A portion of Button Road is shown here after road department personnel cleared the road of downed trees. Photo courtesy of Garland Gilliam, Emergency Management director.
By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1
With the approval of the Federal Disaster Declaration by U.S. President Joe Biden on July 23 Barren County is eligible for federal reimbursement for funds spent in the restoration efforts following the severe weather that swept through the commonwealth on the weekend before Memorial Day, which was on May 27.
At the time Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear in executive order 2024-379 declared a state of emergency writing that the high winds, and in many counties tornados, “endangered public health and safety” of public and private properties.
“State and local governments share responsibility for protection of public health, safety, and security as well as for the protection of public and private property and for taking appropriate actions to ensure the provision of essential public services,” the order read. “I, Andy Beshear, Governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky…do hereby declare that a State of Emergency exists in the Commonwealth of Kentucky.”
On June 14, 2024 Beshear sent a letter to the White House and to Biden requesting a “Major Disaster Declaration” citing that the weather event “impacted 57 of Kentucky’s 120 counties” with 16 tornados traversing the state and six Kentuckian fatalities. Locally, the 12-page letter states that Barren County experienced an EF-1 tornado and straight-line winds up to 100 miles per hour.
With the president’s approval Tuesday federal funds, or more precisely reimbursements, were allocated to numerous counties in Kentucky. The letter, however, differentiates between “individual and household assistance” and “public assistance.” Barren County was not one of the 15 that qualified for individual assistance but was approved for public assistance.
Director of Emergency Management Garland Gilliam said the numerous downed trees, and the subsequent road damage, the water damage and the utility damages caused significant destruction throughout Barren County, though the specific amount of county damage won’t be known until off the restoration work is completed which will then be eligible for federal reimbursement.
“What we do is we turn in all the damages the county incurred and what we qualify for is debris removal,” Gilliam said. “We had so many trees down on roads FEMA will reimburse us for the road department cleaning all them up.”
“That [cost] adds up quickly when you have hundreds of trees down,” he added.
Gilliam said he is unsure at this time of the total amount of reimbursement as it is akin to reimbursing individuals or organizations based on receipts and the process is still ongoing.
“Let’s go back to the wind storm [on] March 3, 2023…we ended up getting just shy of $300,000 but that took months,” Garland said. “This just got declared…I suspect we’ll get close to what we did there.”
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