Community Becomes Lifeline One Year After Helene in Western North Carolina

One year after Hurricane Helene slammed the Swannanoa Valley in the mountains of Western North Carolina, residents recount how the floodwaters upended daily life and stretched into weeks without power and months without potable water. The disaster damaged homes, knocked out roads and bridges, and left communities to improvise shelter, food, and sanitation. The toll was tangible: a former student was lost to the floods, and a friend was hurt when a landslide slammed into her house. In a region where climate risks are rising, the episode underscored how recovery hinges on local networks and the everyday work of neighbors helping neighbors.

A few days after the flood, the campus felt like a makeshift operations hub. A college president spoke to students, staff, and residents from a generator-powered conference room in the campus cafeteria, promising that the campus would work with the wider community. “The interstates are closed and bridges are out,” the president said. “But we’re going to take care of each other and the community.” From that moment, daily morning meetings formed a coordinated cadence: updates from command central, road-clearing assignments, and menus for volunteers. The routine was more than logistics; it was a symbolic commitment to sustain the community through a period of upheaval.

As access opened, the scope of relief widened. Volunteers from within and beyond the campus organized to repair critical infrastructure and support vulnerable residents. Some neighbors who could not leave their homes were helped by small, improvised teams; a retired electrician located a well that allowed crews to haul non-potable water to flush toilets and maintain basic sanitation. Nearby World Central Kitchen prepared meals in Beacon Village, while residents in kayaks rescued people from rooftops, illustrating how improvisation and solidarity stretched across social and logistical lines. The broader effort also spurred new local organizations, such as Swannanoa Communities Together, which advocated for rental and move-in assistance amid a dire shortage of affordable housing for people displaced by the floods.

For more than 50 days after Helene, the community waited for potable water to return. In the months that followed, recovery work shifted from immediate relief to longer-term stabilization. Crews began to stabilize eroded riverbanks by planting 18,000 cuttings of willows, dogwoods and other native species—a low-cost practice known as livestaking that helped reduce further erosion and protect waterways important to the local economy and environment. Students contributed by clearing tree limbs from roads and assisting with fencing and other repairs around flood-damaged lands. Maeve Williams, one of the advisees who helped organize the effort, helped spearhead a tiny-house project and donated the unit to Beloved Asheville, a grassroots organization aiding those displaced by the disaster. Williams described the effect of the effort this way: “Community is like a network of people who show up for each other… We had students, retirees, local tradespeople, churchgoers, and facilities staff working together on the tiny house. These were people you wouldn’t expect to be in the same place, but they shared their skills and stories for a greater cause.”

In late spring, an outreach from a Unitarian Universalist congregation brought an unexpected dimension to recovery: a campus field trip to assess the land and recovery on the farm. The storm dumped four feet of silt across agricultural fields, and a student named Shoshana Caldas led the project, which began with attending UU services and connected climate justice ideals to hands-on work. Caldas recalled that the invitation opened doors that might not have otherwise existed: “Without the invitation from them, we wouldn’t have had this connection,” she said. “I couldn’t believe how interested they were in our work on the farm and garden.” The field work complemented ongoing efforts to restore streams and protect soil health, while reinforcing a broader sense that climate resilience is built through collaboration across generations and faith communities.

Experts acknowledge that this kind of local resilience does not happen by accident. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson notes that a majority of Americans feel a personal responsibility to help reduce global warming, yet many do not know where to begin. The message that emerges from Swannanoa is that resilience starts with relationships—getting to know one’s neighbors, sharing resources, and learning together how to respond to climate threats. “Resilience starts with relationships and how we treat and trust each other,” Williams reminded her peers.

The longer arc of recovery is now taking shape. The community planning process around rebuilding emphasizes a timeline of roughly ten years, a sobering reminder that adaptation and renewal extend beyond immediate relief. Disaster experts, including Samantha Montano, advocate practical steps for residents: contacting Congressional representatives to restore funding for FEMA, signing up for emergency alerts, and advocating for stronger local emergency management resources. In parallel, writers like Rebecca Solnit have explored the social solidarity that disasters can unleash, even as they highlight the broader climate risks that drive such events. The aim is not to celebrate a disaster, but to identify concrete ways communities can strengthen social infrastructure—neighborhood networks, volunteer leadership, and cross-cutting collaborations—that make rebuilding more resilient in the face of a changing climate.

As Helene’s anniversary arrives, the Swannanoa Valley is not just measuring damage but surveying the rebuilding of relationships, facilities, and landscapes. If the headlines continue to emphasize the economic costs and policy debates surrounding climate change, residents say the day-to-day work of neighbors helping neighbors offers a different narrative: resilience rooted in community, built through shared labor, education, and faith.

In Marshall and across the region, the reopening of small businesses, observations of new trees planted along riverbanks, and the ongoing conversations about housing and land use signal a community trying to balance recovery with climate adaptability. The band played on a rainy afternoon under a tent near a bike shop and coffee house rebuilt after storms, a scene that echoed the broader mood: progress is possible when people come together across different backgrounds to care for one another. As Maeve Williams put it, “Resilience starts with relationships and how we treat and trust each other.”