Unprepared: Helene's Deadly Warning

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Unprepared: Helene's Deadly Warning"
Up First from NPR | Release Date: June 8, 2025

---

Introduction to the Story

In the June 8, 2025 episode of NPR's Up First, titled "Unprepared: Helene's Deadly Warning," hosts Leila Fadel, Steve Inskeep, Michel Martin, and A Martinez delve into the aftermath of Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina. Through the investigative reporting of Laura Sullivan and correspondent Shalaina Jordan, the episode explores the profound challenges communities face in rebuilding after catastrophic storms and the systemic issues that exacerbate vulnerability to future disasters.

---

Impact of Hurricane Helene in North Carolina

Shalaina Jordan sets the stage by describing the sheer devastation wrought by Hurricane Helene:

"As much as 30 inches of rain fell in some places, and all that rain came slamming down North Carolina's mountains, just wiping out entire towns. When we got there, many homes were like piles of matchsticks."
(00:27)

She emphasizes the extensive destruction, including smashed tractor trailers and helicopters delivering essential supplies to the stranded residents.

Shalaina Jordan: "The impact is the same no matter where you've covered disasters, but the type of destruction is different."

(01:01)

---

Challenges in Rebuilding Communities Post-Disaster

Jordan discusses her eight-month reporting mission with PBS Frontline, aiming to uncover why rebuilding efforts often falter:

"Rebuilding after a storm is really complicated. No two people are gonna agree on exactly how it should be done. And that conflict means a lot of communities are just getting stuck."
(02:00)

She highlights that conflicting visions and lack of consensus can derail large-scale recovery plans, leaving communities vulnerable in the long term.

---

Comparative Analysis with Houston Post-Harvey

To understand the complexities of rebuilding, Jordan revisits Houston after Hurricane Harvey (2017) and New York post-Superstorm Sandy (2012):

"In Houston, the water rose as high as 12 feet in some places. But even though Houston's flood was less chaotic than North Carolina's, it was no less heartbreaking."
(10:29)

She illustrates Houston's struggle with slow-rising floodwaters and the immense pressure on infrastructure designed to manage such disasters.

---

Flood Control Efforts and Infrastructure Limitations

Jordan explores the limitations of Houston's flood control measures, particularly the role of dams managed by the Army Corps of Engineers:

"As the reservoirs filled up, they had to decide whether to follow the dam's protocol and release the water into Houston or hold it and potentially watch the dams fail."
(12:05)

Richard Long, overseeing the dams, shared the harrowing decisions faced during Harvey:

"We did what we had to do to protect the city, but it's not clear if the results will be enough."
(12:17)

Despite extensive infrastructure projects costing millions, the episode reveals significant gaps in flood prevention capabilities.

---

Rebuilding in Western North Carolina: Personal Stories

Returning to North Carolina, Jordan shares poignant personal narratives illustrating the human cost of inadequate rebuilding strategies:

• Nola and Robert Ramser: An older couple missing five days after Helene, their destroyed trailer park home symbolizing the chaos and loss faced by many.

  "If they were to go into the river to maybe try to escape, they'd be dead alone. Neither one of them can swim."
  (07:23)

• Ben Larrabee: A survivor who recounts the terrifying moments during the storm:

  "The water was already above my knees and it was just raising so fast you couldn't even make decisions."
  (08:05)

These stories underscore the urgent need for effective emergency responses and resilient infrastructure.

---

The FEMA Gap and Building Codes

A critical revelation from the episode is the inadequacy of FEMA's flood mapping:

"Only about 2% of the properties that were impacted actually were in a FEMA zone. 98% of the properties were not."
(22:11)

Shalaina Jordan explains that FEMA's focus on flood zones based on precipitation doesn’t account for the kinds of rains Helene brought, leaving most affected homes uninsured and unprotected. This gap highlights a systemic failure to prepare for increasingly severe weather patterns.

