CHIMNEY ROCK, N.C. (828newsNOW) — Village officials renewed their calls for help Wednesday during a meeting with the United States Army Corps of Engineers.
USACE officials were in Lake Lure and Chimney Rock as the agency marked the 200-day milestone in its Tropical Storm Helene recovery mission.
Mayor Peter O’Leary and Administrator Stephen Duncan said the biggest needs included financial help for business owners and clearing trees and debris to reach the village’s 130-gallon water tank.
When Duncan asked Maj. Gen. Jason Kelly, the USACE deputy commanding general for Civil and Emergency Operations, to show them the money, Kelly replied, “I don’t have it. I don’t have it. I’ve got work, though. I’ve got people to do the work.”
“Really, we appreciate y’all coming up. Just, honestly, we are kind of not sure exactly what you wanted to see or what you wanted us to show you or talk about,” O’Leary said.
Reaching the water tank
Kelly said he wanted to make sure the USACE was doing what it needed to do.
“Are we, under the authority of FEMA, getting after the things that you’d like to see us get after?” Kelly asked. “What concerns do you have now with the workload specific to the Army Corps of Engineers?”
O’Leary said debris removal has gone well and is pretty much complete. But there is one area village officials are worried about.
“We do have one community left that is important to the village and to the community. They were heavily devastated by the winds. When those winds started going up the valley, it accelerated like a chimney effect,” Duncan said. “We’ve cleaned all we can clean. We can’t do any more.”
Even though there are only two houses in the neighborhood, the village is eager to get the debris cleared because it has to go through that area to reach its 130,000-gallon water tank.
“As soon as we’re able to get our lines far enough, we can connect back into using that,” Duncan said.
But there’s a problem — it’s private property. There are about 15 property owners in the neighborhood, with most of the land undeveloped. Col. Brad Morgan, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Wilmington District Commander, said the USACE would do the clearing if it could get permission to be on the land.
Because it’s private property, the easiest way to get the USACE involved would be for each property owner to apply for private property debris removal, he said.
“My humble recommendation would be that they apply,” Morgan said.
He said FEMA had approved debris removal from the rights-of-way in private and gated communities.
“So, all we would need to access that, if it’s a potential right away, is a right of entry form from that HOA to give us access to come in and pull what’s eligible from the right of way,” Morgan said.
“But I think the bigger solution is if we have all those as applicants for the private property degree removal program, we could then service, you know, the vast majority of that.”
Help for business owners
Also on the village’s help list — business owners have been struggling to get back on track since Helene wiped out the area in late September.
O’Leary said businesses hope to start reopening in June.
“That’s kind of a target for us. Some of it depends on the sewer line, certainly for restaurants,” he said. “I can’t give you an exact date, some time, just say early summer.”
The checkpoint into the village will go away on May 1, even though private security will continue to patrol, the mayor said.
“That’s good. I mean, that’s the visible signs of a return to normalcy and then just let that build on itself,” Morgan said.
“I think once we can get some people open, I think then the attitude shifts. All of a sudden, instead of a disaster area that’s closed off, you’ve got an area that’s starting to recover and that’s showing signs of life,” O’Leary said.
That spark of hope is also spilling over to the USACE.
“I think also with the witnessing of the resilience of the businesses, of the people, is inspiration for others to come in. This is good all the way around. So we feel a little positive,” Kelly said.
But that optimism is tempered by the financial hardships for business owners.
Duncan said many businesses did not have flood insurance because they were not in a flood zone.
“This flood was something that nobody had seen. I mean, the water levels were just so much higher than you could really imagine,” Duncan said.
And working with the Small Business Administration hasn’t been easy.
“The SBA, to be honest, has not been as smooth as we would all like it to be. The process, I mean. I’ve seen it in person, and, you know, that’s been a big headache of trying just reaching out and trying to keep that going,” Duncan said.
But there hasn’t been a big SBA presence in the village, he said.
“I mean, they’re they’re kind of around, but they haven’t had a human presence here that I’ve seen,” Duncan said.
But the bigger problem has been getting the money to rebuild.
“A lot of these businesses, we’re nothing but mom and pop,” Duncan said. “And they can’t really, you know, they don’t need another loan on top of a mortgage. So that’s a real struggle for a lot of people.”
The SBA has extended the deadline for physical damage loan applications to April 27, 2025. The extension offers businesses, nonprofits, homeowners and renters in affected areas additional time to access low-interest loans aimed at repairing and rebuilding after disaster-related damages. With these loans, borrowers have 12 months before the first payment is due or before any interest kicks in.
“It’s nice to have the SBA. It’s awesome to have these loans, but they need to be grants,” Duncan said. “We can’t afford the payments. If I can afford the payment, I don’t need the money. So, we’ve got to figure out how to convert this money to an immediate need and then relinquish our worries about how to pay. We just, they don’t have the money to make payments. But we still need financial help.”
When Helene sent the Broad River rising through the village as a wall of water, it decimated the business district.
“We had about 200 employees. We went to Saturday and Sunday after that flood, all 200 and some employees are gone. We lost a third of our business structures and a third of our housing structures,” Duncan said.”We had no residents. To this day, we probably don’t have more than 25 residents in the village. We still have no business activity, and we have no employees.”
He said the village has waived all permit fees for rebuilding.
“And we’re up to the point where we’re doing plumbing and electric,” he said.
In for the duration
Kelly reiterated that the USACE was not finished with its work in the Chimney Rock area.
“My hope is to relieve concerns that we’re trying to figure out when we can run away. That’s absolutely not the case,” Kelly said.
“We’re going to do the work. And the work that we do, there’s a standard that we’re going to maintain and you ought to expect and you ought to hold us accountable for being good stewards of the taxpayer dollar.”
Kelly and Morgan said they will remain responsive to village officials and residents and any questions they may have.
“Because we’re your army, your Army Corps of Engineers,” Kelly said. “We’re not going anywhere.”