Weekly Katrina Response Update For Mississippi
Nearly 2000 Children Gain Stability in New Classrooms
Release Date: November 11, 2005
Release Number: 1604-124
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JACKSON , Miss. -- State, federal, local and voluntary agencies are working in partnership to speed help to Mississippi residents as they continue their recovery from Hurricane Katrina. Families, individuals, business owners, government entities and school districts are receiving assistance to help them rebuild their lives.
The Department of Homeland Security's Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are providing temporary classrooms at the request of Mississippi school districts statewide. S tudents from Mississippi 's Gulf Coast , including Waveland and Bay St. Louis, returned to school this week and stepped into brand-new modular classrooms.
Federal and state disaster officials provided the following summary of the ongoing assistance effort:
- Individual and Household's program total payments disbursed total $ 783,968,887 .
- Public Assistance obligated funds currently total $492,539,322.
- The Small Business Administration (SBA) has approved 2,325 home loans, 197 business loans and 82 economic injury loans to date, totaling $184,605,000.
- 128,730 Disaster Unemployment Assistance claims processed since the program began on October 31, 2005.
- The cruise ship shelter is currently docked in Pascagoula and has 1,570 displaced persons and 48 FEMA staff on-board.
- 317 portable classrooms and offices have been provided to hurricane damaged schools.
- There are 17 total open shelters (including the cruise ship shelter) housing 1,945 individuals.
- 279,035 housing inspections have been completed.
- The five counties with the most applications for assistance are: Forrest, Hancock, Harrison, Hinds and Jackson . Applications in these counties combined total 261,115.
- The four counties with the most travel trailers placed are: Hancock, Harrison, Jackson and Pearl River .
- The total number of travel trailers currently occupied is 16,880. There are 88 mobile homes occupied.
Last Modified: Monday, 14-Nov-2005 09:15:17