The LRA has put up for public comment the attached CDBG Action Plan for Gustav and Ike recovery. A projected $1.5 billion could come to the State and the first third of that allocation is due to arrive on November 28, 2008. Given the confusing allocation formulas - 25% of total funds will be administered by the state for either rental housing, agriculture, fisheries or hurricane protection; of the funds to be allocated to the parishes a total of 10% must be spent on rental housing with an additional requirement that 30% of these funds be spent on housing recovery (it is not clear if the 10% for rental is included in the overall 30% of parish funds to be allocated to housing)-there is a great deal of concern that sufficient funds will not be allocated to addressing the housing needs of the most vulnerable that were affected by these two storms.

PolicyLink has developed a public comment delineating these concerns and proposing suggested changes - many of which came out of the series of community meetings on unmet housing needs that you helped to organize/attended. We are asking that you help circulate these public comments in order to get organizations and individuals to sign on. We will then submit the public comment with whoever has signed on. We have been told the comment period will start on December 1, 2008 and would like to get the comments in asap. Therefore we would like all feedback and sign-ons by November 30th. Please email all comments and your organization’s sign-on to niva@policylink.org. If you have further questions, feel
free to contact me at dominique@policylink.org.

Dominique Duval-Diop
Senior Associate
PolicyLink
1515 Poydras, Suite 105
New Orleans, LA 70112
P: 504-524-8185 ext 24
F: 504-525-8242
M: 225-615-4243
Visit our website: www.policylink.org

Hurricane-affected families to receive assistance with rent, utility payments, and home furnishings.

** Current residents of Acadia, Iberia, Lafayette, St. Mary, St. Martin, or Vermilion parishes are eligible for the assistance. **

Baton Rouge, La. (November 23, 2008)  – BATON ROUGE, La. – The Louisiana Family Recovery Corps will provide more than $3 million to assist hurricane-affected families and individuals in a six-parish area with rent payments and deposits, utility payments and deposits, and household furnishings via its Household Establishment Funds (HEF) program.

The Recovery Corps’ HEF program will provide up to $1,500 in benefits on behalf of families and individuals who meet certain residency and household income criteria. Funds will be distributed on a first come, first served basis.

The Recovery Corps will begin pre-screening applicants for assistance beginning on Monday, November 24, 2008. Those who think they may qualify for the assistance should call 1-800-333-3104 beginning at 8:30 a.m. on November 24. Applicants who advance past the pre-screening process will be scheduled for meetings with local case workers, who will work directly with each family and individual to provide the HEF assistance.

The phone bank will be open from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. It will be closed on Thursday, November 27, 2008, for the Thanksgiving holiday. Continue reading »

From the Galveston County Daily News

LEAGUE CITY — County commissioners have approved a plan to help those who do not have the resources to clear Hurricane Ike debris from their property.

The private property debris removal program requires the property owner to declare why he or she is unable to move debris to the right of way.

Also, the debris must present a community health or safety risk.

Before a county contractor can pick up the first piece of drywall, the property owner must fill out paperwork proving ownership and sign a release form.

When the owner cannot be found, the county will implement a nuisance-abatement program to begin the cleanup. In some cases, the county may impose a lien on the property.

The plan covers only the unincorporated portions of the county, such as Bolivar Peninsula, San Leon, Bacliff and Freddiesville.

The plan was approved so the county could receive reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for the cost of removing the debris. Property owners seeking help can call a toll free line or register online through the county’s Web site.

+++

For More Info

Private property debris removal program

Call: 800-679-2325

Online: co.galveston.tx.us/

From the Towntalk.com

The Small Business Administration has extended application filing deadlines for residents and business owners who live in Hurricane Gustav and Ike-declared disaster areas.

The deadline for filing for physical damage is Dec. 3 and for economic injury is June 2, according to a press release from the SBA.

The SBA says residents who rent or own their own home, own a business or a small agricultural cooperative can apply for financial assistance if located in a declared disaster area.

