Fees waived for hurricane recovery process
By Steve Herring
Published in News on October 19, 2016 8:49 AM
For the next 45 days as hurricane recovery efforts continue in Wayne County, fees normally charged by the county for septic tanks, building permits and for the landfill will be waived.
Also, a FEMA team arrived Monday and set up a disaster recovery center in the W.A. Foster Center, 1012 S. John St.
It opened Tuesday at noon.
"They have it staffed and manned for citizens to come in and talk to them about individual assistance," Mel Powers, office of emergency services director, told Wayne County commissioners Tuesday morning. "If they (residents) cannot go in. If they can't make it, they can always call the 800-number -- 1-800-621-3362 -- or they can go online to www.disasterassistance.gov to set up appointments, and FEMA will come out to their location."
While flooding conditions have improved in the western part of the county, major flooding remains in the Seven Springs area, he said.
"The fire marshal went out this morning," Powers said. "He just texted me to let me know that the water has receded on most of the roads. We will have DOT (Department of Transportation) go in, get those roads straighten up so that we can open them back up.
"He did tell me though that talking to the fire chief out there, Jeremy Price, that of the 49 houses located within Seven Springs, 47 had water within the house. So we only had two houses not impacted directly by the floodwaters."
Powers and Sheriff Larry Pierce appeared before commissioners Tuesday morning to provide an update on the loss of lives and the devastation caused by Hurricane Matthew.
The board unanimously approved Commissioner Joe Gurley's motion to waive fees at the landfill for storm-related solid waste; in environmental health for inspection of wells and septic tanks damaged by Matthew; and for building permit fees secured within the next 45 days for Matthew-related construction or reconstruction
The county also is working with FEMA on storm debris from residences, Powers said.
The DOT will only pick up vegetative materials -- trees, logs, limbs. Those material should be pull out to side of road for DOT pickup, he said.
The public will be notified when the county has more information on the process, Powers said.
The public is being asked to hold off putting construction or debris from houses along the road until the county has instructions from FEMA, he said.
"We implemented a state of emergency on Oct. 8 for Wayne County which included a curfew that stayed in effect until Wednesday (Oct. 12)," Pierce said. "The curfew was to enforce no alcohol sales during the hours of the curfew from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. each evening and also so that everyone would be off the streets at this time.
"During the hurricane we had a number of assets that came into Wayne County as well as our own that we utilized. We did have the National Guard. We brought in Humvees and high-water, five-ton vehicles that we used for rescue operations."
A National Guard military police unit helped secure areas that were inundated with water, and as it receded, to help secure those areas to keep people out, he said.
"We also utilized Department of Motor Vehicle workers that helped us secure areas," Pierce said. "They brought in a team of 10 who helped tremendously with our in-county assets. We utilized three swift-water rescue teams, which were the Arr-Mac units, city of Goldsboro, the Lincoln County swift water team as well as the Sheriff's Office dive team."
The Sheriff's Office also increased patrols units during that time to help "stop and alleviate some of the pilfering," he said.
"One thing that helped us out a lot this time, it was the first time we have ever done this, we did set up two forward logistics centers -- one at the sheriff's annex and one at the Mar-Mac Fire Department," Pierce said. "These units worked in coordination with the emergency operations center to help coordinate all of these resources that were dispatched to Wayne County.
"During the storm we did lose two individuals. Lives were lost from direct impact from the storm. Their vehicles were washed into a ravine and they did lose their lives during the storm. We also had two other deaths that were not related to the storm, one of these was in our shelters. It was a cardiac and not storm related."
During the storm wind gusts up to 20 mph were recorded, Powers said. Rainfall averaged 14.5 inches, but in some areas as much as 19.5 inches fell.
"We did confirm that we had a tornado that touched down in the (U.S.) 70 West area behind Howell's Childcare, and it did cause some localized damage in that area -- some to the building, some trees," Powers said. "We had a few billboards blown down and then a mobile camper was spun around and damaged.
"We went about 11 inches above 1999 Hurricane Floyd (flood level) so just under a foot higher than our previous record. So this is Wayne County's new record at 29.7 foot is what crested at the Neuse River."
During the storm 65 roads were either washed out or flooded out.
"These roads did include some of our busiest thoroughfares such as (U.S.) 117 South, (U.S.) 70 Highway West, (N.C.) Highway 111, (N.C.) Highway 55 and (U.S.) Highway (U.S.) 13 South," Powers said. "If not immediate with the storm then during the flooding we had to shut them down."
Shutting down U.S. 117 South "kind of segregates" the southern end of the county from the northern end, Powers.
"EMS Manager Brian Smith was tasked with setting up a medical plan to get medical care to those the south once we shut (U.S.) 117 down along with (U.S.) 13 South and (N.C.) 55 East," Powers said. "We could not get our patients to Wayne Memorial Hospital any longer.
"Unfortunately those medical emergencies continue on. So we created a forward medial unit at one of the local doctor's office (Mount Olive Family Medicine Center). We have to fly four patients out by Vidant (helicopter ambulances) the night of the storm. The others we had to transport to Duplin Hospital."
Once both lanes of U.S. 117 reopened, the county was able to resume normal medical operations with Wayne Memorial Hospital, he said.
"Currently we still have (N.C.) Highway 111 South, (N.C.) Highway 55 and (U.S.) Highway 13 South -- we still have barricades up," Powers said. "But there are detours in place. You can get around. It just takes a little extended time."
N.C. 55 and N.C. 111 are such "large" washouts that the state Department of Transportation will have to bring in bridge engineers to look at them, Powers said.
Three shelters opened during the storm, one in the county, one in Mount Olive and one in Goldsboro.
The three were combined as of Monday evening at School Street School on Virginia Street.
"Last night (Monday) we housed 50 evacuees and had eight staff who took care of those evacuees," Powers said. "We did have some donation centers set up, handouts centers for ice and water.
"Our Fire Marshal Brian Taylor took care of that. The two distribution centers we had in the Mar-Mac and Mount Olive area, he let me know this morning that as result of that we handed out 75,000 bottles of water in the county and 2,700 bags of ice were given out to support our citizens. We had a lot of support and volunteers that got us through this storm."