In Louisiana, nearly 6,500 subsidized apartments sit unrepaired

The Times-Picayune reports that more than three years after Hurricane Katrina, nearly 6,500 privately owned, federally-subsidized apartments sit unrepaired in the state of Louisiana. Most -- about 4,000 -- are in the New Orleans area.

In New Orleans, many of these apartments were built during the 1960s and 1970s, and were subsidized by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in a federal effort to create more low-income housing by giving private developers low-interest, federally insured loans. According to The Times-Picayune:

Before the storm, the apartments made up nearly 5 percent of the city's total rental stock and about 40 percent of the subsidized housing affordable to extremely low-income residents, according to PolicyLink, a nonprofit housing research organization.

HUD did not provide detailed data on the number or status of all the subsidized rental properties, but information the agency gave politicians, researchers and housing advocacy groups suggests that about 800 of the apartments have reopened while 4,000 remain closed.
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But it's difficult to be exact, because the information coming from HUD is incomplete and hard to get.

“It's like it's the biggest secret in the universe,” said Sen. Mary Landrieu, whose office has tried, unsuccessfully, to get detailed data from HUD about these properties.

Housing advocates are demanding that HUD take a more active role in reopening the affordable apartments, half of which were occupied by senior citizens, reports The Times-Picayune. Since HUD has yet to release a definitive plan that outlines which properties will reopen and which will not, and why, and since the properties are owned by a long list of private owners, it’s difficult to determine who's doing what, reports the Times-Picayune.

Facing South has reported on the affordable housing crisis facing many New Orleans residents. Hurricane Katrina damaged or destroyed nearly 52,000 rental units in the city and the homeless population has doubled to about 12,000 since the hurricane. The bureaucratic delays and the lack of progress on these private, federally-subsidized properties represent yet another a major barrier to rebuilding and providing housing for thousands of people in need.

Housing advocates underscore that instead of supplying affordable housing, some of the large apartment complexes now present a massive blight issue. Before Katrina, the subsidized apartments were a key strategy for housing the poor -- but without these rentals thousands of working poor, disabled and elderly people still live with relatives or struggle to pay steep post-Katrina rent.

Moreover, thousands of low-income households have been unable to return to HUD-assisted properties in New Orleans as many low-income tenants continue to face bureaucratic nightmares and delays. As The Times-Picayune reports:

Unlike residents of public housing complexes, renters in the HUD-subsidized apartment complexes dealt only with private landlords, and have had trouble figuring out where to get help within the FEMA-HUD bureaucracies, said Laura Tuggle from New Orleans Legal Assistance. As a result, about one-third of the HUD-subsidized renters she sees have no housing aid. And it's now too late for them to seek disaster-related rental help, she said. “Every day that passes is another day that a former HUD-assisted family sits on pins and needles, not knowing when their housing assistance may end,” she wrote to HUD in July.

Ike Coverage: Hurricane's environmental toll shows perils of expanded offshore drilling

When Hurricane Ike hit the U.S. Gulf Coast last month, it unleashed an environmental disaster, details of which are only now beginning to emerge. The ecological damage gives some indication of what the tropical storm-prone Southeast could face with the expansion of the offshore oil industry.

At least a half-million gallons of crude oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico and the wetlands, bayous and bays of Louisiana and Texas, according to an Associated Press examination of federal data:

The AP's analysis found that, by far, the most common contaminant left in Ike's wake was crude oil -- the lifeblood and main industry of both Texas and Louisiana. In the week of reports analyzed, enough crude oil was spilled nearly to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool, and more could be released, officials said, as platforms and pipelines were turned back on.

About half of the crude oil known to be spilled so far came from one facility operated by St. Mary Land and Exploration Co. on Goat Island, Texas, near hard-hit Bolivar Peninsula, the AP reports. Ike's surge flooded the plant and broke the pipes connecting its eight storage tanks, which held oil produced from two wells in Galveston Bay. Most of that oil is believed to have ended up in the Gulf of Mexico, which is already suffering from a massive Dead Zone caused by agrichemical pollution runoff.

