As we move further into the Atlantic Hurricane Season, local families are facing the threats of more flooding and storm damage. They need your support.
As Pennsylvania continues to become hotter and wetter, concerns about flooding are rising as residents in Delaware, Chester, Montgomery, Bucks, and Philadelphia Counties are still dealing with destruction from tornedos and flooding caused by Hurricane Ida in September 2021. Then, in 2023, a series of unnamed storms from July-September brought equally destructive consequences to families in Berks, Northampton and Lackawanna Counties.
Lutheran Disaster Response and our partners continue to work with more than 500 households in our area who have suffered storm damage. At the same time, we strive to help them be better prepared for storms that are very likely to come again. The families that require our support are low income, and often are underinsured or uninsured.
In Montgomery County, MJ and her husband have lived in their ranch house overlooking the Schuylkill River for five years. They are still coping with the losses wrought by Hurricane Ida’s massive flood damage to their home. MJ explains:
“We had heard the storm was coming and did all we could to prepare. We moved things out of the basement to upstairs, and we brought furniture to the first floor, in case the basement flooded. Our home had never had flooding on the first floor in 65 years.
The day of the storm, we had driven our granddaughter to JFK Airport, as she was leaving on a trip.
Driving home in the storm took 6.5 hours to reach Plymouth Meeting, where we had to find a hotel for the night, since flooding was so severe we could not get to our home.
IDA’s force caused water to rise up over the bulkhead, thus causing flood waters that filled the basement and brought in over three feet of water on the first floor. The bulkhead then broke from the pressure.
Along with the flood waters came mud and filth that contaminated the house, causing us to lose kitchen cabinets, new hardwood flooring, carpets, furnishings, files, clothing, shoes and other personal effects. The drywall needed to be replaced and my prized professional drum kit that I had for years as a professional musician was destroyed. Then, mice arrived and invaded the damaged kitchen cabinets.”
Thanks to MJ being involved with her community Civic Committee, she and her husband obtained information about how to reach out to local, state, and governmental resources. They were able to get some money from FEMA to restore parts of the house.
Then, they were connected with Lutheran Disaster Response and received help paying for new kitchen cabinets and related work.
They still have not replaced the ruined hardwood flooring they had just installed before Ida hit since they are paying out of pocket for that, as well as for new furniture and clothing. Sadly, they did not have flood insurance.
While MJ and her husband were devastatingly affected in Montgomery County, another resident, named JJ, also suffered losses due to flooding in Delaware County.
JJ works for a car rental agency at the Philadelphia Airport and came home one night during Hurricane Ida to find her basement flooded. Her flooring was destroyed along with her washer and dryer in the laundry room. Cracks in the walls soon developed which she did her best to fix and contain. According to JJ:
“Months after Ida hit, FEMA employees were in town finishing up work on others’ cases. I met them when I rented them a car at the airport. During our conversation, I learned that only two weeks remained for me to apply to FEMA for help repairing damage to my house. Previously, I had not known I was eligible for such help or even how to go about obtaining it.
I ultimately received about $1,500.00 from FEMA for restoration work and then I was connected with Lutheran Disaster Response which helped me to get new flooring and insulation. They also helped with fixing some of the cracks in my walls that I had tried to fix on my own.”
Thanks to your compassionate generosity, Lutheran Disaster Response is able to help people like MJ and JJ, restoring homes and rejuvenating hope. Your support is desperately needed to continue the dedicated work of staff and many volunteers’ to clean-up, repair and rebuild homes and lives after flooding wrought by hurricanes and heavy rains.
Here is what you can do to help:
1. Donate to LDR-Eastern PA. With your gift, you help provide temporary hotel stays, remediation or repair work, and replacement of items lost or damaged. You ensure their long term recovery.
2. Join us in September for God’s Work Our Hands Day at the Northeastern Pennsylvania Synod office in Allentown. There, you’ll help replenish hygiene kits and flood buckets. To lean more, please visit https://libertylutheran.org/liberty-life-services/disaster-response/gods-work-our-hands-2024/
3. Direct Grants to Lutheran Congregational Services through your donor advised funds, Thrivent Choice Dollars and other giving accounts to which you may have access.
Please give what you can today so that we can be ready to help families who will certainly be impacted by storms this coming summer and fall.
With sincere gratitude,
Julia Frank, Director of Community Outreach
