Governor Jack Markell is requesting federal disaster status for Delaware in the wake of Hurricane Irene that will make businesses, homeowners, state and local governments and non-profits eligible for two types of federal help in different parts of the state. The requests are based on areas that met federally mandated thresholds for disaster assistance.

Gov. Markell sent a letter to the Small Business Administration late Friday requesting a major declaration of physical disaster for New Castle County. This designation, if granted, would make businesses and building owners as well as homeowners and renters eligible for low-interest SBA loans for repair and replacement.  The SBA loans would be available both in New Castle County and in Kent County, since it is contiguous to New Castle.

If the SBA approves the designation as expected, it would open a temporary office in Delaware to help businesses and homeowners apply for the low-interest loans.

Only New Castle County met the criteria for the SBA designation, which is major damage to a minimum of 25 homes and businesses resulting in uninsured losses of 40 percent or more of the estimated fair replacement value of pre-disaster market value of the damaged property.

Governor Markell also sent a request to the President Monday for a Major Disaster Declaration for Public Assistance funding in Kent and Sussex Counties. This declaration would make state and local governments and certain private non-profits involved in storm response eligible to be reimbursed for 75 percent of response, rebuilding, and cleanup costs.

The request for FEMA reimbursement for government and non-profit response was based on meeting federal thresholds of $1.14 million in costs statewide as well as  $644,664 for Sussex and $534,024 in Kent. The threshold of $1.76 million in costs for New Castle County to be eligible was not reached.

These requests are in addition to an emergency declaration received by Delaware on Sunday, August 28 that provided direct federal support from FEMA for immediate response.

“Delaware was relatively fortunate with regard to the damage wrought by Hurricane Irene, but DEMA, working with other state agencies, the county and local governments and with representatives of both FEMA and SBA, have worked to identify enough damage to make some parts of the state eligible for some types of assistance,” Gov. Markell said.

Delaware did not reach a damage level in any county that would have allowed application for direct FEMA grants to owners of damaged homes, known as “individual assistance.” That threshold is 173 homes in each county destroyed or suffering major damage. The nearby states of Maryland and Virginia also did not meet the threshold for individual assistance, though other states with more extensive damage to homes from Hurricane Irene did.

Letters Posted Online:

• Letter to President Obama
• Letter to U.S. Small Business Association

In his weekly message, Governor Markell talks about how Delawareans recently came together, first to help build a new home for a non-profit in Sussex County and then to pull together around Hurricane Irene.

“Whether it was the volunteers in the evacuation shelters I visited, the first responders working throughout the storm, or the neighbors cleaning up tornado and flood damage afterwards, the spirit of service that helps define our state – the commitment to making each moment matter – was clear,” Markell says.

The network reality show “Extreme Makeover” came to Sussex County earlier in the month to help drive the construction and capture for broadcast over 1,000 Delawareans, including the Governor and members of his Cabinet, volunteering their time and energy to build several buildings that would become the “Jusst Sooup Ranch.” The energy around the “extreme makeover” gave way to real concerns over extreme weather, as Hurricane Irene approached, then hit, the state.

“Just like so many volunteers did to start the building of that home in Sussex before the storm, when Irene approached, hundreds of thousands of Delawareans quickly pulled together, to protect their own homes and personal safety – taking action before the storm hit, moving quickly to clean up after it passed,” Markell said.

The state has consolidated into place information about recovery assistance that might be available to individuals and six different state agencies have assigned members to join the Governor’s new “Rapid Response Team” which is working to help businesses affected by the Hurricane. Storm and recovery information can be found at: http://governor.delaware.gov/information/storm_resources.shtml

About the Governor’s Weekly Message:

At noon every Friday, a new video message is posted to the Governor’s website and YouTube channel and is distributed to Delaware media outlets. Transcripts of the messages are posted and the audio version of the Governor’s message is available on iTunes as a podcast for distribution to personal MP3 players and home computers. The Governor’s weekly message is currently being carried on the air and posted on websites by various media outlets, and the direct link is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndiyhWm8lgo.

Constituents, media outlets and others are free to link to the Governor’s video message on YouTube – http://www.youtube.com/user/GovernorMarkell – or on his Facebook page – www.facebook.com/governormarkell – or on the Delaware State website at http://governor.delaware.gov/information/podcast_video.shtml. All are also invited to follow him on Twitter – www.twitter.com/governormarkell – and submit ideas through http://ideas.delaware.gov.