Governor announces $20 million for second phase of program to eliminate blue roofs

 Puerto Rico Governor Pedro R. Pierluisi announced the initial allocation of $20 million from the American Rescue Plan (ARPA) funds for the second phase of the repair and rehabilitation program of blue roofs carried out by the Office for Socioeconomic and Community Development (ODSEC).

This program will use these ARPA funds to repair or replace deteriorated roofs that pose a serious threat to the health, safety, and welfare of families residing in such structures. In addition, the program will provide the necessary resources to bring residences up to building codes, address electrical or plumbing problems, improve their energy efficiency, and make other home repairs that eliminate health and safety hazards.

“Since my government began in January, we have sought agility and efficiency in the reconstruction of Puerto Rico. My mission has been that we use every penny we have of federal funds and invest them as soon as possible in our Island. Four years have passed since Hurricane Maria, and the people already want to see the reconstruction work. In my government we have been able to speed up processes, cut red tape, launch auctions and, above all, serve hundreds of homes that still had blue roofs,” said the governor.

The first executive reported that the ODSEC attends to the cases of blue roofs that the Department of Housing has not been able to because the federal guidelines require certain requirements, such as having a title to the property. That is why, to immediately address these needs, $20 million is being allocated initially for the second phase, which will include, in addition to removing the blue awnings, other necessary repairs in homes that need it.

“When we arrived in January, we realized that the program initiative for which $2 million had been allocated in 2019 had not been executed. Given that and the governor's request to speed up the reconstruction projects, we began to work on the project and today we have managed to serve some 200 residences with that money. This has also been achieved with the collaboration of many municipalities that are managing projects under our parameters," said the director of the ODSEC, Thais Reyes Serrano, who added that "I am grateful for this allocation of $20 million, as it will mean that we can help hundreds of families in need."

It was reported that in the first phase homes were repaired in 33 municipalities after the mayors submitted a list of houses in need of repair. ODSEC is responsible for the implementation of the program that includes planning, auction, contracting and administrative closure. In addition, it signs agreements of understanding with municipalities and non-profit organizations. The blue awnings are replaced by much more resistant galvalume and zinc roofs.

For this second phase, an updated inventory of needs has already been requested from the municipalities. To date, some 39 mayors have responded and there is a provisional inventory of 7,060 houses in need of repair, so the ODSEC will now begin the evaluation of that list to determine the qualification of each case and the final number of houses to impact.

During the press conference, which was also attended by the Secretary of the Department of Housing, William Rodríguez Rodríguez, it was indicated that the R3 program of this agency has had an increase of 293 percent from January 2021 to September 2021. It was reported that In December 2020, 412 houses had been completed, while today there are 1,651 houses delivered.

Similarly, the Small Business Financing (SBF) program has already disbursed about $44 million in CDBG-DR recovery funds, through direct grants to small businesses that were affected by Hurricanes Irma and Maria. . From January to September the program has had an improvement of 248 percent. In January, 275 grants had been delivered, while to date 961 grants have been delivered, with an increase of 686 grants delivered. Likewise, in the case of the Direct Assistance to the Buyer program, this has had an improvement of 3,192 percent from January 2021 to the present. In December, 27 closings had been carried out, while at the moment 889 mortgage loan closings have been achieved with this help.