---

Political and Economic Influences on Rebuilding

The episode delves into the political and economic barriers that impede resilient rebuilding:

• Local Governance: Asheville's Mayor Esther Manheimer discusses the limitations in enforcing stricter building codes:

  "We can only enforce the building code. We can't make you exceed the state building code."
  (23:21)

• Congressional Perspectives: Congressman Chuck Edwards emphasizes property owners' rights over government-mandated regulations:

  "The state's codes already ensure what [he] calls safe homes that will last for generations."
  (25:25)

• Developer Influence: Industry insiders reveal that profit motives often override safety considerations, leading to the construction of vulnerable housing even in high-risk areas.

These insights reveal a tension between individual property rights and the collective need for safer, more resilient communities.

---

Conclusion and Future Outlook

"Unprepared: Helene's Deadly Warning" concludes by framing the ongoing struggle between rebuilding for economic recovery and implementing necessary safety measures to prevent future disasters. The episode leaves listeners contemplating whether systemic changes can be achieved amid political resistance and economic interests.

"Do we do something for the greater good at a cost to individuals, or do we lift up those individuals at a cost of the greater good?"
(25:02)

Looking ahead, the episode teases further exploration into how states like New York and New Jersey fared in their post-Sandy rebuild efforts, hinting at a complex interplay of politics, profit, and genuine attempts at creating resilient infrastructures.

---

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Shalaina Jordan: "Rebuilding after a storm is really complicated. No two people are gonna agree on exactly how it should be done."

  (02:00)

• Richard Long: "We did what we had to do to protect the city, but it's not clear if the results will be enough."

  (12:17)

• FEMA Insight: "Only about 2% of the properties that were impacted actually were in a FEMA zone. 98% of the properties were not."

  (22:11)

• Chuck Edwards: "The state's codes already ensure what [he] calls safe homes that will last for generations."

  (25:25)

---

Final Thoughts

This episode of Up First masterfully intertwines personal narratives with in-depth analysis of systemic issues, providing a comprehensive look at the intersection of disaster recovery, governance, and community resilience. It serves as a compelling reminder of the critical need for proactive measures and inclusive policies to safeguard lives and property against the increasing threats of climate-induced disasters.

Transcript

[Aisha Rascoe]

Aisha.

[Laura Sullivan]

I'm Aisha Rascoe, and this is the Sunday Story from Up First. Every Sunday, we do something special going beyond the news of the day to bring you one big story today. That story comes from Laura Sullivan, a correspondent on the investigations team here at npr, who was on the ground in western North Carolina last fall, five days after Hurricane Helene. Laura, tell us what that was like.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Okay, so first, you have to understand that as much as 30 inches of rain fell in some places, and all that rain came slamming down North Carolina's mountains, just wiping out entire towns. And when we got there, many homes were like piles of matchsticks. Tractor trailers were smashed into homes. There were helicopters carrying pallets of water over our heads to people who were trapped.

[Laura Sullivan]

Now, you've covered a lot of disasters. Did this one feel different?

[Shalaina Jordan]

No, that's the thing. I've covered disasters in Florida, New York, Texas, Puerto Rico. And each time, the type of destruction is different, but the impact, the impact is the same. And in North Carolina, standing there in this town called Swannanoa, it was hard to imagine how any of this was gonna work out for anyone. And not only were they gonna have to look at all the decisions that they had made that may have left them vulnerable, but figure out what they wanna do now, now that they know how bad things can get.

[Laura Sullivan]

You've spent the past eight months on a reporting mission with PBS Frontline trying to figure out how exactly communities are building back from disasters. And I know from the places you. Some of the communities have gotten it wrong. Why is this such a hard thing to do?

[Shalaina Jordan]

Rebuilding after a storm is really complicated. I mean, no two people are gonna agree on exactly how it should be done. And that conflict means a lot of communities are just getting stuck. These big plans falter. The big ideas, they just fizzle out. And over the past few months, we've seen North Carolina struggle to rebuild, just as we once saw other communities strug. So we decided to go back to places that we've been to see if there were lessons for North Carolina. We went back to New York, which had been hit by Superstorm Sandy in 2012. We went back to Houston, which had been hit by Harvey in 2017, to see if all these years later, had they figured it out, had they figured out how to put their communities and their neighborhoods back together and whether they had done so in a way that might help them survive the. The next storm.

[Laura Sullivan]

What did you find?

