Thousands of people likely remain stranded, and an estimated 30,000 to 40,000 homes have been destroyed in the Houston area as Hurricane Harvey, now a tropical depression, continues to batter the Gulf Coast with torrential rains, flooding and strong winds, Harris County Judge Ed Emmett said. 
 
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 Harvey made its third landfall, just west of Cameron, Louisiana, Wednesday at 4 a.m. CDT, with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph, according to the National Weather Service. As of 11 p.m. EDT, the slow-moving storm had picked up some speed, moving northeast at 9 mph, with its center was about 30 miles northeast of Alexandria, Louisiana. 
 
 The storm was starting to fall apart overnight, with rain scattered in nature and falling over Mississippi and Arkansas. Residents in western Tennessee, around Memphis, should expect heavy rains on Thursday morning and possible flash flooding as up to 8 inches of rain are possible locally. 
 
 Before that, it battered the Beaumont-Port Arthur area in southeastern Texas, dumping more than 2 feet of rain in some parts. By Wednesday evening, the storm had weakened from a tropical storm to a tropical depression. 
 
 "We have people who are on the second floor of their homes. They're riding it out, and they're waiting for the waters to go down," Emmett, who is also the director of Texas' Harris County Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, said in an interview Wednesday with ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos on "Good Morning America." 
 
 "We've got probably [30,000] to 40,000 homes that have been destroyed," Emmett added. 
 
 Power outages in the Houston area are down to 75,000, but 32,000 of those outages are inaccessible to crews, officials said Wednesday. 
 
 The brunt of the storm's impact has begun to shift to western and northern Louisiana. Now, for Harris County, "the biggest challenge is going to get people back in their homes," Emmett said. "We've got to get those people back into their normal lives as soon as possible." 
 
 The Houston Airport System announced that it has lifted restrictions on commercial operations. On Saturday, Southwest Airlines will ramp up the number of flights, according to the airport system. 
 
 A curfew from midnight to 5 a.m. will take effect in Houston for the second night in a row, Mayor Sylvester Turner said in a press conference. No arrests were made during Tuesday night's curfew, a spokesperson for the Houston Police Department said at the press conference. 
 
 The Houston Fire Department has received about 15,000 calls for assistance, a spokesperson said Wednesday evening. The fire department will begin recovery operations in certain areas and conduct door-to-door checks of accessible homes that got more than 3 feet of water, the spokesperson said. 
 
 Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo said 911 calls for water rescues were down to about 40 an hour as of this morning. Still, the Coast Guard is taking more than 1,000 calls per hour from people needing rescue. 
 
 The Navy is sending two ships -- the USS Kearsarge and the USS Oak Hill -- to the Gulf of Mexico to held with storm relief efforts, it announced Wednesday. 
 
 Vice President Mike Pence said on Wednesday that he will travel to Texas Thursday. "@POTUS asked me to travel to Texas tomorrow with his message: 'We will be with you every single day to restore, recover, and rebuild,'" the vice president tweeted. 
 
 .@POTUS asked me to travel to Texas tomorrow with his message: "We will be with you every single day to restore, recover, and rebuild." pic.twitter.com/jQ0A9BGnPK — Vice President Pence (@VP) August 31, 2017 
 
 Harris County Flood Control District meteorologist Jeff Lidner told reporters this morning that the lowest homes near the Addicks and Barker reservoirs have 3 to 6 feet of water. 
 
 Harvey, which first came ashore last Friday in Texas as a category 4 hurricane, dumped more than 51 inches of rain on some parts of the state, according to preliminary reports from the National Weather Service. The storm led to at least 31 deaths over the past five days, according to The Associated Press. Harris County officials, where Houston is located, confirmed six new deaths late Wednesday. 
 
 Texas Gov. Greg Abbott -- who spoke by phone Wednesday with the president while the commander in chief was on board Air Force One, returning from Missouri -- said most of the deaths were due to people driving vehicles into high water. 
 
 .@POTUS @realDonaldTrump speaks w/ Texas @GovAbbott on Air Force One - returning to Washington, D.C. from Missouri w/COS General John Kelly. pic.twitter.com/oTwxwM4VMU — Dan Scavino Jr. (@Scavino45) August 30, 2017 
 
 An undetermined number of people are missing. The Coast Guard is leading a search for two volunteer rescuers missing after their boat crashed and capsized on Cypress Creek near the North Freeway early Wednesday. Authorities found a third rescuer clinging to a tree, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office. 
 
 The Harris County Sheriff's Office urged people awaiting rescue to "hang a towel or sheet prominently" for rescuers to see because addresses are difficult to spot. 
 