Studies on marine species have found that the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons contained in petroleum can remain toxic for many years following an oil spill. Crude oil also contains toxic heavy metals.

Groups hope to see microlending programs at work in the Gulf Coast

The Christian Science Monitor poses the question this week: could microloans work to revitalize the Gulf Coast in the same way they have worked for poor areas of Africa and Asia?

Three years after Katrina, one-quarter of New Orleans small businesses remain closed. But the return or recovery of small businesses “is essential to the long-term stability of these neighborhoods,” Christy Wallace Slater of the Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation (LDRF) told the CS Monitor.

In the Institute for Southern Studies recent report, Faith in the Gulf, we reported on the vital work of Jewish Funds for Justice (JFSJ) and other faith-based groups and funders in community-centered redevelopment work along the Gulf Coat. This latest project by JFSJ is the first person-to-person microloan program in the country, and it will be partnering with contributors nationwide to provide loans to struggling small businesses along the Gulf Coast.

The campaign, called the 8th Degree, will give microloans ranging from $5,000 to $15,000, which will be distributed through the ASI Federal Credit Union (ASI). The JFSJ campaign is modeled on Kiva.org, which enables individuals to give a loan of any size directly to entrepreneurs in the developing world, the campaign aims to enlist individual Americans to do the same for hurricane-ravaged businesses, reports the CS Monitor.

Ike Coverage: Galveston mayor's wish list has some complaining of "conspiracy"

The rebuilding requests that Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas presented during last week's congressional hearing on the post-Ike recovery has generated so much controversy that the local paper has published an editorial trying to assure readers that it did not involve some sort of nefarious conspiracy.

One item on Thomas's wish list that's proven particularly suspect was the request that the federal government hand over undeveloped land it holds on the island's relatively unscathed east end. Opponents of a plan championed by Thomas and others to essentially give away that land to private developers "saw a conspiracy" to carry out that plan, the Galveston Daily News reports.

Thomas also requested money for a bridge over West Bay -- a proposal that generated an enormous controversy back in the 1990s and which the state eventually rejected as too expensive. Thomas also asked for a flyover lane off Interstate 45 that had initially been rejected as a political favor for developers. The mayor, we should probably note, is president of Thomas & Company of Galveston, a private real-estate and investment firm.

City Manager Steve LeBlanc said the wish list was put together by the city's department heads and some consultants after a discussion lasting about an hour. The paper scolded city leaders for the undemocratic nature of the process:

...[I]t is also hard to see how anyone at city hall might think large sums of federal money actually might be spent on the items on that list without further discussion by the city council. After all, any money the city receives should be spent on projects that reflect the will of the people, and that is properly expressed through elected representatives.

Gustav Coverage: Hundreds of Katrina Cottages ruined by Gustav

When Hurricane Gustav hit the U.S. Gulf Coast earlier this month, it ruined hundreds of cottages in southern Mississippi that were provided to residents left homeless three years ago by Katrina. So far, more than 230 of the so-called "Katrina Cottages" have been deemed uninhabitable by insurance adjusters due to water and storm surge damage, according to a release (pdf) from the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency. There are current over 2,800 Katrina Cottages occupied by families across South Mississippi.

The state is offering affected families a few options: relocation to a cottage in a commercial mobile home lot, with the family responsible for paying any lot rents or fees; placement in a cottage on other land where local codes allow it to be there permanently and where it does not have to be elevated higher than six feet; or moving to a rental apartment with the state footing the bill for the security deposit and rent through February 2009, when assistance for Katrina victims is set to end. Families that opt to live in a cottage will get the opportunity to buy it at a reduced rate based on income and ability to pay. Funds to house the Gustav victims are coming from insurance proceeds for the destroyed cottages.

"We are making every attempt to not only help these families find housing, but to ensure they are able to remain within their communities and school districts where they currently live," said MEMA Director Mike Womack.

The Associated Press reports that most of the uninhabitable cottages are located in Mississippi's coastal Hancock County, which was Katrina's Ground Zero. The state obtained a federal waiver that allowed the cottages to be temporarily set up in flood zones so residents could live on their own properties.

