FEMA.

Seasonal workers begin to leave the Salinas valley in October to find work in other areas, or to return to Mexico where they can be reunited with their families until the next season starts. Workers who left early in October were spared the trauma of living through the earthquake, but due to nature's timing and FEMA's definition of victim they have been denied an avenue to replace their, very real, losses.

Consider the situation of two farmworkers who shared housing in the 1989 season. Both were laid off in early October and promised jobs for the following season with the same company. One left the area to search for other work or return to Mexico. The other stayed a few days longer and was caught in the earthquake. Both need housing now because the 1990 season is beginning and their former home has been destroyed or red-tagged. Only the farmworker who was in the area on October 17, 1989 is eligible for assistance from FEMA.

The ineligible farmworker has suffered the same loss of housing. He is as victimized by the decreased housing and increased rents as his friend. Yet, because he was laid off a few days earlier he searches for a place in a crowded apartment with ten or twenty others, ineligible for the FEMA trailers or 18 months of rental assistance payments.

Even those families who were fortunate enough to receive federal or local assistance realize that they are living on borrowed time with borrowed resources. There were 150 trailers sent to the area by FEMA. These trailers are housing primarily low

income families, many of them farmworkers. Current plans for development and replacement of destroyed and damaged housing do not guarantee replacement of even that many low income units. It is likely that at the end of their 18 months many of these families will be faced with the same poor choices of substandard overcrowded housing at exorbitant cost.

Solutions

A commitment must be made to use this opportunity to augment energency resources in a manner that rectifies a pre-existing problem. Funding for low income housing must become a priority. Money from other sources must be matched with the emergency monies to allow a permanent solution to a problem that cannot be solved by volunteerism or private enterprise. Every earthquake victim living in temporary housing now is at risk of becoming homeless at the end of the disaster period. The costs of providing for the homeless in the future can be reduced by a commitment to low income housing development now. That commitment must be made in policy and in funding.

Respectfully submitted,

CALIFORNIA RURAL LEGAL ASSISTANCE

CYNTHIA L. RICE

DARRYEL NACUA

Mr. Chairman, Members of the Panel, my name is Susan Peck and I am the Western Regional Director of the Housing Assistance Council. I'd like to commend the Subcommittee on Housing for appointing this panel to address the considerable consequences of the October 17, 1989, earthquake on the housing needs of northern Californians.

The Housing Assistance Council (HAC) is a national nonprofit corporation supporting the development of low- and moderate-income housing nationwide. For 19 years HAC has been providing technical housing services, housing program and policy analysis, training and information services to local and state governments, nonprofit and private organizations involved in the production of housing in rural and small town America. This has given us, we believe, a grasp of both the housing need in rural America and the policies, programs and funding which are needed to meet that need.

In California, HAC has focused considerable predevelopment loan resources on rural, low-income housing developments that have contributed to improving the housing conditions of thousands of farmworker, elderly and low-income families. We have worked with other nonprofits and public agencies, as well as the State, to create within California financial and programmatic resources to complement and supplement federal housing assistance, and we have ensured that the housing needs and the concerns to be addressed with federal programs have been relayed to policy-makers in our nation's capitol.

When the earthquake struck at 5:04 p.m. on October 17, 1989, we were in an unique position to quickly assembly a guide to the housing resources available to disaster victims in the affected rural communities. Just one month prior, Hurricane Hugo whipped through the Carolinas, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, devastating whole communities. Soon after, HAC prepared a guide to restoring housing communities in 24 of South Carolinas' rural counties. This guide was adapted to the four counties in California in which the earthquake caused damage to rural communities. Entitled "After the Earthquake: A Guide to Restoring Rural Housing and Communities in Northern California”, the guide describes federal and state resources, and identifies specific contacts in four counties: Santa Cruz, Monterey, San Benito and Santa Clara. I would appreciate it if you would insert this guide in the hearing record. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) specifically requested our permission to use the guide in their outreach effort and the California Department of Housing and Community Development is using the guide to train their disaster relief staff. It is our understanding that no comparable guide exists for use by organizations and individuals in urban communities similarly affected by a disaster.

In preparing the Northern California guide, we learned a lot about the inadequacy of current resources to meet post-earthquake housing needs, and the pre-earthquake housing needs that were dramatically compounded by this devastating natural disaster. In Watsonville alone, the identified housing shortage before the earthquake exceeded 2500 units; about 1000 units were destroyed or suffered major damage as a result of the earthquake. Most of the units destroyed or damaged were occupied by low-income, Hispanic families, sometimes two, three or four families to the unit. This doubling-up was an indication of the housing shortage in the community before the earthquake. This has resulted in many families being declared ineligible for federal disaster assistance because they could not prove, through rent receipts or mortgage statements that they rented or owned housing prior to the earthquake. It continues to be a serious issue for pre-earthquake homeless people not only in Watsonville, but in Santa Cruz County and Oakland and San Francisco.

Inadequate Resources for Disaster Victims

The community of Watsonville has a population of around 30,000 people yet, as stated earlier, there was considerable overcrowding in units and many of the additional households may not be counted in the official population. Although an agricultural community, with Hispanics numbering about 60%, many of whom are farmworkers and of low-income, this community is not within the eligibility definition for the Farmers Home Administration (FmHA). I have appended to my testimony FmHA's definition and a brief history of how it came about. With the exception of the farm labor housing program, Sections 514 and 516 of the Housing Act of 1949, as amended, none of the agency's resources may be applied in this obviously needy community. Why is this important?

Primarily, because resources to rebuild or to provide housing for low-income households are woefully inadequate. Other witnesses both here and in San Francisco, tomorrow, will described in detail the programs and processes of obtaining assistance from the nation's disaster relief agency, FEMA. For persons who are not homeowners, rental payments are made available if the household can prove that it rented or owned a home prior to the disaster; moreover, the rent payments are for a limited time. Low-income, debt-ridden homeowners may be denied Small Business Administration (SBA) loans to repair or rebuild their homes if their incomes would not adequately support repayment. The poor, who need the assistance the most, are often the ones who will not receive it.