[Shalaina Jordan]

What we found were powerful forces undermining the choices communities make, leaving homes and neighborhoods more vulnerable to future disasters and in some cases allowing private developers to profit.

[Laura Sullivan]

So where do you want to start.

[Shalaina Jordan]

This story this story starts on the side of the road in Swannanoa when we first heard the names Nola and Robert. They were an older couple that was missing and some search and rescue volunteers had stopped us and they asked us if we had seen them. It's been days and she still can't find them. And how many people are missing. This is the older couple. We hadn't seen them, but we decided to go down the street to where they had lived to see what had happened and that's where we met the couple's daughter.

[Laura Sullivan]

When we come back, an investigation into what really happens when communities try to rebuild. Stay with us.

[Esther Manheimer]

This message comes from Charles Schwab. When it comes to managing your wealth, Schwab gives you more choices like full service, wealth management and advice when you need it. You can also invest on your own and trade on Think or swim. Visit schwab.com to learn more. This message comes from Capital One. Your business requires commercial banking solutions that prioritize your long term success with Capital One. Get a full suite of financial products and services tailored to meet your needs today and goals for tomorrow. Learn [e-mail] Commercial Member FDIC this message.

[Chuck Edwards]

Comes from NPR sponsor Tools and Weapons, the podcast hosted by Microsoft's Vice Chair and President Brad Smith. Across three exclusive conversations on the company's 50th anniversary, Microsoft's CEOs Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer and Satya Nadella share the stories, dreams and drive that fueled the digital revolution and explain why it may be at its most exciting point yet. For these and more conversations with other thought leaders, search tools and Weapons Wherever you listen to podcasts. This message comes from T Mobile for Business. In golf, precision is everything on and off the course. PGA of America chose advanced 5G solutions from T Mobile for Business for smooth operations and seamless transactions. Together, they enhance ticketing and concessions for better fan experiences from gate to green. This is pro level efficiency. This is PGA of America with T Mobile for Business. Take your business further@t mobile.com now.

[Laura Sullivan]

We're back with NPR correspondent Laura Sullivan, who's going to pick up our story on how we recover from disasters.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Nola and Robert Ramser lived in a trailer park along the Swannanoa river five days after Helene the Ramsar's daughter, Shalaina Jordan drove the couple hours from her home in Winston Salem to see if she could figure out what had happened to her parents. Only a week before, she and her husband and kids had visited her parents here. And now her parents home was barely recognizable. And this is the first time you've seen this? Yes.

[Laura Sullivan]

I've only seen helicopter footage, Facebook stuff.

[Shalaina Jordan]

That's how I've been trying to make.

[Laura Sullivan]

A timeline of what happened.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Yeah, if they were evacuated, if they left on their own accord. Shalaina reaches the trailer. Oh, it's ripped open, exposing the bedroom and bathroom. The tub full of brown water. All the furniture is smashed into the far side of the trailer. And a black pickup truck is wedged up against one end. What do you think? It's just unbelievable. We were just here. She looks around, hoping her parents left a note. All the other neighbors have been found.

[Laura Sullivan]

My parents are the only ones that haven't been.

[Shalaina Jordan]

I mean, of course, Friday, you know.

[Laura Sullivan]

I'm like, oh, they got a lot of rain. Whatever. She'll call me back, you know.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Cause she stopped texting me around 7:30 and she stopped texting you at 7:30, 7:30am on Friday morning. And their cars are still here. That black Jeep with the door that's.

[Laura Sullivan]

Open and that red car just ahead of them.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Those are their cars. That's their cars. If they were to go into the river to maybe try to escape. Neither one of them can swim. They can't swim. Neither one of them can swim.

[Aisha Rascoe]

And if they did get washed away.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Like what they did by themselves, they'd be dead alone. The Ramser's trailer was about 60ft from the river's edge. Ben Larrabee lived next door. And standing outside the remains of his own trailer, he. He tells us he knows exactly what the Ramsers went through. The morning of the storm, when we.

[Aisha Rascoe]

Woke up, the water was already above my knees and it was just raising so fast you couldn't even. It was like you couldn't even make decisions.