 Harvey is expected to weaken and continue moving to the north and east across the Lower Mississippi Valley and Tennessee Valley through Thursday. But the National Weather Service said Harvey still has the potential to cause "life-threatening flooding." 
 
 "Catastrophic and life-threatening flooding continues in southeastern Texas and portions of southwestern Louisiana," the service said in an advisory this morning. "Excessive runoff from heavy rainfall will cause flooding of small creeks and streams, urban areas, highways, streets and underpasses, as well as other drainage areas and low-lying spots." 
 
 The situation became serious in eastern Texas Wednesday. The National Weather Service issued a flash-flood warning for parts of southeastern Texas, including the cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur, which received more than 26 inches of rain in some areas on Tuesday alone. 
 
 Port Arthur Mayor Derrick Freeman urged residents to get to higher ground in a Facebook post early Wednesday. 
 
 "Our whole city is underwater right now but we are coming!" Freeman wrote in one post. "Please get to higher ground if you can, but please try stay out of attics." 
 
 The largest oil refinery in the United States is shutting down because of the devastating floods. Its owner, Motiva Enterprises, announced in a statement early Wednesday that it began a "controlled shutdown of the Port Arthur refinery in response to increasing local flood conditions." 
 
 The refinery won't reopen until floodwaters recede, the company said. 
 
 Officials were forced to evacuate the shelter at the Bob Bower Civic Center in Port Arthur this morning after it began to fill with water. One witness, who was forced to relocate, said some areas of the center had almost 4 feet of water inside. 
 
 Displaced residents were taken to a secondary evacuation site at the Carl Parker Center, according to ABC Texas affiliate KBMT-TV. 
 
 The disastrous rainfall Wednesday led the National Weather Service to further extend a flash-flood emergency for the cities of Beaumont and Port Arthur until 4:30 p.m. CT in anticipation of additional rain that morning. 
 
 The worst is not over for Texas, Abbott warned Wednesday. He said 24,000 National Guard troops, including all of Texas' force, have been deployed in the state and will be crucial in the weeks and months to come to help restore order. 
 
 The National Guard has made 8,500 rescues, evacuated 26,000 people and done 1,400 shelter-in-place welfare checks in Texas so far. Meanwhile, there are 32,000 people in shelters throughout the state, Abbott said. 
 
 Five days after Harvey first made landfall, FEMA said it's still in "life-saving, life-sustaining" mode, with recovering survivors being the top priority. FEMA Administrator Brock Long said at a news conference Wednesday that there are more than 12,000 emergency staffers on the ground in Texas and Louisiana, spread across 50 counties. The agency is operating more than 230 shelters in Texas, housing more than 30,000 people. 
 
 The George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston is no longer accepting evacuees, Turner said. About 8,000 people are currently at the convention center, down from 10,000 people on Tuesday night. The city had opened up the Toyota Center as an additional shelter to ease the overcrowding at the convention center. 
 
 Long said the FEMA travel trailers used after Hurricane Katrina are a "last resort" and the agency will first try to move displaced residents into local hotels before helping them clear out their inundated houses so they can return to them. FEMA has already placed more than 1,800 flood survivors in hotels, he said. 
 
 The Air Force said it was providing aircraft assistance in response to Harvey, including two HC-130J Combat King IIs, three HH-60G Pave Hawks, air crews and other support personnel to College Station, Texas. Two C-17 Globemaster IIIs are carrying more than 30 tons of relief supplies to Louisiana's Alexandria International Airport. 
 
 Help is also coming from overseas. Gov. Abbott said on Wednesday that Texas is accepting resources from Mexico, including boats, food and other supplies. And Israel's embassy in Washington tweeted, "A team from the Israeli Rescue Coalition will arrive in #Houston on Thursday to help victims of #HurricaneHarvey." 
 
 A team from the Israeli Rescue Coalition will arrive in #Houston on Thursday to help victims of #HurricaneHarveyhttps://t.co/Wd7Kl3fs7B pic.twitter.com/rbBL0NNHWX — Embassy of Israel (@IsraelinUSA) August 30, 2017 
 
 ABC News' Max Golembo, Serena Marshall, Whitney Lloyd, Luis Martinez and Zunaira Zaki contributed to this report. 
 
 Take part in Disney's Day of Giving: To support people impacted by Hurricane Harvey, call 1-855-999-GIVE, donate at www.RedCross.org/ABC or text "HARVEY" to 90999 to make a $10 donation. ||||| On 27 August 2017, as the full damage to Texas from a storm of historic proportions was not yet fully known, a number of social media posts began to spread, alerting readers to a change in Texas law around insurance claims in the event of weather damage. 
 
