{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://troycarter.house.gov/media/press-releases/congressman-carter-graves-introduce-bipartisan-bill-help-remaining-2016-flood", "Congressman Carter, Graves Introduce Bipartisan Bill to Help Remaining 2016 Flood Victims", "2023-10-30", "2023", "2023-10", "Democrat", "House", "LA", "Troy A. Carter", "C001125", "troycarter.house.gov", "troycarter", "https://troycarter.house.gov/media/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 Today, Congressman Troy A. Carter, Sr. (D-La.) and Congressman Garret Graves (R-La.), members of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, introduced legislation to extend the Duplication of Benefits (DoB) relief provision in the Disaster Recovery Reform Act (DRRA) of 2018 for an additional five years. Without this bill, the provision will expire this year, putting current and future disaster victims at risk.\n\n\u201cStorms don\u2019t discriminate. They affect us all, regardless of race, political party, or socioeconomic status,\u201d said Rep. Carter. \u201cOur bipartisan bill would allow governors to ask the federal government not to consider a loan a duplication of a grant following a disaster. It\u2019s wrong to tell someone desperate to return home after a storm that because they took out a loan, they will be unable to benefit from future federal programs. A loan is not a grant, and I\u2019ll happily provide a copy of the dictionary to anyone who thinks otherwise.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe federal government has spent less time expediting the recovery process for our community than they have developing reasons why we shouldn\u2019t receive recovery assistance at all,\u201d said Rep. Graves. \u201cTheir crazy policies have made it nearly impossible for families to recover, and our bill changes this trajectory. We promised the 2016 Flood victims that we would not give up \u2013 and the majority of Duplication of benefits victims were promised relief through our previous efforts. We aren\u2019t going to stop until the remaining flood victims receive the relief that they deserve.\u201d\n\nBackground\n\nAfter the 2016 Flood, the Louisiana delegation secured $2.9 billion in Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds to help flood victims rebuild and protect our community from future flooding events.\n\nHowever, recovery funds promised to victims were reduced or eliminated if a homeowner had qualified for a federal disaster recovery loan from the Small Business Administration (SBA). Because the homeowner was already approved for federal relief, HUD stated it would be a \u201cduplication of benefits\u201d for them also to receive a federal recovery grant from the CDBG-DR program. While SBA loans are required to be repaid to the federal government, CDBG-DR grants were one-time payments to victims and do not require repayment.\n\nIn 2018, the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee included language in DRRA to clarify that a loan is not duplicative of a grant because the federal government makes different kinds of assistance available at different times after a disaster.\n\nBut, when HUD implemented this DoB fix, the agency said that a loan is still considered duplicative of a grant if a homeowner makes more than 120 percent of the area median income (AMI). As a result, many remaining DoB homeowners were prevented from accessing the grant dollars, even if they had simply applied for a loan and never received it. The AMI requirement did not apply to original flood victims, only those who had received eligibility through the DRRA DoB fix. Carter and Graves\u2019 legislation clarifies that HUD cannot use an additional income test to determine eligibility for duplication of benefits relief.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-08T00:49:26Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://troycarter.house.gov/media/press-releases/congressman-carter-graves-introduce-bipartisan-bill-help-remaining-2016-flood"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.185520250350237, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}