Mortgage relief for Ida storm survivors finally

Mortgage relief for Ida storm survivors finally / NJ Spotlight / November 1, 2024

By Brenda Flanagan

Three years and two months after the remnants of Hurricane Ida dumped 8 inches of rain on New Jersey, some storm survivors will get the help they’ve waited and worked for — a one-year break from mortgage payments. On Wednesday, Gov. Phil Murphy signed a bill that gives storm survivors a break from mortgage payments and shields them from foreclosure for one year.

“I was shocked … I was happy, ecstatic,” said Michelle Belding, who lobbied lawmakers for the relief bill. Her family rented for two years after Ida flooded them out of their home in Milford.

Bills piled up, Belding said. “We spent over, it’s like $37,000 out of pocket renting, while paying a mortgage,” she explained.

Colleen Kane still can’t move her family back home in Lambertville. Ida trashed the building, its plumbing, electrical and heating systems — and their family’s budget.

“Right now I’m almost five months behind on my mortgage. This will catch me up and remove the threat of foreclosure and losing my home. You know, it’s a huge, huge reaction,” Kane said.

Murphy had conditionally vetoed a previous iteration of the bill, even though the Legislature had passed it unanimously. Sen. Troy Singleton (D-Burlington), a sponsor of the bill, then worked to address the governor’s concerns about possible fraud. The bill Murphy finally signed also eases eligibility requirements to include more survivors.

“The administration has worked diligently to begin the process of already thinking through what that back office operation needs to look like to move relief faster. So I’m pretty confident that we will not have folks waiting too long for this relief,” Singleton said. “They never gave up. And this will give them that opportunity truly to try and get their lives right-sided.”

Ida survivor Leanna Jones works with the New Jersey Organizing Project, which lobbied hard for this relief program. She’s grateful but notes that many people were left financially underwater and some lost their homes.

“I know it will make a big difference to me but it is not the end. The reason that we are in such difficult financial situations is largely in part to the fact that it takes too long for money to reach disaster survivors,” she said.

The Department of Community Affairs will process applications and provide a certificate of eligibility to families whose main residence sustained damage and who applied to a list of aid programs — now including Blue Acres. That opened up eligibility for Debby Josephs. But she faces another Ida-related problem: Her home is in Manville’s Lost Valley, which is so flood-prone that the state Department of Environmental Protection won’t pay to elevate it. Her only viable option is taking a Blue Acres buyout.

“You can’t afford to fix it the way they want you to fix it. You can’t afford to elevate it. You’re forced to sell it back to the state only for them … to tell you this is their offer and you have no choice.”