$442 million more for fire relief

The Oregon Housing and Community Services (OHCS) published a draft Action Plan for a $422 million disaster recovery grant this week, funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Officials say the effort, known as “ReOregon,” was established to support individuals, households, and communities that are still recovering from the 2020 Labor Day Fires.

Assistance will primarily come in the form of new permanent housing in the areas most impacted by the disaster. The proposed programs target fire survivors who were renters prior to the disaster or people who lost a home they owned.

“Feedback from the community plays a critical role in the development of the plan and recovery programs,” according to Alex Campbell, chief external affairs officer for Disaster Recovery and Resiliency at Oregon Housing and Community Services. “That is why we want to make it easy for Oregonians to do so in whatever format works best for them. In particular, we are very interested to hear from fire survivors themselves and will be visiting four of the most-impacted counties to hold public hearings.”

Through June 1st, OHCS is seeking public comment on the draft Action Plan for spending the funds, known as Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR). People are invited to provide their input on the draft Action Plan in person at McKenzie River Community School’s “New Gym” on Wednesday, May 18th. The doors will open 5 p.m. and the public hearing is set for 6 p.m.

A summary of the plan and the entire draft Action Plan itself will be made available for review on OHCS’ website at: https://www.oregon.gov/ohcs/housing-assistance/Pages/CDBG.aspx. Printed copies of the plan will be available by request. All comments must be submitted to OHCS no later than 11:59 p.m. June 1st. After the 30-day public comment period, feedback will be incorporated into the plan before OHCS submits it to HUD for review and approval before the June 8th deadline.