Contractors in Wisconsin wait for share of FEMA flood money

Daily Reporter (Milwaukee), Aug 1, 2008 by Sean Ryan

Joel Frank said he's surprised he didn't see an increase in construction work to repair houses swamped by the June floods.

Frank, project manager for Service-Master Disaster Restoration, New Berlin, focuses on mold remediation work and repair projects costing less than $30,000. He said he didn't get many calls for repair estimates, but mold work is on the rise.

He said the lackluster business is un-characteristic, especially considering the Federal Emergency Management Agency distributed $42.57 million to repair flood-damaged homes in Wisconsin.

Frank could only guess at the reasons. Maybe homeowners are spending the money on other things or doing the repair work themselves. Maybe they're not spending it on anything.

But, Frank said, more people are calling for mold remediation, which requires more expertise than repair work. Flood-drenched walls are fecund spawning grounds for mold. With more home buyers asking if a house ever flooded, sellers want a professional certification proving their house is mold-free so the selling price isn't affected, Frank said.

"It's been on the rise, but I can't say it's been tenfold," he said. "It's probably 15 to 20 percent more than people were doing a year ago."

Companies hired by FEMA inspect every house that applies for assistance, and most find damage to drywall or floors in basements, said Debra Young, FEMA public information officer. The agency estimates the amount of damage based on the inspection reports and gives owners grants to cover the work.

It does not monitor how the homeowners spend the money, she said.

"We give it to the individual," Young said. "It's their responsibility to get the work done."

A lot of homeowners are fixing their own houses because they can't afford to hire a contractor, said Diane Ausavich, cleaning division administrator for Carl Krueger Construction Inc., Milwaukee. Many others applied for FEMA money but can't repair anything until the money comes through, she said.

Instead of improving basements, many homeowners simply build walls and new floors without anything fancy, she said.

"If they had something more down there, they're a little bit shy about putting something nice back down there," she said.

As of Tuesday, FEMA had given grants to 20,314 houses, but there are more than 36,000 more applications that haven't yet been processed. This week, FEMA extended the deadline for applications from Aug. 13 to Sept. 15 because it discovered there were many people who are eligible but have not applied, Young said.

Even though there's still a lot of work on the way, Krueger, which does home-restoration projects through insurance companies, is thriving on the work generated by the floods, Ausavich said. Crews worked 18 hours a day for three weeks after the floods struck, she said. The company was already busy before June repairing damage from frozen pipes that burst.

"This last year has been, I hate to say, a banner year for that type of thing," she said. "Wisconsin, Milwaukee, usually isn't a place where you see a lot of that going on, but these last eight months have really been rough on people around here."