The president has approved a federal disaster declaration for 22 counties impacted by severe weather in June and July. The governor sent the request for a declaration on July 29th for damage caused by severe weather that produced damaging winds, tornadoes, heavy rains, hail, and thunderstorms June 26 through July 7th.
The declaration includes: Audubon, Black Hawk, Butler, Cedar, Des Moines, Grundy, Hamilton, Hardin, Ida, Iowa, Jackson, Jasper, Johnson, Jones, Keokuk, Lee, Linn, Mahaska, Muscatine, Poweshiek, Tama, and Washington counties.
The declaration allows the counties to receive federal funding to help with the recovery for public areas and selected non-profits. This is Iowa’s third Presidential Disaster Declaration in 2014. The two other federal disaster declarations covered 35 counties.