I first spoke with Wauwatosa resident Jessica Young a day after her family’s home flooded. The water reached all the way up from their basement to the first floor. At the time, they were staying in a hotel. They had been told their home insurance wouldn’t cover the damage.
Since then, the Young family has tried every open avenue to help with restoration efforts.
“I felt like a project manager. I think sometimes I felt guilty because I was on my computer or on my phone when we were able to have a couple of friends come and help us with stuff, or people in the community, because it was like, apply for FEMA, apply for possible American Red Cross funding. I had a friend who was so gracious and set up a GoFundMe, and there were offers of help,” she says.
Young says they have been able to clean, disinfect, install a new water heater and take out all damaged drywall and carpeting. They were able to move back into their home on Sat. Sept. 6, but Young worries about what will happen during the next heavy rainfall.
“I have a friend who, you know, went through Hurricane Katrina, and she's kind of been giving me tips and tricks of different things that she does in her house to prep and the things that she's experienced, just emotionally and then, in the aftermath, even now, you know,” Young says.
While Young and her family have moved back into their home as they continue repairs, others like Dena Jones from Greenfield, decided to relocate permanently.
The flood caused Jones' condo basement to fill with water after her sump pump failed, destroying her belongings. The entire basement had to be gutted, cleaned and disinfected.
Jones says after insurance declined to pay for repairs, she faced price gouging when she tried to find services to remove water from her basement carpets. Jones says she was forced to cover the costs the only way she could.
“In the meantime, I had to contact my retirement funds and ask for an emergency distribution of money to pay for all this. It was a total, probably about $10,000 roughly, and then the loss of everything. I haven't included that,” Jones says.
Since the flood, Jones has listed her condo for sale and has chosen to become a renter. She reported her home’s damage to 211 but she says she has not received any help.
“I asked for cleaning supplies. They were supposed to deliver, but they never did. They said, you still need help. I'm still in this place, kind of, yeah, because right now I'm paying for Ubers to pack me up, and I just had a hip replacement. And then I'm trying to do all this, I'm recovering from the hip replacement. But, yeah, it's the fact that nobody stops by, nobody calls. I did get a call from the city of Greenfield engineer about maybe a week and a half ago saying that they're waiting on FEMA, blah blah blah,” Jones says.
Many families and businesses affected by the floods have turned to GoFundMe. Kevin Dixon-Seidl's family lives in West Allis. They used the crowdfunding site to help raise money for repairs to their home.
Dixon-Seidl says sewage and flood water filled their home and garage ruining their drywall, furnace, water heater, washer and dryer. He says since sewage water was part of the damage, home insurance did cover $5,000 in repairs. He says some of his neighbors had it much worse.
“We were actually kind of lucky. We're, apparently the high point because while we got like three feet of water in our basement and more water from the flood went through our garage and everything. A lot of our neighbors got hit a whole lot worse. Just, you know, two houses away, the water, you know, created a hole in somebody's foundation across the street. They took out a whole basement wall,” Dixon-Seidl says.
Now that President Trump has announced about $30 million in federal funding for Wisconsin, those affected by the floods may see some relief.
In the meantime, they’re continuing to do what they can to rebuild.
