It’s been one year since Hurricane Helene first hit Western North Carolina on Sept. 27, 2024. With so many recovery needs still yet to be addressed and so little help from the federal government, it’s time for the state legislature to pass a budget that prioritizes people and stops cutting taxes.
Helene caused an immense amount of damage in a mountainous region that is not usually prone to hurricanes and flooding. All told, it’s estimated that the storm caused $60 billion in damage in Western NC, making Helene the costliest storm to ever hit our state.
Over the past year, important strides have been made to repair public roads and infrastructure, restore utilities, and expedite the process of rebuilding homes. Yet even still, as of September 2025, the combined funding for recovery from federal, state, and private sources is only about $15 billion. This means that 75 percent of the damage caused by Hurricane Helene remains unaddressed one year later.
Neither the federal nor state government has taken seriously the recovery needs of Western North Carolinians.
During past major hurricanes in the country, the federal government has typically covered between 40 and 50 percent of the total damage. For the costliest hurricanes like Katrina (2005), Sandy (2012), and Maria (2017), the federal government has covered about 75 percent of the billions in damage. In contrast, to date, the federal government has covered about 9 percent of the total damage caused by Hurricane Helene in North Carolina.
On Sept. 15, 2025, Governor Stein issued a renewed request of $13.5 billion in federal funding for Helene recovery. If granted, this would make a significant contribution toward addressing the outstanding $45 billion in damage that remains unaddressed. However, even in the optimistic scenario where Governor Stein’s request for the $13.5 billion in new appropriations is granted in full, we’re still left with over $31 billion in outstanding damages — about half of all the damage.
With so much damage that still needs to be addressed and the expectation that these sorts of extreme climate disasters will continue, one would figure that state lawmakers would be getting serious about ensuring that we have the funding that we need to recover fully from Hurricane Helene and prepare for the next major disaster. It’s all the more so critical in light of the actions being taken by the current federal administration, including sweeping staffing cuts at FEMA, cuts to essential FEMA programs, and the push to increase the responsibility of states in responding to climate disasters.
Instead, our state budget writers are pushing ahead with unpopular tax cuts for profitable corporations and the ultra-wealthy that will cost our state billions in revenue that is urgently needed to respond to community needs. When fully phased in, for example, the Senate’s proposed tax cuts would mean over $10 billion per year in lost revenue compared to today’s tax rates. Meanwhile, the House and Senate’s continued commitment to eliminating the corporate income tax will enrich out-of-state corporate executives and shareholders while doing nothing to help everyday North Carolinians like you and me.
This is money that could be used to address the many outstanding needs in Western North Carolina. Rather than giving handouts to those who don’t need them, we could instead:
Of course, there is also no shortage of other, non-disaster related needs that we need tax revenue to address, like ensuring that all North Carolinas have quality health care, that families have access to child care, and that everyone in the state has food on their table.
State budget writers need to wake up to the reality that now is not the time to cut taxes. The people of North Carolina know this, but our elected representatives seem to have missed the memo.
Alex Campbell is a public policy analyst with the NC Budget & Tax Center. Republished from NC Newsline.