[Shalaina Jordan]

The entire trailer park in every direction was already engulfed in raging brown water. Larrabee called his brother to discuss whether his mattress might make a good flotation device. Then he took out his phone and started recording video.

[Aisha Rascoe]

This is nuts. I ain't never seen something like this.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Man.

[Aisha Rascoe]

I don't know what to do.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Guys, look how fast it is. You can't jump in that.

[Aisha Rascoe]

No, you can't jump in that.

[Shalaina Jordan]

We see a semi trailer floating by.

[Aisha Rascoe]

There's one of the trailers that are gone. And then it rose to the top. Oh boy.

[Shalaina Jordan]

And then Larrabee pulls up one final video. In it, he points his phone at the Ramsar's trailer.

[Aisha Rascoe]

I hope these guys are gonna be all right.

[Shalaina Jordan]

And in the very back, you can see a tiny figure, a man in a dark coat, wading out onto the porch.

[Aisha Rascoe]

And that's him down there. There he is, see, it's already almost to his knees.

[Shalaina Jordan]

It was the last time anybody saw Robert Ramsor alive. Larrabee was lucky. He survived the worst of the storm with his trailer intact, he. He waded to safety after the water receded from this spot on the river's edge. On all sides, you can see homes and trailers pulled off their foundations and ripped apart. But just across the way, we could see a row of sturdy duplexes. They seemed barely touched, some of the only man made structures still standing. They're set back from the river's edge, elevated far off the ground on stout concrete foundations. There are wide slots under the house, flood vents meant to open under the pressure of water to let it flow through. These homes survived. They were built to survive in a place that has flooded repeatedly. And standing here amid all this destruction, the question seems obvious. Why weren't more of the homes built like this? And this question took us on a journey to understand what happens after a catastrophic storm and how communities prepare for an uncertain future.

[Richard Long]

Breaking news, Hurricane Harvey barreling into the Texas coastline.

[Shalaina Jordan]

To find some answers, we had to go back to a place we had visited eight years ago. Houston. Hurricane Harvey rolled in off the Gulf of Mexico and then lingered, pouring more than four days of relentless rain over the city. The Houston area is dealing with a disaster of epic proportions from Hurricane Harvey. Houston is different from North Carolina, where flooded mountain rivers swept houses away. Houston is low, barely rising above sea level. Here. When floodwaters come, it's usually a slow rise, foot by foot until entire neighborhoods are engulfed. That's what happened during Harvey, where the water rose as high as 12ft in some places. But if Houston's flood was less chaotic, it was no less heartbreaking. A week after the flood, we visited one of the dams built above the city. Its earthen walls hold back the rain that rolls down the vast Texas prairies on its way to the Gulf, storing it in large natural reservoirs. It was a solution the Army Corps of Engineers came up with almost a century ago to slow the water. But during Harvey, it wasn't enough. The floodwaters were still rushing through the gates of the dam when we arrived to talk to Richard Long, who oversaw the dams for the Army Corps. And he told us of a harrowing choice he and his colleagues had to make. As the reservoirs filled up, they had to decide whether to follow the dam's protocol and release the water into Houston or hold it and potentially watch the dams fail. He released the water.

[Aisha Rascoe]

You gotta realize that some of these people are my friends and neighbors that I've known for years. So this has been tough, but we did what we had to do.

[Shalaina Jordan]

But he said he was confident Houston would find a solution in the years ahead so this would never happen again.

[Aisha Rascoe]

We're gonna put it back together again. We're gonna build the city back better and stronger than before, and we'll be back in business before you know it.

[Shalaina Jordan]

That's not exactly what happened. On a recent rainy day, we returned to the dams above Houston. A horn signals a controlled release of water.

[Aisha Rascoe]

We are here every day, and we ride this whole dam. We look for any imperfections.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Jerry Meese is the Army Corps lead ranger here now. He's just come by to check on the flow of water and stops to talk to us. He says in the years since Harvey, they've shored up the dam's earthen walls and they've rebuilt the outflows. But the problem Richard Long faced back then hasn't changed. If there's too much water, some of it has to be released.

[Aisha Rascoe]

We do have a protocol to where we have to release. If we don't release at a certain point, the last thing we want is the water to go over the top of the dam, because it'll erode very quickly. And that's where you can have a catastrophic wall of water.