 One Facebook user posted the following: 
 
 EFFECTIVE FRIDAY, the laws governing insurance claims in Texas will change to your detriment. To take advantage of current law, YOU MUST FILE YOUR CLAIM, IN WRITING, BY THURSDAY, AUGUST 31, regardless of whether your damage occurred before that date. That is, it does not matter if your DAMAGE occurred before the effective date. To take advantage of current law you must actually file a claim by Thursday. It must be (1) IN WRITING, and (2) SPECIFIC ABOUT WHAT DAMAGE YOU ARE CLAIMING OCCURRED. The changes were made by H.B. 1774. The provisions in that bill hamper your ability to challenge your insurance company if they slow pay, low pay, or deny your claim. (Among other things, It lessens the penalties for their failure to pay your claims or their slow-paying them, and it limits your ability to collect attorneys fees, so you’d have to pay to sue out of your own pocket.) Again, this law makes it harder for you to get the insurance companies to pay what they are supposed to pay when they are supposed to pay it. 
 
 Former Texas state representative Glen Maxey wrote: 
 
 In the 2017 Legislative Session, a majority of your state lawmakers changed the laws which help property owners recover losses after a storm like Harvey and hampered your ability to hold your insurance company accountable if they slow pay, low pay, or no pay. Well, the new law goes into effect SEPTEMBER 1!! This law will make it harder for you to get the insurance companies to pay what they are supposed to pay when they are supposed to pay it. 
 
 And on 29 August, Rep. Joaquín Castro encouraged Texans affected by Tropical Storm Harvey to file their claims before 1 September: 
 
 Texans: be sure to file for #Harvey relief before Sept 1. #TXlege passed a bill making it harder to dispute weather-related property claims. — Joaquin Castro (@JoaquinCastrotx) August 28, 2017 
 
 Texas House Bill 1774 does indeed introduce changes to the way property damage insurance claims are dealt with in the state, but only in the event of a litigated dispute over a claim. Most insurance claims are settled out of court, and so the potential benefit in filing a claim before 1 September 2017 (which is itself marginal) will likely not apply in most cases. 
 
 The real benefit would be in filing a lawsuit before 1 September, but for obvious practical reasons, it is extremely unlikely that someone whose home has been destroyed or extensively damaged days earlier, would be in a position to do this. 
 
 The law was signed by Governor Greg Abbott on 26 May 2017. 
 
 What the law changes 
 
 The first major provision in the law is that an individual or business filing a lawsuit in relation to a weather-related property damage insurance claim (including flood damage) will have to give their insurance company 61 days’ notice before initiating litigation. 
 
 According to an analysis published by the independent House Research Organization in the Texas House of Representatives: 
 
 [The law] would require an insured [person] making a claim against an insurer or agent relating to damage to real property caused by an earthquake, earth tremor, wildfire, flood, tornado, lightning, hurricane, hail, wind, snowstorm, or rainstorm to provide written notice to the insurer at least 61 days before filing the claim. This pre-suit notice would have to provide a statement of the acts giving rise to the claim, the specific amount alleged to be owed, and amount of reasonable and necessary attorney’s fees already incurred by the claimant. This notice would be admissible as evidence in a civil action or alternative dispute resolution. 
 
 The second major provision in HB 1774 is that it imposes a claim recovery threshold in order for individuals to recover the full amount of their attorney’s fees, if they decide to go to court. If, in the event of a lawsuit, a jury decides to award a plaintiff 80 percent or more of the amount they are claiming, then all that individual’s attorney’s fees will be covered. If a jury decides to award 20 percent or less, none of their attorney’s fees are covered: 
 
 The bill would require the court to award the full amount of reasonable and necessary attorney’s fees if the amount to be awarded in the judgment divided by the amount alleged to be owed was at least 0.8, not limited by statute, and recoverable. The court would be prohibited from awarding attorney’s fees if this fraction was less than 0.2, or if the claimant failed to provide pre-suit notice. 
 
 We consulted two experts on insurance: Etti Baranoff, an associate professor of finance at Virginia Commonwealth University and a former regulator at the Texas Department of Insurance, and Dalit Baranoff, a historian of insurance policy who runs the Risks and Consequences blog. 
 
 They told us the bill is designed to discourage consumers from taking a claim to court and filing exaggerated claims, but otherwise doesn’t change the process of settling claims out of court. 
 
 HB 1774 should not have any effect on homeowners’ ability to recover claims from insurers. The law has nothing to do with payment of insurance claims. It only applies if a lawsuit is involved. The vast majority of insurance claims will be settled without any dispute. Where it does come into play, is if a policyholder disagrees with an insurance settlement, in which case litigation is still an option. 
 
