It is estimated that 30,000 Texans will wind up in shelters, and a total of 450,000 citizens of the state will be seeking some sort of disaster assistance or other, once the damages brought upon by Hurricane Harvey is finally assessed. And rebuilding costs are expected to land somewhere between $30 billion and $100 billion. To the misfortune of Texas residents and business people, that rebuilding process may be void of the type of modern infrastructure designed for future flood protection, and that has everything to do with an executive order the President signed to scrap environmental policies instituted under Obama.
Only ten days prior to Harvey hitting land, Donald Trump rolled-back the Federal Flood Risk Management Standards the former President introduced in response to the effects seen by past storms experts believe to be the result of climate change. The piece of 2015 legislation would have made the process of getting infrastructure built in areas susceptible to flooding more difficult, with the intention of ensuring that regulations put in place so that construction is equipped for such a disasters are met. Seeing how much damage 30 inches of rain can cause in less than 48 hours, most would agree that such policy makes sense after the fact. But as he moves to make good on his promise to expedite the building of infrastructure to bring about jobs in America, Trump struck the standards down so that companies wouldn't have to go through such a process before initiating a project.
“We're going to get infrastructure built quickly, inexpensively, relatively speaking, and the permitting process will go very, very quickly," Trump said while announcing his decision to cut the flood standards. “It’s going to be a very streamlined process, and by the way, if it doesn’t meet environmental safeguards, we’re not going to approve it.” While the latter portion of the President's statement would seem to justify the move, experts point to the fact that with the stroke of his pen some of the more vital safeguards have been removed.
