NYT: (After a year) Hurricane Katrina Aid Flowing Directly to Homeowners

[DeepModem Mom]

Hurricane Aid Flowing Directly to Homeowners
By LESLIE EATON
Published: July 17, 2006

Nearly $10 billion in federal aid is finally starting to flow into the hands of people in Mississippi and Louisiana who lost their houses in last year’s hurricanes, the culmination of a year of political battling and bargaining between the states and Washington.

The money is widely considered the most important single factor in rebuilding the still-ruined landscapes of New Orleans and the other devastated Gulf areas of the two states. With it will come a test of what experts say is an unprecedented government effort to foster recovery from a natural disaster by giving taxpayer dollars directly to homeowners and allowing them to decide whether and where to rebuild or relocate.

“Our belief is that this has never been done in this country, and certainly not on this scale,” said Walter J. Leger Jr., a New Orleans lawyer who is the chairman of the housing task force for the Louisiana Recovery Authority, which developed the Road Home, as the state’s housing program is known. “This may be the biggest redevelopment effort in history.”

Outside experts agree that the level of direct assistance to individual homeowners is unprecedented. “This is a dramatic shift in government policy,” said Mary C. Comerio, a professor of architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, who has studied housing after disasters.

In Mississippi, the first round of up to $3 billion in checks should be in the mail within days, officials said, while Louisiana has just opened the first of 10 offices where homeowners will be walked through the process of applying for more than $6 billion in aid. Money is likely to start flowing in Louisiana late next month, officials there say....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/17/us/17rebuild.html

[partylessinOhio]

1. Our national failure thanks to BushCo

"Money is likely to start flowing in Louisiana late next month"

Still TOO long!

[yankeeinlouisiana]

2. That was my first thought too.

People down here have been waiting waaaay to long for recovery. But at least it is coming now.

[uppityperson]

3. 2 more bits from article, about what money is for

In Mississippi, the focus is on compensating owners of damaged homes who did not have flood insurance because they were not in a flood zone. Once they have satisfied any liens or mortgage arrears, they can use the money almost entirely as they see fit. Though homeowners do not have to rebuild, state officials expect most to do so....


Louisiana’s leaders had a different goal in preparing their program, and were less focused on compensating homeowners than in rebuilding the state. Many Louisiana residents are still living in other states, debating whether to return, a problem Mississippi does not have. With far more damaged homes than Mississippi, but fewer that were wiped away outright, Louisiana wanted a program that would primarily induce homeowners to return to the state and begin rebuilding.

As a result, the state created a series of financial incentives to get them to do so. Those who sell and leave the state will get less money than those who stay and rebuild, though Louisiana will still give the full amount to those who return but build or buy elsewhere in the state. (Officials will not object if residents want to live in safer parts of the state.) And those who do stay can use the money for only one purpose....

[pitohui]

9. yes the program is dual pronged

but louisiana homeowners who lost everything and who choose not to return, such as the elderly friend i described in previous discussions, will still get 60% of the pre-katrina value of their home to start a new life in a safer location

officials will not object if residents want to live in safer parts of the state

that is very important, don't force people to return to low lying areas when they see a chance for a new life elsewhere

[quiet.american]

4. Just in time for elections. n/t

[Flirtus]

5. just in time for hurricane season n/t

[quiet.american]

6. Yep -- which is closer to election season than a year ago. n/t

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

7. Chill out!

Trent Lott MUST have a porch!

[pitohui]

10. trent lott not the only man cheated by his insurer

he is just the most famous man, but there is plenty of it going around in mississippi

[pitohui]

8. and not a moment too soon!

this is going to be a huge help here

in louisiana the "road home" people are already authorized to go after insurance companies who might try to shift people from collecting on their insurance -- if people not receiving their insurance turn to "road home" then "road home" will be able to proceed aga. the dilatory insurance company

esp. important here because MANY people in louisiana DID have flood insurance -- we have the highest level of compliance w. the nat'l flood insurance program of ANY state -- but insurance companies are trying to cheap out on people

this gets money into people's hands w.out letting insurance companies off the hook for what they owe

[KamaAina]

11. K-A: After a year, aid still not flowing to renters, or would-be landlords

At least half of New Orleans residents pre-K were renters, with a disproportinate number of renters being African American.

Barbara Sard, director of housing policy for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal research group based in Washington, said that while the state programs would help low-income homeowners in Louisiana and Mississippi, she was dismayed that the federal government had done so little for renters, who were the majority of New Orleans residents.

"The disproportion of the federal response strikes me as unbelievable," Ms. Sard said.

Louisiana is planning to use more than $1 billion of federal assistance to encourage the construction of new rental housing and the repair of apartments with low rents.

That last paragraph is the kicker. People may apply to repair their own homes, or apartments that they own, but not both. And in many older neighborhoods in New Orleans, the dominant building style is the "double shotgun", basically a duplex. Often a family will buy a double, live in one side, and rent out the other. Such families will be caught on the horns of a dilemma: do we fix our side, or the other side? Seeing as how every homeowner will qualify for the program, but landlords will be chosen by lottery, and that the award amounts are greater for homeowners, the answer is simple: We fix our side. And thus thousands of perfectly repairable rental units may go begging, in the midst of a rental crisis that has seen rents soar into four figures.

On the bright side, I have heard an eyewitness report frrom a NOLA-area DUer that people who are already rebuilding are generally doing both sides, thus avoiding a worst-case scenario of even "rebuilt" neighborhoods being nearly half-empty.

Solutions, anyone? One wonders if a rent-to-own program would qualify the renters as "homeowners" for the purpose of this program.