Mississippi built the cottages with a $281 million federal grant. While Louisiana also got money for cottages, it hasn't built any yet. The idea for the cottages arose during the post-Katrina Mississippi Renewal Forum as a way to provide storm-safe emergency housing that could be transformed into permanent dwellings.

(Photo of Katrina cottage by Samantha Bearden from MississippiRenewal.com)

Ike Coverage: In Texas, undocumented workers are rebuilding the coast

In towns along the Texas Gulf Coast, residents continue to rebuild following Hurricane Ike. The Houston Chronicle reports that Ike’s destruction is sparking one of the largest rebuilding efforts the state has seen in decades, and much of this work will be done by illegal immigrants.

Homeowners have already turned to undocumented day laborers to help with debris removal, roof repairs, and repairs to other storm-damaged property. Contractors have also hired them to rebuild or restore businesses and the city's infrastructure, reports the Chronicle. Unlike in New Orleans, which experienced an influx of Hispanic immigrants coming to work in the recovery effort, in Texas many of the area’s existing immigrant population will do the rebuilding work.

According to the Chronicle:

…this tug and pull of the labor force highlights an uneasy dilemma: The region needs the muscle of undocumented immigrants, but simultaneously is a cog in a broader crackdown of illegal immigrants at worksites.
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The looming demand for immigrant labor for rebuilding efforts illustrates how dependent Texas industry and commerce are on undocumented workers.
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According to a 2006 study by the Greater Houston Partnership, construction is the largest employer of undocumented workers in the city, employing nearly 36,000 people.

Crackdowns on illegal immigration, including the numerous immigration raids of the past few years, have had a devastating impact on many immigrant communities in Texas—separating families and creating a climate of fear. More the ever, the large role that immigrants have played in rebuilding the Gulf Coast following the devastating storms of the past three years illustrates the need for long-term immigration reform and not short-term policies of scare-tactics and raids.

Along the Louisiana coast, indigenous cultures and communities remain in peril

Hurricanes, flooding, and coastal erosion continue to threaten many indigenous communities across coastal Louisiana. Albert Naquin, chief of the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians on Isle de Jean Charles in Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, says it's time for the island's remaining residents to move farther inland, surrendering their way of life to the twin threats of storm surge and coastal erosion, reports the Times-Picayune.

Due to land loss, the island and much of the community is being swallowed by the Gulf of Mexico. According to the Times-Picayune, more than a week after Hurricane Gustav flooded much of Isle de Jean Charles, Hurricane Ike brought a 9-foot storm surge, overtopping the island's 6- to 7-foot levees and swamping homes once again. Although the Native American residents of the island have lived through numerous floodings, most do not have the money to continually rebuild, and the community knows it will never get stronger levee protection.

As the Times-Picayune reports:

Like other bayou communities, Isle de Jean Charles is a victim of coastal erosion, subsidence and sea-level rise. The oil and gas industry's construction of canals for vessels and pipelines enabled saltwater from the Gulf to invade and destroy freshwater wetlands. Levee building also caused southern Louisiana communities to be cut off from the Mississippi River and its sediments, which would have replenished the land and prevented it from sinking.
Island shrinking

Isle de Jean Charles once stretched about four miles wide, but is now a quarter-mile wide.

Coastal and bayou communities throughout Louisiana have been sinking for years, placing Cajun, Creole, and other unique cultures along the coast at risk of disappearing completely, and threatening the livelihoods of entire coastal communities. This land and culture loss is one of the biggest ecological and social disasters along Louisiana's coast.

Tribal leaders and tribal attorneys say the recent storms again sound the alarm that Louisiana's coastal communities need stronger flood protection and more emphasis on coastal and wetlands restoration to reduce surge, reports the Times-Picayune. “These communities are cultural and historical assets,” Joel Waltzer, a tribal attorney for the Pointe-aux-Chenes Indians, told the Times-Picayune, adding that losing the communities “would mean the end of an entire lifestyle and, in this case, the end of an entire people.”