Hurricane Harvey traveled from a tropical wave to the east of the Lesser Antilles.  It hit the coast of Texas, Friday night as a Category 4 hurricane.  The 130 mph winds destroyed just about everything in its path as the storm raced towards the fourth most populated city in the U.S.  In the first 24 hours that Houston was hit, it received 20 inches of rain and is expected to get 30 more before Saturday. Around 4,000 national troop guards have been sent into the area, but there are already 30,000 people in shelters.  That’s also not counting the 13 million who have been displaced and the five people who have been found dead.

So why wasn’t a city the size of Houston evacuated when the hurricane warnings came?  Houston is known for its susceptibility because of how flat the terrain is.  However Mayor Sylvester Turner did not give the order to evacuate.  In a press conference Sunday morning he defended this decision, despite the national criticism. He said, “You literally cannot put 6.5 million people on the road.” Turner continued to argue that if he had done so, the situation could have been much worse.  

The water is still rising in Houston but once it recedes, the problems won’t stop immediately.  Experts say that it is going to take years for Houston to recover.  Tens of thousands of structures have been structurally damaged, a lot of them need to be knocked down and completely rebuilt.  And while that will be a financial burden, only some of the damage will be covered by insurance companies.  However, money isn’t the most essential problem right now; it’s human resources.  

Right now the U.S. is at a shortage of construction workers.  Usually in the case of a natural disaster, immigrants would help fill those job positions. But that doesn’t look to be an option with President Trump’s increased deportations.  This means that Houston, already in a financial crisis, will end up having to pay workers above average wages because construction will take longer than normal.  With the damage still rising, the country will watch and wait for a migration of workers. The question the country has right now is where will they come from?