Houston-area victims may sue the federal government because the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers flooded their homes and businesses inside the Addicks and Barker reservoirs during Hurricane Harvey in 2017 in the belief that doing so would prevent worse flooding elsewhere, a federal judge ruled.
Hurricane Harvey covered the region in more than 33 inches of rain over four days, leading to catastrophic flooding that affected upward of 150,000 homes. Property owners filed lawsuits asserting that the flooding constituted a “taking” requiring “just compensation” under the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
