18 months later, Alabama town still waiting for FEMA

CORDOVA, Ala. — Main Street in this old mill town looks about the same as it did the day after tornadoes killed about 250 people across Alabama a year and a half ago: Battered red bricks and broken glass litter the pavement, and the buildings still standing are rickety and roofless.

The entire one-block downtown, still deemed unsafe, remains sealed off by a chain-link fence. City officials blame the Federal Emergency Management Agency, saying the money to demolish skeletons of the old buildings is mired in miles of red tape.

When one request for photos or historical documentation is met, FEMA makes another, the mayor and others in this town of 2,100 say. One crop of workers is replaced by another, forcing locals to constantly explain their problems to new people.

"It's very frustrating," said Mayor Drew Gilbert, a 25-year-old Cordova native who served on the City Council before taking office this month. "You would think it's been touched and seen now by everyone who needs to touch and see it."

On April 27, 2011, dozens of tornadoes ripped across the southeastern U.S., spawned by freakish weather. Hundreds were killed and thousands of homes and businesses were damaged or destroyed, causing more than $1 billion in damage.

While cleanup and demolition projects are moving along in devastated communities like Tuscaloosa and Hackleburg — where wrecked homes and businesses are mostly gone and new ones are slowly being built — Cordova's downtown stands out as an eerie reminder of the destruction.

FEMA officials say they're only doing their job in Cordova, documenting damaged buildings and covering all the details before providing money to tear them down.

"This project involves demolition of multiple historically significant structures and requires that FEMA consider all pertinent environmental and historic-preservation laws before funding the project," the agency said in response to questions from The Associated Press.

Yet the process has been baffling not just for local residents, but to the head of historic preservation for the state, Elizabeth Brown.

"I think FEMA needs to give their people in the field more latitude," said Ms. Brown, preservation officer for the Alabama Historical Commission. "It seems things have to keep going back up the chain."

Ms. Brown said the demolition process seems to be taking longer than usual in Cordova, but government rules don't set out a strict timetable for such decisions since needs and damage can vary so greatly from one place to another. Town leaders say FEMA has never given them a firm timetable.

Located in coal country about 35 miles northwest of Birmingham, Cordova began in the 1880s at a spot where two railroad lines converged. A textile mill operated in town for about seven decades before closing in 1962.

The mill's failure displaced 800 workers and sent Cordova into a tailspin. Most of the 19 or so buildings in the downtown block were vacant and deteriorating by the time the twisters struck last year.

Many people left town for work in metro Birmingham or nearby Jasper before the twisters, and there are even fewer jobs in Cordova now, aside from schools, a bank, a pharmacy and a health clinic. The town's sole grocery store was wiped out and has yet to reopen; a convenience store near the battered downtown block has closed, too.

Cordova Fire Chief Dean Harbison, who also serves as the town's recovery coordinator, said FEMA was helpful at first.

"They've provided us some money," Chief Harbison said. "But as far as recovery, they've slowed us down."

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.