 This is where the 61-day waiting period comes into play, which the Baranoffs say is “meant to encourage mediation and out-of-court settlement”, and the 80/20 rule in the new law will make it harder for people to recoup their legal costs if they decide to sue. The reasoning behind this, according to the Baranoffs, is to discourage inflated or exaggerated claims, since claimants will be less likely to be awarded 80 percent or more of a relatively large claim and are therefore more likely to have to pay some attorney’s fees if they do. 
 
 Indeed, the stated purpose of HB 1774 was to stop a historic increase in the number of hailstorm-related property damage insurance claims, something the bill’s sponsor State Representative Greg Bonnen called “the worst lawsuit abuse we have in the state” (Relevant portion begins at 3:50). 
 
 Tanya Pierce, Associate Professor of Law at Texas A&M University, previously practiced in the area of complex litigation and insurance coverage. She told us there is only one potential benefit to homeowners in filing a written claim before 1 September 2017: 
 
 [Filing a written claim with the insurance company before 1 September] protects them from a small provision of the act that limits the insurance company’s liability on the interest that they would have had to pay as additional damages. 
 
 Again, however, this benefit only accrues if the homeowner later decides to sue the insurance company. 
 
 Under current law, Pierce says, an insurance company would have to pay 18 percent interest on whatever they owed in the event that a consumer successfully sues them for a delayed payment. Under the new law, she points out, companies would have to pay a lower rate of interest arrived at by adding 5 percent to the interest rate determined under Sec. 304.003, Financial Code (Sec. 2c). 
 
 So there is a potential benefit in filing a claim before 1 September 2017, but only if you then later file a successful lawsuit in the event of a dispute over your payment. 
 
 Conclusion 
 
 The new law will not have a direct effect on insurance claims that are settled out of court, and most insurance claims are settled out of court. However, the law could make it slower and more difficult for homeowners to get paid what they believe they are owed if they start litigation after 1 September 2017. It will also make suing insurance companies more financially risky. 
 
 If a consumer were to file a lawsuit against their insurance company before 1 September, they could experience a significant benefit from having done so. However, if their home has been extensively damaged just before 1 September 2017 (by historically catastrophic flooding, for example), it is extremely unlikely they would be able, practically speaking, to find and hire an attorney and file a suit before 1 September. 
 
 They would also have to have a reasonable basis to sue — a dispute over their claim, or an insurance company’s refusal to pay, for example — a process that there simply wasn’t time for between the arrival of Tropical Storm Harvey on 26 August and the enactment of the new law on 1 September. 
 
 The only potential benefit from filing a claim before 1 September is that if someone later decides to sue the insurance company and wins, the company will be obliged to pay them the higher, pre-September rate of interest on what they owe. 
 
 The claims contained in viral Facebook posts on 27 August 2017 are a largely accurate description of the provisions of HB 1774, but they do lack important context and do not make it clear to readers that the law only affects how claims are dealt with in the event that someone decides to sue an insurance company. These posts do not include that most insurance claims are settled out of court, and will therefore not be directly affected by the change in the law. ||||| Updated at 12:50 p.m.: Revised to include comment from Sen. Kelly Hancock, sponsor of the insurance legislation. 
 
 AUSTIN — Even as Harvey's devastating deluge continues to inundate Texans' homes, lawyers are urging waterlogged homeowners to file insurance claims by Thursday to avoid losing out on important rights that lawmakers limited during the legislative session this year. 
 
 "It's a David vs. Goliath battle from the start," said Dallas lawyer Brian Lauten. "They have basically taken away David's slingshot." 
 
 Starting Sept. 1, House Bill 1774 becomes law in Texas, a measure that advocates for insurance companies say was designed to limit lawsuit abuses while preserving protections for homeowners. ||||| A home is surrounded by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Harvey on Monday, Aug. 28, 2017, in Spring, Texas. Homeowners suffering from Harvey flood damage are more likely to be on the hook for losses than... (Associated Press) 
 
 A home is surrounded by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Harvey on Monday, Aug. 28, 2017, in Spring, Texas. Homeowners suffering from Harvey flood damage are more likely to be on the hook for losses than victims of prior storms, a potentially crushing blow to personal finances and neighborhoods along... (Associated Press) 
 
 NEW YORK (AP) — Homeowners suffering flood damage from Harvey are more likely to be on the hook for losses than victims of prior storms — a potentially crushing blow to personal finances and neighborhoods along the Gulf Coast. 
 
 Insurance experts say only a small fraction of homeowners in Harvey's path of destruction have flood insurance. That means families with flooded basements, soaked furniture and water-damaged walls will have to dig deep into their pockets or take on more debt to fix up their homes. Some may be forced to sell, if they can, and leave their communities. 
 
