Most homes are still dark in the Cypress Club subdivision in Austell, four months after the great flood of September.
"It's like a ghost town," said resident Loretta Crowder-Rorie. The community of about 190 homes was among the hardest hit in the southwestern Cobb County city. Austell bore the brunt of the 500-year storm that dumped up to 20 inches of rain on some parts of Georgia.
Crowder-Rorie and her husband have patched up their flood-damaged house, but about 60 percent of the homes around them remain vacant, she said.
Flood victims in Cobb County have received $22.9 million in grants -- the lion's share of the individual disaster assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. They have also received the greatest share of Small Business Administration low-interest loans to rebuild, a total of $24.6 million. Statewide, flood victims have received $61.2 million in SBA loans and $55.4 million in FEMA grants.
Just the same, it hasn't been enough to coax residents of Cypress Club and other communities to fix their homes and move back. About 250 people in unincorporated Cobb and the cities of Austell and Powder Springs want the government to buy their homes and take the mess off their hands. Some are traumatized by the memory of the rising waters that September day. They don't ever intend to move back.
Tuesday is the deadline for counties and cities to submit home buyout paperwork to the Georgia Emergency Management Agency. Local governments review the paperwork from homeowners before submitting it to GEMA, which administers the federal buyout money.
There is about $29 million in federal grant money available statewide this year for home buyouts related to the flood. Another $10 million will come from state and local governments. Homeowners may be asked to pay a small portion to complete buyout deals.
At least 30 homeowners in Cypress Club hope Austell receives grant money and will buy their property, said Randy Bowens, Austell's director of public works.
Allison Gabriel is one of them. Her home flooded to the second story and her youngest son was evacuated from Clarkdale Elementary School in water up to his knees.
Gabriel was at work and didn't realize her home was under 15 feet of water.
When she arrived at Cypress Club, a neighbor stopped her near the entrance and told her, "You can't go back down in there. Your house is flooded," Gabriel recalled.
"So I walked," said Gabriel, who wanted to see it for herself.
Her house on Egret Court had been flooded in a previous storm before she owned it, as had several others on the street. But Gabriel's house does not fall inside the official 100-year flood plain. Still, Austell's Bowens says he'll ask FEMA to consider homes that have sustained repetitive flooding for the buyout.
Gabriel, a native of Jamaica, moved to metro Atlanta from Miami about four years ago. She's never experienced flooding like this, and she's not moving back. "We're moving somewhere where there is no creek near us," Gabriel said. She used her FEMA disaster assistance to rent a house on a hill nearby.
She stopped paying her mortgage and hopes the bank will wait to see if her home makes the buyout list. The government will only buy out the original homeowner, not a bank, said Bill Higgins, Cobb's storm water management director.
At least 139 people in Austell have applied for the buyout. The deadline for homeowners to submit their paperwork to Austell is today. Cobb County has about 98 homes on its buyout list and Powder Springs has about a dozen.
It's unlikely all of the homes will be chosen. The criteria is strict, with preference given to homes in the 100-year flood plain which are more than 50 percent damaged. Within that group, GEMA will give preference to homes that are in the 10-year flood plain and have a high risk of flooding again, said agency spokesman Ken Davis.
Houses that sit outside the official flood plain, and were substantially damaged, will be given lower consideration for a buyout.
Those homeowners will most likely have to wait for a second pot of money, and no one is sure how long that will take. The state might get $20 million from a community development block grant to help buy out substantially damaged homes outside the 100-year flood plain , Higgins said. There are about 67 homes in that category in unincorporated Cobb, he said.
Bowens in Austell could not give the breakdown for how many buyout applications were in the 100-year flood plain and how many were outside of it. He intends to hold a meeting with homeowners on the issue.
"There's no guarantee that their property's going to be purchased," Bowens said. "It's a gamble."
"It's a difficult decision to make and my heart goes out to them," he said.
Higgins, Cobb's storm water management director, is optimistic that at least the first tier of badly-damaged homes inside the flood plain, which includes 31 in unincorporated Cobb, will get the buyout -- and sooner rather than later.
"The turnaround time, hopefully, is going to be a lot faster than it normally is," Higgins said.
FEMA estimates that it could approve a list of homes in May, and send the money back to GEMA so that governments can start negotiating sales prices. The price will be based on the tax appraisal before the flood.
In Cypress Club, the ravages of the flood are still apparent. A garage door falls off one home. A dwelling where renters once lived still has storm debris. Mold grows on abandoned homes.
"I don't want to be in here, but what can you do?" said Crowder-Rorie. Her house took about five feet of water, ruining the downstairs. She and her husband used their FEMA grant of less than $15,000 and added their own money to refurbish their home in time for winter. Still, with so many empty houses in the neighborhood, it's very quiet, almost eerie.
Looters have stolen flat screen TVs and other electronics from some homes, Crowder-Rorie said. That caused her family to downplay Christmas.
"We were afraid to put lights up and put up a Christmas tree," she said. "We did not want to attract any danger to this house."
She hopes more neighbors decide to return and refurbish their homes.
"I'm hoping that with New Year's resolutions, they'll commit to come back."
Meet the reporter
Mary Lou Pickel has been a staff writer for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for 10 years, covering Cobb County government, immigration and demographics, as well as aviation and transportation. She served as interim Mexico City bureau chief for Cox Newspapers and previously reported for The Palm Beach Post in Florida for five years. Pickel covered September's flood from the first day and has talked with flood victims and disaster relief officials throughout Cobb County and the state. She has reported on flood damage, the magnitude of the storm, cleanup efforts and the complicated process of rebuilding.
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