[Shalaina Jordan]

For nearly a century, Houston and Harris county have tried to control water with enormous infrastructure projects like these dams. They've built storage basins the size of small lakes, carved out channels to move water to the Gulf. And in the last few years, the county has spent millions on smaller projects to keep neighborhoods dry. Tina Peterson is in charge of flood control for the county. I asked her if all these efforts would be enough to protect against the next Harvey. Well, we don't use Harvey as a metric. Harvey was a one time example. You think it was a one time example? Well, that's based on the data we have. Meaning it won't happen again? No, I mean, it's statistically an infrequent event, but not a never will happen again event? Both. Yeah. So when you do these projects, do you take into account the fact that it happened once and it might happen again? Certainly we are concerned about Harvey certainty. Certainly we are concerned about storms of those magnitudes. But the storms that affect people frequently are those smaller storms. As those smaller storms have gotten bigger, so has Houston. One of the Hardest things for us is finding solutions where we know that development has happened. That development didn't just happen. Charles Irvine is a lawyer who's been researching the dams and their reservoirs as part of litigation on behalf of residents whose homes flooded during Harvey. He says when the Army Corps first built the dams, they didn't buy enough land in the natural basin of the reservoirs, leaving much of it in private hands. In the years since, Harris and another neighboring county allowed developers to purchase large tracts.

[Aisha Rascoe]

When the reservoirs were built, most of those were ranches and rice fields. But then as Houston grew westwards, the ranches were sold off, developers moved in, they were subdivided, and now if you go out there and those just look like everyday American subdivisions.

[Shalaina Jordan]

There are now more than 20,000 homes built inside the natural reservoirs, areas designed to flood during a severe storm. When 20,000 people were buying homes inside a reservoir, they had no idea. They didn't know. No. These days, much of Houston looks exactly as it did before Harvey. Neighborhoods I rode a boat through are bustling again, full of rebuilt homes and shops. Residents are counting on the flood control projects to keep them dry. But it's not clear if the results will be enough. Phil Beedian is a civil engineer who studies flood models at Rice University, and he brought us to one of the county's most recent undertakings.

[Aisha Rascoe]

So what you're looking at here is Braze Bayou drains all the way down to the Houston Ship Cow.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Now, don't picture a natural meandering bayou. What he's pointing to is an enormous man made concrete canal full of water. It was recently upgraded, mostly since Harvey, at a cost of $480 million, to make it wider and lessen the flooding in nearby neighborhoods.

[Aisha Rascoe]

So you can see where it's flat here they widen this all the way out 30 miles.

[Shalaina Jordan]

So how much did it lower the water?

[Aisha Rascoe]

According to my calculations, it lowered it in the range of a foot or so.

[Shalaina Jordan]

A foot?

[Aisha Rascoe]

That's it.

[Shalaina Jordan]

But Harvey flooded this neighborhood with four to six feet of water.

[Aisha Rascoe]

Yes, it did this.

[Shalaina Jordan]

What is this? What we're doing now, Saving a foot.

[Aisha Rascoe]

I think they just had no choice but to move forward. They had. They had the money. It had been approved. Remember, these are Army Corps of Engineer projects that take decades to come to fruition.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Do we have decades?

[Aisha Rascoe]

I'm not sure we do. I'm not sure we do.

[Laura Sullivan]

When we come back. Now North Carolina has to decide how it's going to rebuild. Stay with us.

[Chuck Edwards]

Support for this podcast and the following message come from Mint Mobile this summer chill to Mint Mobile's premium wireless service on the nation's largest 5G network. Skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. All plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk and text. Get your summer [e-mail] NPR upfront payment of $45 for 3 month 5GB plan required equivalent to $15 a month new customer offer for first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details.