 "All these people taken out in boats, they have a second problem: They have no insurance," said Robert Hunter, director of insurance at the Consumer Federation of America who used to run a federal flood insurance program. 
 
 Hunter estimates that total out-of-pocket costs for flooded homeowners could reach $28 billion, the largest in U.S. history. 
 
 Harvey made landfall in Texas late Friday as a Category 4 hurricane and has lingered off the coast, dropping heavy rain as a tropical storm. Hunter expects flood damage alone from the storm to cost at least $35 billion, about what Katrina cost. But in that 2005 hurricane about half of flooded homes were covered by flood insurance. 
 
 With Harvey, only two of 10 homeowners have coverage, Hunter estimates. 
 
 Homeowners insurance typically covers just damage from winds, not floods. For that, you need separate coverage from the federally run National Flood Insurance Program. The insurance must be bought by homeowners with federally-backed mortgages living in the most vulnerable areas, called Special Flood Hazard Zones. 
 
 People in those areas and near them have complained for years that the premiums are too high, though they would be much higher still if not subsidized by the federal government. 
 
 Much of the Houston area falls outside those most vulnerable zones and many homeowners who aren't forced to have coverage have decided to do without. Now they are stuck because much of the damage in the nation's fourth largest city won't be covered by their homeowners insurance. 
 
 Unlike Corpus Christi and Rockport, much of the Houston area was damaged by flooding, not winds. 
 
 "There's going to be a huge uninsured economic loss here," said Pete Mills, a senior vice president at the Mortgage Bankers Association. 
 
 About 1.2 million properties in the Houston-Sugarland-Baytown area are at high/moderate risk of flooding but are not in a designated flood zone requiring insurance, research firm CoreLogic estimates. That's roughly half of all properties — residential and commercial — in that area. 
 
 Hunter of the CFA said that homeowners without flood insurance can possibly apply for federal disaster relief benefits, but those come in the form of low interest loans, a burden for those already struggling with too much debt. 
 
 "If you have $30,000 in damages, you can get maybe $25,000," Hunter said. "But there will be interest, and then you have your mortgage. You'll have two loans on your house." 
 
 Homeowners with water damage can get paid through their homeowners insurance but only if wind blows out a window or sends a roof aloft first, allowing the water in. If the water rushes through the floorboard or walls, you're not covered. 
 
 Harvey has dumped more than 30 inches of rain in some places, and rivers are swelling and expected to crest at record levels. The Cypress River, which runs through downtown Houston, is expected to rise four feet higher than the record 94.3 feet set in 1949, according to Air Worldwide, a risk modeling firm. 
 
 Hunter said that adjusters typically take about 30 days to visit your home and send a check, but the crucial distinction between wind damage and flood damage can be tricky and take longer. Fights in court with insurers over wind-versus-storm damage stretched out for years after Superstorm Sandy in 2012. 
 
 Sandy resulted in $8.4 billion in payouts for flood damage from the federal insurance program, according to the Insurance Information Institute. After Katrina in 2005, the program paid $16 billion for flood damage. 
 
 The flood program is run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which owes the Treasury about $23 billion in funds borrowed to cover the cost of past disasters, according to a recent report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office. 
 
 For homeowners facing big bills, some banks may be willing to help. During a disaster like Harvey, they typically will institute a type of forbearance program on any borrowers who are in the disaster's impacted counties. 
 
 Wells Fargo, the nation's largest mortgage lender, said Monday that it was suspending all negative reporting to credit bureaus, collection calls and foreclosure procedures against customers in the impacted communities at least through the end of September. 
 
 Customers who contact Wells Fargo can get disaster relief for 60 to 90 days, and can postpone payments. Further relief will be offered case-by-case, the bank said. 
 
 Loretta Worters, a spokesperson for the Insurance Information Institute, said floods do have a least one positive effect: They convince people who had shrugged off the risk to their homes to buy policies. 
 
 But the memory quickly fades, she added, noting that despite the blows of Katrina and Sandy and other storms only 12 percent of homeowners nationwide had flood insurance last year. 
 
 "People buy coverage immediately after a storm, then it starts to drop," Worters said. "Three or four years later, we're back to where we started." ||||| Tens of thousands of people have been displaced in Houston, Texas alone by Hurricane Harvey. The long-term damage from the catastrophic flooding engulfing the US’s Gulf Coast is expected to cost companies, small businesses, and homeowners as much as $100 billion, according to Imperial Capital. The insurance industry alone may pay out $10-$20 billion, JP Morgan estimates. 
 
