legislation that would have restricted the construction of new homes in landslide-prone areas. In 2011, they also passed a law that limited how local officials could regulate building codes to account for sea-level rises. They amended that law in 2013 to limit the frequency with which updates to local laws for building codes (based on recommendations by the D.C.-based International Code Council) could be considered, lengthening the period from every three years to every six years.
Republicans also refused to implement proposed codes from that group’s recommendations, including a standard from 2015 that called for new homes in flood zones to be built on stilts “at least one foot above the projected height of a major flood,” The New York Times reported.
And just this past summer, Republicans passed a law removing regulation duties within the governor’s office, granting themselves that power instead and subsequently undoing a number of regulations. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed that law, but Republicans overrode the veto to pass the law anyway.
Other reports, including one from the World Socialist Web Site, highlight how capitalist policies from both parties have resulted in ecological exploitation, social inequality, and the erosion of “basic measures to save lives.” Among the simple measures that could have lowered Helene’s catastrophic death toll were larger investments in warning systems and coordinated methods for evacuation, and stronger regulatory standards to protect against mudslides and flooding, the report noted.
Actions by Republican politicians after the storm have also hampered recovery efforts. Former President Donald Trump, who has campaigned in the area and been critical of the Biden administration’s response to Helene, is promulgating a false conspiracy theory that the government is purposely withholding funds meant to help residents of North Carolina and other states affected by the hurricane. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia), meanwhile, is falsely stating that an ominous “they” is “[controlling] the weather,” errantly suggesting that the storm was manufactured with the specific purpose of harming people in the region.
Correcting this disinformation is using time and energy that could be spent on recovery efforts, a PBS News report indicated.
The White House has blasted Republican lawmakers for trying to “sow chaos” to achieve political ends, calling their comments “wrong” and “dangerous.”
“Disinformation after a hurricane or other natural disaster can discourage people from seeking critical assistance when they need it most,” a brief from the White House read. “It is imperative that we encourage impacted residents to register for FEMA assistance, not discourage it, by allowing falsehoods to spread.”
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