Governor Greg Abbott announced Oct. 30 that the federal government has approved Texas’ appeal for FEMA Individual Assistance in 20 counties hit by the July storms and flooding. The approval opens help with temporary housing and emergency home repairs, along with other aid for people whose losses insurance did not cover. Bexar, Kerr and Uvalde are among the counties on the list.
Which 20 Texas counties are covered?
The governor’s office names them as Bandera, Bexar, Comal, Crockett, Dimmit, Frio, Gillespie, Kendall, Kerr, Kimble, Kinney, La Salle, Maverick, Medina, Real, Schleicher, Sutton, Uvalde, Val Verde and Zavala. The State of Texas filed the appeal through the Texas Division of Emergency Management. A KSAT report on the announcement says it followed President Donald Trump saying his administration would make additional relief available.
“President Trump has approved Texas’ appeal for FEMA Individual Assistance after the July storms and flooding,” Abbott said. “This brings essential financial assistance and services to eligible Texans in the 20 approved counties.”
What does Individual Assistance pay for?
The governor’s page lists temporary housing, emergency home repairs and uninsured and underinsured personal property losses. It also lists disaster legal services, disaster unemployment assistance, and medical, dental and funeral expenses caused by the disaster. Which of those a household actually receives depends on the damage and on what insurance already covered.
Individual Assistance is a different program from the aid approved earlier. On Sept. 3 Abbott’s office said President Trump had approved a Major Disaster Declaration for the July weather, with Public Assistance for 19 counties. That program pays for emergency work and for repairing or replacing disaster-damaged facilities, which is a different job from helping a family fix its own home.
For anyone in one of the 20 counties whose home, car or belongings were damaged in July, the question now is whether to apply and what to have in hand when they do. The governor’s page does not give an application deadline, so there is no safe reason to wait. People who live in a neighboring county that is not on the list are not covered by this approval.
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How does a household apply for the money?
The governor’s office says residents can apply online at disasterassistance.gov or call 800-621-3362. The federal site, DisasterAssistance.gov, lets a person select a state to see whether their county is in a declared area, then apply online. It also lists the closest FEMA Disaster Recovery Centers by address, and says no login or personal information is needed to look them up.
Texas also runs its own damage reporting tool. The state’s flood response page directs people to the Individual State of Texas Assessment Tool at damage.tdem.texas.gov, where residents can report damage to the state. A damage report there is a separate step from applying to FEMA.
What came with the earlier approvals, and what is still pending?
When the Major Disaster Declaration came Sept. 3, the request for Individual Assistance covered 30 affected counties and was still pending. Twenty of them have now been approved on appeal. The Oct. 30 page says an appeal for Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding is still pending, which would pay for projects that reduce damage from future disasters.
The governor’s office also lists a suspension of the federal tax deadline for affected Texans and businesses, and an extension of SNAP replacement benefits for people who lost food in the floods. Its list of earlier actions on the July storms also includes federal disaster assistance for four additional counties.
What other help is open to flood-hit Texans?
The state’s flood response page lists several programs outside FEMA. Disaster Unemployment Assistance for people who lost work because of the flooding runs through the Texas Workforce Commission, which can be reached at (800) 939-6631 from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. Workers’ compensation claims go through the Texas Division of Workers’ Compensation, with help at 800-252-7031, option 1.
The same page says pharmacies can fill refills early, up to a 30-day supply and excluding Schedule II controlled substances, for affected Medicaid, Children with Special Health Care Needs and Kidney Health Care Program enrollees in the disaster-area counties. The state’s SNAP replacement window for food lost in the floods has its own dates, and the page says requests for affected counties were accepted through Aug. 12.
Where does the money go once an application is in?
Abbott’s announcement does not say how much any household can receive, and it does not give a total for the 20 counties. It says only that the approval brings “essential financial assistance and services” to eligible Texans. People who applied earlier under a different program should treat this approval as a new chance to apply for housing and repair help, since those items are listed under Individual Assistance.
The governor’s office is still waiting on one request. Its Oct. 30 page says an appeal to FEMA for Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding remains pending.
Is your Texas household’s paperwork ready for a FEMA application?
A FEMA application goes faster when the insurance policies, account details and legal papers are in one place. In the July flooding, families in 20 Texas counties had to rebuild that list from memory while water damage and displacement were still fresh.
The Family Emergency Binder is an 18-page fill-in binder with 14 fill-in sections, one at a time, including a page for insurance policies and a section for legal papers and your wishes. It also has a page for every account, last four digits only, so the next storm does not catch the paperwork scattered.
Get the fill-in binder for insurance policies and disaster papers →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
Warren Cohen is a finance writer based in Phoenix, Arizona, covering personal finance topics including credit, banking, and beginner investing. He earned his degree in business administration from Arizona State University and began his career working in consumer finance, where he gained direct experience with lending and credit systems. He now writes for personal finance websites and fintech platforms, focusing on clear, practical content that helps readers make informed financial decisions.