[Esther Manheimer]

This Message comes from DataIQ AI is raw power. It's alive in every agent, every decision, every workflow. So do you let it take over or do you become the force behind it? Take control with DataIQ, the universal AI platform for business teams and AI experts. Designed for trust and engineered to scale. Make AI flow through your enterprise. Don't just keep up with AI. Control it with Data IQ, the universal AI platform. Find out [e-mail] NPR this message comes from Thuma. Create your oasis with Thuma, a modern design company that specializes in furniture and home goods by stripping away everything but the essential. Thuma makes elevated beds with premium materials and intentional details with clean lines, subtle curves and minimalist style. The Thuma Bed collection is available in four signature finishes to match any design aesthetic. To get $100 towards your first bed purchase, go to T H U M A CO NPR.

[Laura Sullivan]

We'Re back with the Sunday story. We just heard how Houston is trying to engineer its way out of flood danger, but keeps running into problems. Now we're headed back to North Carolina, where the question is, should homes be built to withstand flood?

[Shalaina Jordan]

As we returned to western North Carolina in the months after Helene, we found rebuilding was already getting complicated. Communities were struggling. More than 12,000 people were still displaced. Unemployment was high. Some people, like Frances Buckner, who was trying to rebuild on her family's property, were confused about where to start. We haven't had no one stop by.

[Laura Sullivan]

Or help or anything.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Morgan Clark was trying to replace a workshop that the river washed away, but a county inspector told her she wasn't allowed to. It was there before the flood. We're just building it back. And he was like, well, the flood took it. So who says that to someone that just lost almost everything? Homeowner Carla Gay was struggling with how she was going to pay for it all. Even if we found out that the funding was approved in the next, say, tomorrow, they said, yay, the funding's here. It may be years until the action actually happens after a disaster. Even with fema, there's no magic check that comes in the mail for homeowners to rebuild. Money can trickle down from Congress through federal and state programs, but usually with rules attached. Often individual homeowners have to turn to government loans or rely on volunteer groups to rebuild. Down in Asheville's historic Biltmore Village, Kit Kramer, the head of the local chamber of Commerce, told us the need to reopen has been intense, even if that means rebuilding exactly the same in a place that repeatedly floods. Right now we need the jobs, we need visitors, we need customers. So you're thinking let's get the businesses open, right? And let's worry about the resiliency a little bit later as we're working on things. How people rebuild after a flood has always been fraught. Telling people in devastated situations to elevate their properties or waterproof their walls often doesn't go over well, even if it might save them from another flood down the road. Decades ago, the federal government did weigh in on this debate through its National Flood Insurance program run by fema. It give storm victims and flood prone areas cache. But if they rebuild their substantially damaged homes, they often have to do so differently, usually by elevating them. Except in the months we spent in western North Carolina, we rarely came across anyone who was part of this program. A data scientist in New York City named Jeremy Porter found the same thing. He works at a company called first street that studies the places or zones where, where FEMA requires anyone with a federally backed mortgage to join the program. They looked at the area hit by Helene. Ultimately, we found that only about 2% of the properties that were impacted actually were in a FEMA zone. 2% of the properties that were flooded were in the FEMA zone.

[Aisha Rascoe]

Right.

[Shalaina Jordan]

And 98% of the properties were not. Yeah, the models just aren't developed to pick up heavy precipitation events. Since FEMA doesn't map precipitation and Helene's damage came from rainfall, most people weren't in the program. So not only were most people out of luck when it came to insurance money, the vast majority of people in these risky areas had never been required to build in a way that could have helped them withstand Helene. Lots of communities have this problem. First street found millions of Americans live in dangerous flood prone areas that have not been required to build for a flood and may not even know that they're at risk. Surprising in the sense that everybody's talking about it, everybody knows it's an issue, FEMA knows it's an issue. The politicians definitely know it's an issue, but we don't see it in any sort of formal way being brought forward. As a possible change to the way in which we create our flood map. Outside these FEMA flood zones, there are few federal requirements. So when a disaster hits, it falls to state and local communities to make decisions on how to rebuild.

[Richard Long]

All right, we're coming in here.

[Shalaina Jordan]

This is your office.

[Richard Long]

This is my office.

[Shalaina Jordan]

We went to talk to Asheville's mayor, Esther Manheimer, from her office in a historic art deco building downtown. Manheimer can help residents with small grants and guidance, but she can't tell them how to construct their homes.

[Richard Long]

I know the limitations of what the government can require folks to do, but we can incentivize.