 While big corporations will probably survive the hit, many individual homeowners in Houston could be forced into debt or bankruptcy because they don’t have flood insurance. That’s despite the fact that scientists have been warning for years that unchecked development and climate change could cause severe flooding in Houston. 
 
 As of August 2016, just 15% of the 1.6 million homes in Harris County, where Houston is located, had flood insurance, according to emailed data from the Insurance Information Institute, and only 28% of the homes in “high-risk” areas for flooding. 
 
 That’s because only US homeowners in the “100-year floodplain”—areas that have a 1% chance of flooding in any given year—have to buy flood insurance, and then only if they’re taking out a federal mortgage loan or their private lender specifically requires it. This flood insurance in the US is mostly handled by an outdated, heavily debt-laden government scheme, the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). The NFIP’s data determining which zones are flood zones can be years, or even decades, out of date (pdf, p. 3). Climate change has exacerbated the problem, making storms potentially more destructive and raising sea levels along the Texas coast. 
 
 The end result is that many Houston homeowners outside the 100-year floodplain have been flooded several times in just the last few years, and most city homeowners don’t have flood insurance now. More than 50% of Houston’s homes in “high” and “moderate” flood risk areas are not in designated flood zones, according to CoreLogic, a property information company. 
 
 “There are some early indications that this is going to have an exceptionally large impact on the number of people who are totally uninsured,” says Howard Mills, the global insurance regulatory leaders at consulting and accounting firm Deloitte. 
 
 “Those folks will be eligible to receive small amounts of disaster assistance, but it won’t be enough to rebuild their home or help them move somewhere safe, or elevate their home,” said Rob Moore, a senior policy analyst on water issues for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “These people are in a situation that no one wants to find themselves in.” 
 
 While consumer groups and news outlets in Texas have recommended that homeowners buy flood insurance in recent years, not many have. People may not know they don’t have it, or may have decided it’s just too expensive, says Sam Friedman, the insurance research leader for the Deloitte Center for Financial Services. “They don’t want to make the investment,” he said, and they rationalize that a major flood is unlikely to happen to them. 
 
 While Harvey may make some of them reconsider, there’s no such thing as retroactive insurance. Meanwhile, The Trump administration’s proposed budget would cut $190 million from the flood insurance program—specifically, from the funds allocated for updating those old flooding maps. That means people are likely to keep on building where they’re at risk of flooding, and not buying insurance. ||||| In this photo provided by Jiles Daniels, his flooded home near Cleveland, Texas, northeast of Houston. Daniels, a retired oil company manager, never wavered when he bought flood insurance on both his... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo provided by Jiles Daniels, his flooded home near Cleveland, Texas, northeast of Houston. Daniels, a retired oil company manager, never wavered when he bought flood insurance on both his homes: one in Houston and another on an island near Cleveland, northeast of Houston. (Jiles Daniels... (Associated Press) 
 
 WASHINGTON (AP) — Houston's population is growing quickly, but when Harvey hit last weekend there were far fewer homes and other properties in the area with flood insurance than just five years ago, according to an Associated Press investigation. 
 
 The sharp, 9 percent drop in coverage means many residents fleeing Harvey's floodwaters have no financial backup to fix up their homes and will have to draw on savings or go into debt — or perhaps be forced to sell. 
 
 Houston's Harris County has 25,000 fewer flood-insured properties than it did in 2012, according to the AP's review of Federal Emergency Management Agency data. 
 
 In percentage terms, the drop was even more dramatic in certain sections of the county: In Pasadena, just southeast of Houston, policies were down nearly 20 percent. Baytown, east of Houston, saw a 22 percent drop. 
 
 A former head of the federal flood insurance program called the drops "unbelievable," and criticized FEMA, the agency overseeing the program. 
 
 "When you start to see policies drop like this, FEMA should have done something about this," said Robert Hunter, who ran the program in the late '70s. He estimates that fewer than two of 10 homeowners with flood damage have flood insurance. 
 
 FEMA's director, Brock Long, told the AP on Wednesday he was uncertain what was driving the drop in insurance coverage in Houston. He said storm victims who have lost their homes and are uninsured could seek assistance through the Small Business Administration, which offers loans. 
 
 Experts point to a mix of reasons for Houston area residents deciding to drop coverage, but said a lack of fear was a big one. The last big flood, Tropical Storm Allison, was 16 years ago, and people stopped worrying and wanted money they would have spent for insurance premiums for other items. The average cost for premiums in Harris County increased from $514 per year in 2012 to $555 annually this year, an increase of 8 percent, according to FEMA data. 
 
 "Allison was a once-in-500-year flood," said Texas A&M University economist James P. Gaines. "We weren't supposed to have another one." 
 
