Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2019

Floor Speech

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Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank Mr. Larson for yielding and, again, for offering this amendment, which has been part of a number of initiatives that we have worked on jointly together to deal with this issue.

Again, for the record, just to clarify what is going on here, a concrete quarry up in north central Connecticut, which had been mining aggregate for foundations in homes, it turned out there was a material called pyrrhotite, which is an iron sulfide material that, over time, when it is exposed to moisture, rusts and cracks in a sickening fashion and results in the total collapse of home foundations.

The estimate is as high as 19,000 homes have had foundations using material from this quarry. As the gentleman pointed out, this has also occurred in western Massachusetts. It goes as far north, actually, as Three Rivers, Quebec, because it is a strain of pyrrhotite that runs from Canada down through New England.

This picture shows vividly the damage caused to a home in Coventry, Connecticut, where the repairs require you to lift the house, clean out the old foundation, pour a new foundation, and, again, lower the house back. It costs roughly about $200,000.

We were able to secure a tax ruling from the Treasury Department that allows individuals like this homeowner in the picture to basically deduct those losses, which, again, is some relief.

Frankly, there is more that we need to bring to the table. The gentleman's amendment would allow the Federal regulators that set up the rules for lending banks and institutions to get some flexibility for loan-to-value ratio rules that occur when there are natural disasters.

Again, in Federal natural disasters in places like Florida and Texas, there is some flexibility to allow homeowners to get a loan perhaps above the loan-to-value ratios so they can, again, basically conduct repairs to make their houses habitable again. This amendment will set up that process.

Secretary Mnuchin, as the gentleman and I know we have met with personally, would be the Department that would organize this task force that the amendment contemplates.

Again, it is something which the banking industry in Connecticut and Massachusetts has expressed a strong interest in basically allowing some relief for homeowners who, again, have poured their heart and soul into their homes to be able to recover their losses.

I thank the gentleman for offering this amendment. We had a similar amendment last night that was adopted by Mr. Calvert. Again, I want to thank the majority for their understanding on this issue.

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