[Shalaina Jordan]

If the city wanted to tell people, look, we want you to build to a higher standard, could you do that?

[Richard Long]

What we can do is we can provide them with an advisory regarding what height to build to given this flood event.

[Shalaina Jordan]

So you can't tell them to do it, but you can ask nicely.

[Richard Long]

We can only enforce the building code. We can't make you exceed the state building code.

[Shalaina Jordan]

The state building code. Well, FEMA calls North Carolina's building code outdated and says that with some of its requirements, it, quote, weakened hurricane resistance and weakened flood resistance resistance. FEMA now rates North Carolina a 0 out of 100 for its hazard resistance. Manheimer worries homeowners will be just as vulnerable when the next storm rolls in.

[Richard Long]

If we could get everyone to adhere to current code requirements or even strengthened code requirements to try to prevent this sort of effect of a disaster on a community, we could lessen the overall disruption to a community, the hit on the economy, on the lives of the people, and we would rebound from it quicker. But I think individual property owners would say, well, why do I have to bear the burden of that?

[Shalaina Jordan]

Manheimer says it's been difficult.

[Richard Long]

Isn't this the fundamental question that we ask in America all the time, which is, do we do something for the greater good at a cost to individuals, or do we lift up those individuals at a cost of the greater good?

[Shalaina Jordan]

Chuck Edwards now represents a western part of the state in Congress, but for years he served in the North Carolina state legislature. He's with the individuals.

[Aisha Rascoe]

What's difficult is the premise that our government would tell a property owner what they can and they can't do on their own property.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Edwards says the state's codes already ensure what he calls safe homes that will last for generations. And he says he's worried that government regulations are keeping people from rebuilding quickly.

[Aisha Rascoe]

There are reasonable regulations that we should consider out there, but number one, I think we need to consider the rights of the people that own the property.

[Shalaina Jordan]

Still, decisions property owners make don't always stay on their own property. During Helene, homeowners described shoring up their own homes only to have them smashed by someone else's that came off its foundation. And what about people like Nora and Robert Ramsor, the missing couple by the river? They were renters and like most renters, would have had little knowledge or say in how or where their trailer was built. Edwards says you can't build based on fear.

[Aisha Rascoe]

The primary thing that has to be considered is the likelihood in a particular area that it would experience a storm like that ever again. Everything is a risk. There is no guarantee. But property owners should be able to make up their own mind how they want to rebuild.

[Shalaina Jordan]

We've heard that before back in Houston. Why change the rules and rebuild for a storm that may never happen again? In our next episode, we go to two states that did plan for the next storm after Superstorm Sandy. New York and New Jersey felt like they had the best ideas, the best plans, programs that would make everyone safer. But when we got there recently, we heard a very different story. Oh, they lied to us. All those great ideas don't always pan out. What's the plan here?

[Aisha Rascoe]

There is no plan. People like to think there's a plan.

[Shalaina Jordan]

And back in North Carolina, we found industry insiders who tell us when developers say their focus is on building safe and affordable homes.

[Laura Sullivan]

It's bull, plain and simple. On the next part of our story, how politics and profits shape how we rebuild.

[Chuck Edwards]

This Message comes from NPR. Sponsor 1Password Protect your digital life with 1Password if you're tired of family members constantly texting you for the passwords to streaming services. 1Password lets you securely share or remove access to logins access from any device anytime. 1Password lets you securely switch between iPhone, Android, Mac and PC with convenient features like autofill for quick sign ins. Right now, get a free two week trial for you and your [e-mail] NPR.

[Esther Manheimer]

This message comes from Warby Parker Prescription eyewear that's expertly crafted and unexpectedly affordable. Glasses designed in house from premium material starting at just $95, including prescription lenses. Stop by a Warby Parker store near you. This message comes from homes.com homes.com knows having the right agent can make or break your home search. That's why they provide home shoppers with an agent directory that gives you a detailed look at each agent's experience, like the number of closed sales in a specific neighborhood, average price range and more. It lets you easily connect with all the agents in the area you're searching so you can find the right agent with the right experience and ultimately the right home for you. Homes. Com. We've done your homework.