 Jesse Trubia, president of a metal fabrication company, decided to pass on flood insurance when he moved to his two-story home on the outskirts of Houston several years ago. That decision will now cost him up to $30,000, he estimated. 
 
 Up to one foot of water seeped into his home in Cypress, he judges from a neighbor's report, ruining furniture, plasterboard, paint, carpets and wooden flooring. 
 
 He said a real estate agent and title insurance company had given him the impression he did not need flood insurance, because his home wasn't in a flood plain. 
 
 "Of course, you have that gut-wrenching feeling now, but at the time I'm talking to people who live in the neighborhood 10 or 15 years, and they say they've never seen water in the street," he said by phone from a Dallas hotel, where he had fled with his wife and two children. 
 
 Loretta Worters, a spokesperson for the insurance industry's Insurance Information Institute, said she was not surprised at the drop in flood policies in the Houston area. She said polling performed for her group showed that only 12 percent of American homeowners in flood-prone areas were insured against flooding in 2016, down from 14 percent in 2015. 
 
 "There's a naivety on the part of people. A lot of people think it's not going to happen to them," she said. 
 
 Several Houston-area homeowners and insurance experts also attributed the decreased coverage to tight family finances in recent years due to the drop in oil prices and the region's reliance on that industry. 
 
 "The price of oil has gone up and down like a yo-yo, and with those ups and downs come a lot of jobs lost over the years," said Mark Hanna, a spokesman for the trade group Insurance Council of Texas. "A lot of it has to do with what comes first: flood insurance or food on the table." 
 
 In total, Harris County residents were paying premiums on nearly 250,000 flood insurance policies in June, down from almost 275,000 policies at the end of 2012. There were roughly 1.75 million housing units in Harris County, but that includes apartment and condominium buildings, making it an imperfect figure to try to calculate what overall percentage of families are covered by flood insurance. 
 
 The number of policies in Houston itself fell from 133,000 to 119,000, an 11 percent drop — roughly in line with the trend nationally. Over the same period, the number of flood policies across the country dropped 10 percent, to 4.9 million. 
 
 Jiles Daniels, a retired oil company manager, never wavered when he bought flood insurance on both his homes: one in Houston and another on an island near Cleveland, northeast of Houston. The cost is considerable: about $1,800 a year in premiums for the two houses combined. 
 
 But he thinks it's worth it: The lower level of his island house went about four feet under water, he estimates, though his city home had been spared so far. "I've been living here since the mid-'70s, and I've seen the floods," he said in a phone interview from an upper floor of his island house. "I don't care where I am: I'm getting flood insurance." 
 
 FEMA has been criticized for years for not doing more to get people to buy flood insurance. The agency underwrites the policies but farms out the task of pitching them to homeowners to private insurers. The idea was that the private sector would do a better job of getting people to sign up, but that does not appear to be the case. 
 
 A report last year by the Homeland Security Department's internal watchdog office criticized FEMA for "not providing adequate oversight" of the private sector marketing efforts. It also slammed FEMA for leaving the federal flood insurance program — called the National Flood Insurance Program — at "risk for fraud, waste, abuse, or mismanagement." 
 
 Under current rules, most homeowners with mortgages living in high risk areas for flooding, called Special Flood Hazard Zones, must buy flood insurance. 
 
 Most of the Houston area falls outside those most vulnerable zones, and many homeowners who aren't forced to have coverage have decided to do without. 
 
 According to the Harris County Flood Control District, 65 percent of the land that flooded during Tropical Storm Allison in 2001 was not in a designated flood plain. The county has since redrawn its flood risk maps several times, notably in 2007, with smaller changes in 2014 and then early this year. 
 
 One problem with the maps highlighted by Tropical Storm Harvey: They don't take into account the risk of flooding from overcapacity drainage sewers and ditches or from water flowing toward a sewer or bayou. More than half of the flooding in Harris County over the years has been due to such problems, according to the Harris County Flood Control District. 
 
 "Nobody's buying flood insurance outside the federal flood risk areas, particularly where we're talking about storm water flooding," said Carolyn Kousky, an expert in natural disaster insurance at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. She added that even people who figure they should have insurance just to be safe, usually put it off and then never get around to buying it. 
 
 For Ronnie Walsh, 45, flood insurance was out of the question. He was laid off from a factory job in June and even before that money was tight. 
 
 "That's just another bill I can't afford," he said. 
 
 On Monday, Walsh was evacuated from his east Houston home by rescuers in helicopters after water started seeping into the house. He and his two sons, ages 4 and 6, had just a few bags of belongings with them when they arrived at a downtown convention center. They spent the night on flattened boxes, wondering how much damage their house sustained. 
 
 He fears everything is gone. 
 