There are several types of loans available through the SBA to help in the recovery effort.

For information, contact SBA Disaster Assistance Customer Service Center at (800) 659-2955 or disastercustomerservice@sba.gov.

Information is available online at www.sba.gov/services/disasterassistance.

A Disaster Recovery Center remains open in Alexandria to assist residents.

It is located at the Bolton Avenue Community Center, and federal officials have said the facility will remain open as long as it is needed.

BRIDGE CITY, Tex. — After Hurricane Ike flooded her house, Terri Reeves could not wait for the federal government to provide her with housing, so she spent all her savings — about $8,000 — on a camper to live in on her front lawn.

Now, she has watched wistfully as the Federal Emergency Management Agency has installed several mobile homes on her block for other people with flood-damaged homes.

“They keep telling me one day I’m on the list, and the next day I’m not on the list,” Ms. Reeves said, holding her Yorkie, Rufus, in the gutted ruins of her house. “They give you the runaround.”

Since the storm hit on Sept. 13, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has installed about 1,000 mobile homes in some of the hardest-hit areas, almost all alongside ruined homes. Another 400 have been delivered but are not ready to be occupied, either because they lack utilities or have not been inspected. But at least 1,500 families are still waiting for units to arrive, agency officials said.

Read the rest of the New York Times article

From ABC 13- Houston

It has been over two months since Hurricane Ike made landfall on the Galveston coast and left a path of destruction in its wake as it moved north through Houston. Many victims of Hurricane Ike are still trying to put their lives back together, but are having problems getting the money they need to make the necessary repairs to their homes from their insurance company.

Undervalued and denied insurance claims are not new problems. In many cases these disputes are not easily resolved and a policyholder may need to seek aid from resources available outside of their insurance company. Policyholders may choose to enlist the services of a public adjuster or an attorney to assist them in recovering the money that they are entitled to from their insurance provider.

Read more here.

From AP/Houston Chronicle

GALVESTON, Texas — A Hurricane Ike-damaged library wants to share stories of Galveston residents who rode out the storm on the island and those who fled.

The Rosenberg Library is seeking personal accounts of the hurricane, which hit Galveston on Sept. 13, as part of its historical project “Memories of Ike.”

The library, on its Web site, says recording Hurricane Ike from the viewpoint of the everyday citizen offers a chance to understand the disaster from the “ground up.”

The Rosenberg Library also welcomes personal accounts of those who evacuated, with the written information eventually being made available to researchers and authors.

The library itself is an Ike survival story, after the storm surge swamped the first floor and destroyed some building internal systems.

Go to http://rosenberg-library.org

From redOrbit.com

Experts say the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season may be best remembered as one of the worst in Cuba’s history.

Hurricanes Gustav, Ike and Paloma caused an estimated $10 billion damage in Cuba, where they damaged nearly half a million homes and flattened sugar cane and tobacco fields.

As hurricane season nears its end on November 30, 16 cyclones have formed — eight tropical storms and eight hurricanes — making it the busiest Atlantic season since the record-breaker of 2005, which produced 28.

However, chances for another storm are ebbing. Three years ago, Tropical Storm Zeta formed on December 30 and lasted into January.

AccuWeather forecaster Joe Bastardi said the hurricane season is over for the United States, “but you might get something developing in the middle of nowhere.”

Meteorologists say the average hurricane season produces about 10 storms, of which six become hurricanes. But 2008 will go down in the record books as another in a string of exceptionally busy seasons.

Researchers believe that in 1995 the Atlantic basin entered a new cycle of prolific hurricane production that could last anywhere from 25 to 40 years. Continue reading »

The Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center (GNOFHAC) is offering mini-grants to approximately 20 families in the greater New Orleans area that are experiencing financial difficulties related to the Hurricane Gustav evacuation and that are facing eviction.  Families making up to 60% of area media income and facing eviction may receive up to $250 in order to prevent an eviction and should call (504) 596-2100 or email rwaxman@gnofairhousing.org for more details about eligibility and the application process.  Applicants will have to provide proof of income in order to receive assistance.  Qualified applicants will be subject to a lottery.  All applications must be received by Friday, November 14th, 2008.

