<P> On December 11, 2012, the Legislative Assembly of Puerto Rico enacted a concurrent resolution requesting the President and the Congress of the United States to respond to the referendum of the people of Puerto Rico, held on November 6, 2012, to end its current form of territorial status and to begin the process to admit Puerto Rico as a State . The initiative has not made Puerto Rico into a state . </P> <P> In late September 2017, Hurricane Maria hit the island as a Category 4 storm causing severe damage to homes, other buildings and infrastructure . The recovery as of late November was slow but progress had been made . Electricity was restored to two - thirds of the island, although there was some doubt as to the number of residents getting reliable power . In January 2018, it was reported that close to 40 percent of the island's customers still did not have electricity . The vast majority had access to water but were still required to boil it . The number still living in shelters had dropped to 982 with thousands of others living with relatives . The official death toll at the time was 58 but some sources indicated that the actual number is much higher . A dam on the island was close to failure and officials were concerned about additional flooding from this source . </P> <P> Thousands had left Puerto Rico, with close to 200,000 having arrived in Florida alone . Those who were then living on the mainland experienced difficulty in getting health care benefits . A The New York Times report on November 27 said it was understandable that Puerto Ricans wanted to leave the island . "Basic essentials are hard to find and electricity and other utilities are unreliable or entirely inaccessible . Much of the population has been unable to return to jobs or to school and access to health care has been severely limited ." The Center for Puerto Rican Studies at New York's Hunter College estimated that some half million people, about 14% of the population, may permanently leave by 2019 . </P> <P> The total damage on the island was estimated as up to $95 billion . By the end of November, FEMA had received over a million applications for aid and had approved about a quarter of those . The US government had agreed in October to provide funding to rebuild and up to $4.9 billion in loans to help the island's government . FEMA had $464 million earmarked to help local governments rebuild public buildings and infrastructure . Bills for other funding were being considered in Washington but little progress had been made on those . </P>

1. as a commonwealth of the united states puerto rico has strong ties to the united states and is