Trailer Dispute May Mean Thousands Will Go Unused NY Times 2/14/06

[Coastie for Truth]

Mobile homes worth hundreds of millions of dollars are deteriorating in a muddy field in Arkansas and may never be used to house victims of Hurricane Katrina because of a dispute over where to install them, federal officials acknowledged Monday.

Only about 2,700 of the 25,000 mobile homes ordered at a cost of $850 million have been installed, and at least 10,000 are sitting in Hope, Ark., according to documents and statements from Federal Emergency Management Agency officials. Though about 55,000 Louisiana families are still waiting for a manufactured housing unit, the mobile homes may never be used because FEMA regulations prohibit them from being installed in flood-prone coastal areas, federal officials said.

Members of a Senate committee investigating the response to Hurricane Katrina called the mobile home episode an appalling example of government stumbling.

<<<snip>>>

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, FEMA ordered far too many mobile homes and too few travel trailers, which are smaller, less expensive and more portable, and can be placed on lots in the disaster zone. The federal government had expected that Louisiana officials would identify sites inland where the mobile homes could be placed. But so far, with just a few exceptions, they has not done so, officials said.

[Wordie]

1. K&R Chertoff's got some explaining to do.

[emc]

2. not quite sure !!!!

I have read the story about mobile homes stored in Hope AR----and now reading your comments ---as far as I know these are travel trailers----I live right off of Interstate 10 in NM and all I have seen for many months are thousands of Katrina travel trailers going east ---have even looked in a few----so I dont understand the comments about cant be moved---I understand that its about flooding and no one wants huge trailer ghetto's set up----its the same old question, no one wants a land fill in his back yard or a nuclear energy plant next door----its a question of failure of policy and government to step in and take over when it should----now as usual, these trailers will either rot in this field or be sold for pennies on the dollar...

[mom cat]

3. Of course! ... FEMA again! ... And isn't it convenient that if people

want to place those trailers, they won't be able to do it on their own property! That is in the restricted zone! And if someonw wants to use the trailors, they will have to BUY land elsewhere. And we know the survivors are all rolling in dough! :sarcasm: