Hurricane refugee no longer homeless

HARLINGEN -- Although he had been homeless since Hurricane Dolly, Alfredo Guzman finally has a place to hang his hat.

But it took persistence from his sister and help from a congressman's aide to cut bureaucratic red tape to get him into an assisted-living apartment, he said.

Guzman, 60, who had been living in an old house he used to share with his father on FM 506 northwest of Harlingen, had to leave his home in a hurry when Dolly brought in wind and flooding rain on July 23.

He said recently that his home was still flooded and he knew it was unlikely he would ever move back there. He can't even return to see if anything is salvageable.

"They've been pumping for 42 days," he said in a recent interview of Cameron County crews.

Guzman now has only a few sets of new clothes still in packages and an old Geo auto.

"I go to dialysis three days a week and I go to La Frontera (Adult Day Care) on Stuart Place Road every day," Guzman said. "That's where I rode out the storm."

His sister, Beatrice Montemayor, a San Antonio teacher, said she has been very worried about him.

"My brother is a senior citizen, he's a (kidney) dialysis patient," she said. "He was living in my parents' house all by himself," she said.

Even though it was the first week of school, a little more than three weeks ago she took a day and a half off to go to Harlingen to try to get help for her brother, Montemayor said.

"I went to the (Federal Emergency Management Agency) center in Harlingen and they gave me the wrong information," she said.

FEMA offices in the Rio Grande Valley later closed due to the possible threat from Hurricane Ike.

Later, when she tried to deal with FEMA over the telephone, she got a completely different story about her brother's situation, Montemayor said.

She was just trying to get her brother into some kind of safe, adequate housing, his sister said, sobbing while recalling her telephone conversation with a FEMA employee.

"He's staying in a motel and they (FEMA) said they had to have a rental receipt before he can get another check," she said in a recent interview, after her brother had received one FEMA check.

Most upsetting, Montemayor said, was what she described as a bad attitude of a FEMA caseworker.

"The lady was very rude," Montemayor said. "When I asked for her identification number and to speak to a supervisor, she hung up on me. I don't feel that, as citizens of the United States, they (FEMA employees) should be treating him or me like that."

"I don't' think they are doing their job," she said of FEMA.

FEMA spokesman Dean Cushman in Austin said that because of privacy laws and issues with Guzman's case, he cannot discuss it.

Montemayor said it was not until she contacted U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa's office that she finally got some action to help her brother.

Salomon Torres, district director for Hinojosa's office in Edinburg, said he got in touch with Amigos del Valle and a Catholic Church social worker who agreed to help Guzman.

"They told me that ... he is moving into an apartment," Torres said. "They have an assisted living facility in Harlingen and they found a spot for him there."

Guzman, who had been living in an old motel in the north side of Harlingen, said the $488 check he received from FEMA lasted only half a month.

"It costs $200 a week to live here," he said of the motel in a recent interview.

"There is air conditioning, but if I use it, I have to pay more."

At Amigos del Valle, rent will be more affordable and water will be included, he said. But he will still have to pay for electricity.

Cushman said FEMA officials are now in touch with Montemayor and a FEMA inspector will go to Guzman's house after water recedes from the area.

But 3 more inches of rain fell on the area last week. Precinct 4 Cameron County Commissioner Edna Tamayo said pumping efforts have been increased despite frequent rains that make it seem impossible to dry out the Tio Cano Lake area.

After the inspection, FEMA will determine how much compensation the government will be able to give Guzman for the loss of his home, Cushman said.

His sister said at least she won't have to worry so much about him in the Harlingen facility, where someone will check on him each day and where medical care can be obtained quickly.

"I never lived there (before), but I'm going to try it," Guzman said of Amigos del Valle.

When he lived in his own house, he did have a home health provider who cleaned for him and did laundry, he said. But in the country, dust constantly came through the windows, making it hard to keep anything clean.

But with six weeks of water, mud and silt in the house up to the windowsills, he knows he cannot move back there, Guzman said.

"I'll have to sell it, but nobody will want to buy it anyway," he said. "Maybe if they tear down the house, a farmer can use the lots for storage."

With his monthly Social Security checks that total about $600, he can barely buy groceries, much less gasoline for his car, he said. Now, even though the rent is very reasonable, his budget will be even tighter, he said.

The last time he was able to work at a job, he worked at a school district in the 1980s through a government jobs program, Guzman said.

He and his family are originally from Lubbock, Guzman said.

"We used to come down here to work the onion fields," he said. "My dad was in a car accident and got some money and was able to buy that place."

Torres said he will continue to monitor Guzman's situation.