Federal disaster buyout program excludes mobile homes, leaving flood-prone trailer parks to repeatedly flood
ProPublica investigation reveals how a policy gap leaves residents of affordable housing in Appalachia trapped in recurring flood zones.
What to know
- Federal disaster buyout programs were designed for traditional housing and systematically exclude mobile homes, the nation's largest affordable housing stock, leaving residents in floodplains unprotected.
- The Hyder Mountain Road trailer park in North Carolina has flooded at least three times in 20 years (2004, 2021, 2024), with Hurricane Helene killing a resident, yet new tenants continue to rent the same flood-prone lots.
- Local authorities bought out a wood-frame house on the same floodplain but declined to buy out the mobile home park, leaving the decision to rent to private park owners with financial incentives to fill the lots.
The dispute Whether the root cause is voter choice (Appalachian residents backing anti-safety-net politicians) or systemic inequality (both parties abandoning the region), and whether proposed solutions like insurance restrictions would protect or displace vulnerable residents. · positions read across 109 posts and comments
Appalachian voters repeatedly vote against their own interests, particularly supporting politicians who oppose disaster relief and social programs.
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“So, you get policy's what you vote for.”
truthrfacts.bsky.social · Bluesky ↗
Appalachia's poverty and political alignment result from systemic abandonment and impoverishment by both parties, not individual voter failure.
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“It's hard to rewire your brain, especially when your entire family/community believe the same thing. There are also lots of really good people here who don't vote against their best interests.”
ebwell.bsky.social · Bluesky ↗
Insurance-based solutions to the flooding problem would harm poor residents by pricing them out and accelerating gentrification rather than protecting them.
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“This is a great way for insuranse/counties to force out poor people and sell their land to developers and invite gentrification.”
pammageddon.bsky.social · Bluesky ↗
“to mitigate the possibility of future damage to life and property should subsequent events occur.”
State relocation program, Government documentation · ProPublica article
Dave Masters Mobile home residentHaywood County Local governmentFederal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Federal disaster response agency
The record 2 articles and posts · last 22 days
- summary covers to here · Sep 2, 7:14 PM · 1 piece above arrived after
What people are saying 24 voices from 1 site · best of 109 · verbatim
- What specific policy changes would allow mobile homes to be included in federal buyout programs?
- Why do park owners have authority to re-rent flood-prone lots after disasters rather than local authorities?
- Sep 6
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If we can borrow trillions to support Apple, Google, Exxon, Meta, we could tax billionaires to build safe communities.
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A home is a home whether it is a rich person's mansion or a poor man's mobile home. Everything seems to be designed to protect the richest people and essentially neglect the less wealthy when, in fact, it is the less wealthy of us who really need the assistance. Kick Repubs from congress!
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Unless you own the land that your mobile (mobile= moveable) home is on, it is considered personal property, like a car or a boat. As more people can only afford to have a home on rented land due to companies buying up all of it, this increases the risk of losing everything in a natural disaster
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It's not "falling between the cracks". It's, as a family member once observed, being pushed between the cracks.
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FEMA and other disaster recovery funds must be strengthened and expanded. But local regulations are the front line for preventing repeated occupation of high-risk areas. There are some
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These mobile home park owners aren't at risk. They watch waves residents die, then set up a new batch of new residents to die next flood. We could legislate to ban this at the federal level, so it's not up to states. Eminent domain has been used for far more ridiculous purposes than saving lives.
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Because too many entitled people look down on the folks who live in them.
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T
Setting this up to cover the replacement cost of a home that should have never been there, shows that the government didn't give a single fuck about housing, just bailing out the lenders When there's no lender involved de nada We always have money to bail out the banks and sometimes credit unions
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D
That is because the least affluent are the most ignored., cbwrong.
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This program sounds awesome but I’d love to see where exactly it’s happening bc my house was underwater twice in 13 months (Helene and Idalia) and I’ve never heard boo about this actually happening anywhere, single family or mobile home smh
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Affordable housing options like tiny homes, mobile homes, and trailers are often relegated to unincorporated areas that don’t enjoy county, state, or federal support.
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I wonder why the ProPublica hasn’t reported on this enormously consequential story. Disabled people make up 20%+ of the US population, and this would affect elderly people and veterans as well. It’s time to hear from the media on this.
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FEMA, or what’s left of it, is for the wealthy on the Outter Banks, not for people.
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P
FEMA’s buyout program can help homeowners move to safer accommodations after catastrophic flooding. But trailer owners are often excluded, leaving people in the country’s largest source of affordable housing to fall between the cracks.
- Sep 2
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It’s not though. There’s still registered Democratic voters that didn’t vote for this even in the reddest of states. Then factor in that the party over the last 30 years has abandoned the rural areas and what not
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Follow Appalachian here it’s not just the churches, it’s the capitalist media as well. It’s also the fact that Democrats and Republicans both hate us and are abusers and when your options are old abuser or new abuser, you stick with the abuser, you know. 
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And lots of people who don’t even vote at all. Not to mention gerrymandering. It’s a system built to fail but the powers that be know how to deflect and refocus people’s anger in other directions.
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Appalachia here. Most get brainwashed at churches that tell them how to vote. I grew up in one such church. It’s hard to rewire your brain, especially when your entire family/community believe the same thing. There are also lots of really good people here who don’t vote against their best interests.
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How do people know the mobile home parked on the land they're about to buy, can't be insured? It's a fix for the Insurance corporation, no-one else. Any outstanding auto loan and past insurance claims against a car are available to the public, in some places. That is needed for real estate too.
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Appalachian voters: Ouch that stove is hot Ouch that stove is hot Ouch that stove is hot Ouch that stove is hot Ouch that stove is hot Ouch that stove is hot
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The very real human being in the story, who Bluesky has determined they know how she voted and that she deserved her fate.
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No new insurance for homes in a flood plain. That's the policy fix. Being unable to insure will deter constructing on the flood plain and will deter people from moving there.
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The 2024 Election: The region showed deep Republican loyalty. As noted by Old North State Politics, “Of the 214 counties defined as Appalachian, all but four gave the majority of their votes to Donald Trump in 2024.” @ms.now So, you get policy's what you vote for.
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NEW: Residents of a riverfront trailer park in the Appalachian Mountains have lost homes and loved ones in multiple storms. A policy gap puts mobile home residents in harm’s way again and again. with @theassemblync.bsky.social