This funding is generously provided by the Gulf Coast Fund.

Download the application here

From houmatoday.com

From the Associated Press

HOUSTON (AP) — A top official of the Federal Emergency Management Agency admits that the agency was sluggish in its response to Texans affected by Hurricane Ike’s devastation, according to a published report.

Deputy FEMA Administrator Harvey E. Johnson Jr. said he intends to improve the help that the agency provides to Texans whose home were damaged or destroyed by the September hurricane. He said FEMA will deploy mobile homes to the hardest-hit areas more rapidly, review rules that might be causing premature denials of assistance and provide more resources to Texas.

He said Friday he has put more personnel into Texas housing assistance programs. He invited energy company officials into FEMA’s Texas field offices to help provide electric power to mobile homes housing storm victims, and he has started a review of procedures that result in relatively few families being approved for assistance when they first apply.

Ike came ashore near Galveston on Sept. 13, causing at least $11 billion in damage to Texas.

Johnson met this past week with local officials in Galveston, the Beaumont-Port Arthur area and Houston.

“I think that I agree with the elected officials I met with,” Johnson told the Houston Chronicle. “They all have called and expressed the concern that FEMA is moving too slowly. Within FEMA, there is a renewed sense of energy to redouble or triple our efforts, that we need to box some ears.”

Officials in Beaumont, Port Arthur and Orange say they need thousands of temporary homes, particularly for refinery and chemical plant workers who toil in industries crucial to the local economy.

Johnson said FEMA’s assessment shows that 2,800 to 5,100 mobile homes are needed in Texas.

From earth2tech.com

The debris from Hurricane Ike, a depleted oil field and some biomass power expertise could soon start delivering clean power to the city of Houston, which is still recovering from the third-most destructive hurricane to hit the U.S. Biofuels Power Corp. signed an agreement today to create a biomass plant that will use wood chips and debris from the ongoing Hurricane Ike cleanup to produce 4 megawatts of clean energy and then sequester the carbon emissions in a depleted oil field.

Under the terms of the agreement, six acres of land will be leased from DSMC of Humble, Texas, a waste wood storage facility operator which has been the primary collector of debris for the City of Houston’s Hurricane Ike cleanup effort, and which will also supply the fodder for the plant. The land includes a number of abandoned oil wells that will be retrofitted for exhaust gas sequestration by Texoga Technologies Corp.  The end result will be a pilot-scale power plant that burns the city’s waste debris to produce power while safely storing the emissions underground. “We don’t expect our carbon sequestration activities to result in significant oil production, but surprising things can happen in old oil fields,” Fred O’Connor, president and CEO of Biofuels Power, said in a statement.

Biofuels Power will manage the project and contribute a 2.5-megawatt steam turbine, a 1.5-megawatt diesel electric generator and transformer and grid interconnect equipment. Based in The Woodlands, Texas, Biofuels Power currently operates two grid-connected biodiesel-powered plants and a biodiesel refinery.

From the Advertiser

The Family Tree is continuing its long-term recovery counseling program for those affected by hurricanes Gustav and Ike thanks to funding from United Way of Acadiana. Individuals and families in a parish affected by either of these hurricanes are eligible to receive up to three free counseling sessions in Lafayette, Abbeville, or New Iberia. After three free sessions, fees are based on household income. Clients typically seek counseling for adjustment, family issues, behavior problems in children, divorce or increased stress after a natural disaster. Counseling at The Family Tree is done by master’s-level clinicians and is available for children ages 4 and up, adults, couples, and families. For more information, call 337-237-2160 or visit www.thefamilytree.ws.