 "At a time like this you can't really worry about TVs, entertainment centers, things like that," Walsh said. "You just have to survive." 
 
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 Condon and Sweet reported from New York, and Donn from Plymouth, Massachusetts. AP National Writer Matt Sedensky in Houston and staff writer Michael Biesecker in Washington contributed to this reporting. ||||| NEW YORK -- Texas Gov. Greg Abbott downplayed the effects of a bill that goes into effect Friday that will make it more complicated for people to sue their property insurance companies in a dispute. 
 
 The law limits how much insurers must pay when they are sued, and adds another step necessary for a lawsuit to take place. Some consumer advocates and even a Democratic congressman have urged Texans to file their claims before Friday, when the law goes into effect. Rep. Joaquin Castro, who represents San Antonio, has said the state legislature should reconvene to delay the law. 
 
 In an interview with CBSN's Elaine Quijano, Abbott sidestepped the question of whether the law should be delayed to allow concerned homeowners more time to file. 
 
 Gov. Greg Abbott CBS News 
 
 "You signed a bill this year that reduces the penalties insurance companies face for delayed payments," Quijano asked. "Now the law affects claims made after Friday and some homeowners are concerned that it's going to be harder for them to get insurance payments after this storm. Should the implementation be delayed?" 
 
 "That law has no effect whatsoever of these types of claims," Abbott answered. "Every valid claim is going to be paid regardless of when it will be filed. So no one should have any concern whatsoever about that." 
 
 Asked if people should be urged to file before Friday to avoid delays, Abbott answered with a firm no. 
 
 "No one should be concerned about that," he said. "All the concerns raised about that are bogus and no one needs to be concerned about that. All valid claims whenever they're filed will be paid." 
 
 However, the law in question, House Bill 1774, does add a hurdle for policyholders who believe their insurance companies are being slow to settle a claim, or whose claims are denied altogether. 
 
 The law requires an insurance company to receive written notice before a policyholder files a lawsuit, and for the company to have a chance to inspect the property in question. It also sharply reduces the compensation plaintiffs' lawyers can get in cases where their clients are awarded less money than they were seeking. 
 
 Supporters of the law claim that it weeds out frivolous lawsuits, but consumer advocates are concerned it will make it harder for homeowners to get legal representation when they argue with their insurer. 
 
 Texas has faced unprecedented amounts of flooding due to the storm. Hundreds of thousands of homes have been destroyed, Abbott said, and the sheer magnitude of the disaster is not yet known. Harvey is already expected to be one of the costliest storms in U.S. history.
– The math isn't pretty: An official in Harris County, Texas, estimated Wednesday that Harvey has destroyed up to 40,000 homes in the Houston area, reports ABC News. Countless others have lesser damage. Now balance those figures with another: Only 2 in 10 homeowners in the hardest-hit areas have flood insurance, according to a Washington Post analysis. It's all adding up to a devastating financial toll for homeowners. Details: $555 a year: The average annual premium for flood insurance in Harris County is $555 this year, and the AP reports that more and more homeowners had opted to skip it. The percentage of those covered dropped 9% in Harris County alone over the last five years, and the plummet is even greater in certain parts of the county. One critic blames FEMA for not urging homeowners to recognize the need. Out $30,000: One homeowner on the outskirts of Houston figured he was safe without flood insurance when he moved in several years ago, because he wasn't in a flood plain and neighbors couldn't ever remember seeing water in the street. He tells the AP that the decision will now cost him about $30,000. The rules: Only those who live in a designated "100-year floodplain" and who have a federally backed mortgage (or a stricter private lender) are required to get flood insurance through the National Flood Insurance Program, explains Quartz. (The post adds that the data the government uses to designate flood zones can be years out of date.) It's people outside such zones who are out of luck if they gambled on skipping—or perhaps mistakenly thought they were covered. A loophole: Normal home insurance covers wind damage. Therefore, those without flood insurance might be able to collect if they can show that their home sustained water damage after the roof was blown off or windows blown out, per a separate AP story. Ominous quote: "There are some early indications that this is going to have an exceptionally large impact on the number of people who are totally uninsured," says an insurance expert at accounting firm Deloitte, per Quartz. These people can get some federal relief, perhaps through low-interest loans, but a second loan on top of the mortgage might not be a feasible option for many homeowners. A new law: A law that goes into effect on Friday across Texas makes it more difficult for homeowners to sue insurers in a dispute, reports CBS News. Gov. Greg Abbott says it's no cause for concern for homeowners with valid claims, though the Dallas Morning News reports that attorneys are urging people to get their claims in before Friday. Snopes has more details on House Bill 1774, noting that some wild claims now circulating on social media about the measure are lacking context.