North Carolina State Auditor Dave Boliek speaks to reporters at a press conference about his office's report on hurricane recovery efforts in the east. (Photo: Galen Bacharier/NC Newsline)
GOLDSBORO, N.C. — State Auditor Dave Boliek said Wednesday he wants his office and other statewide elected offices to have more input in North Carolina’s hurricane recovery efforts for the ongoing Helene rebuild and future disasters.
Boliek, a Republican, said he was recommending a “partnership” between lawmakers and all 10 elected statewide offices to revamp the state’s long-term response to natural disasters.
“I do think the entire Council of State needs to be brought in, along with legislative leadership, to assist in this,” Boliek said.
The auditor’s comments came during a press conference after his office released a report on ReBuild NC — the state’s long-embattled recovery program for eastern North Carolina established under former Gov. Roy Cooper, also known as the North Carolina Office of Recovery and Resiliency or NCORR — that has experienced a budget deficit, untracked spending and years-long homebuilding delays.
His office detailed extensive bureaucracy errors within ReBuild NC that delayed construction, did not properly track payments to contractors and left survivors waiting in temporary housing and hotels for years. Those issues have been the subject of extensive reporting by NC Newsline and Inside Climate News.
In his recommendations and public remarks, Boliek called for broader changes to how North Carolina recovers from all disasters — changes that would involve input from his office and the rest of the Council of State, which includes five Republicans and five Democrats.
“I’m standing here as an elected official, telling you I’m willing to move this ball down the field and move it forward on behalf of the people of North Carolina,” he told reporters Wednesday. “And I have a real conviction and belief that the other members of the Council of State will step right up to the plate and join in, along with our legislative leadership.”
That could mean taking measures like establishing “key performance indicators,” or measurable metrics, to track government contractors, he said.
Boliek said he believes those changes need to start “immediately” as the state recovers from Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina. A new, separate homebuilding program, called Renew NC, is repairing and rebuilding homes in the mountains, and will use up to $1.4 billion in federal money.
Officials leading Helene recovery efforts have repeatedly said the state has learned from mistakes made by ReBuild NC in eastern North Carolina. As of Wednesday evening, the western rebuilding effort, Renew NC, has 4,700 active applications; five homes have been completed and six others are under construction.
Lawmakers have pushed officials to speed along the process, which state officials say has been complicated by slow federal approval.
“We don’t want to stand up here eight years from now and give a similar report about how an agency failed the people of North Carolina because they didn’t have their financial house straight,” Boliek said.
Boliek did not, however, commit to a similar investigation into the Helene operation, saying it would be “unfair” to do so early on.
“We’ll give them a chance, make sure that they can get some results,” Boliek said.
The auditor’s office, which has seen a boost in funding and staffing from GOP lawmakers since Boliek’s election, has already sought to play more of a role in disaster oversight, creating an online dashboard that tracks Helene spending.
Other members of the Council of State have roles to play during disaster recovery, including agricultural aid, insurance assistance and stopping price gouging. But under the current structure of state government, the governor’s office and executive branch control much of the day-to-day recovery process.
“Since taking office in January, Gov. Stein has been committed to completing NCORR’s mission and getting people back into their homes,” a spokesperson for Stein’s office said in a statement to NC Newsline. “We are reviewing the report and will continue to work with NCORR to implement any needed improvements.”
Auditor’s report on ReBuild NC: A ‘logistical nightmare’
Boliek’s report tread on largely the same ground as prior news reporting and findings by legislators, outlining a program that he described as “a disaster from the start” and a “logistical nightmare.”
Applicants took an average of 936 days to get through just one of eight steps under the program, he said, and some families remained in temporary housing for more than 1,400 days.
Boliek focused in particular on contracts and line items for software and technology, like $25 million for a Salesforce platform that “really didn’t do the job for them,” he said. And while he believes that the state needs to continue partnering with the private sector, he said, “you can’t outsource governance.”
“We have to have management from the state level,” he said, calling for “reasonable expectations” with contractors.
During its investigation into ReBuild NC, Boliek said his office consulted with Craig Fugate, who led FEMA under the Obama administration. Fugate said ReBuild NC “spent a tremendous amount of time on process, when their job was swinging hammers.”
The head of ReBuild NC, in a letter to the auditor’s office dated Monday, said the agency had “significantly improved” its financial management and other processes, and has “actively shared lessons learned” with those leading Helene recovery efforts.
“NCORR continues to implement process improvements with regards to strengthening vendor management, local governments and construction vendors,” wrote Pryor Gibson, a longtime Cooper advisor and former Democratic lawmaker who now leads ReBuild NC.
Gibson and Boliek will both testify in front of lawmakers Thursday in Greenville, where a hurricane recovery oversight hearing is expected to focus on ReBuild NC.
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