Why Aren’t Our Homes Built Better?

Pete Gaynor has years of experience in disaster management. He is a former FEMA Administrator and Acting Secretary of Homeland Security during the last presidential administration. He’s visited disaster sites around the country and seen first-hand how we aren’t building our homes well enough to withstand major disasters.

Pete was a guest on this week’s Tell Us How to Make It Better podcast. I asked him why after a devastating storm like Hurricane Michael in 2018, is Mexico Beach rebuilding to a level that wouldn’t be high enough if another category five hurricane hit the area. His response, “Because we love status quo in this country. We don't want to be upset by new rules, new regulations. I think it goes back to human nature. Most people just want to live their life the way they've been living it. And they don't want any added heartache or expense in doing anything different.”

Pete went on to say that the federal government has no authority to mandate local building codes, which means it’s up to each city to raise the code themselves. We see year after year that doesn’t always happen.

As Pete would travel to various disasters around the country the causes of each one was different, but the end result was the same. Whether people were flooded, burned to the ground, washed away, or blown away, in most cases there were things that the victims could have done to either protect their homes better in advance or at least had the right type of insurance to help rebuild after the disaster.

Pete says most people just don’t think it’s going to happen to them. He said it would be interesting if they could get a glimpse of the future and see what post-disaster life would be like, “if we could take those people that haven't been impacted by disasters and transport them real-time into the shoes of a disaster survivor while they're shoveling out, a shovel at a time looking for their life mementos you would change the way we look at disasters in this country. It really is quite important that people understand what's at risk.”

Since there is no real-life hot tub time machine, people are either going to wake up and figure it out, or it’s going to continue to happen year after year. There’s a steep price to pay for doing nothing. Maybe every homeowner should have to sign a pledge, putting in writing that they don’t think anything bad will ever happen to them. Just make sure you put a copy of it in a very safe place.

To listen to Pete’s entire interview click here.