US agency may house Katrina evacuees for 5 years (Reuters)

[Up2Late]

(I wonder if this is the "new guy" already getting "up to speed?")

US agency may house Katrina evacuees for 5 years

Mon Sep 12, 2005 05:06 PM ET

BATON ROUGE (Reuters) - U.S. federal authorities may have to take care of some evacuees from Hurricane Katrina for as long as five years, an official of the Federal Emergency Management Agency said on Monday. "We're planning to have to take care of a significant number of people for three to five years, until somebody can give us some better information," said Brad Gair, the head of FEMA's housing relief effort in the U.S. Gulf Coast region.

He said information on how much housing would be needed and for how long was still uncertain, but the agency estimated it would have to provide what he called "direct housing," like trailers or motor homes, for 200,000 households.

"It may not be quite on the scale of building the pyramids, but it's pretty close. And I'm already telling you right now, get your headlines ready, because we're not going to do a perfect job of it," Gair told a news briefing.

He said the agency had 6,000 travel trailers staged around Louisiana already and about 500 more units were coming into the state each day. He said FEMA had already ordered more than 100,000 housing units so far. FEMA has been under fire from Louisiana officials who say the agency was not responding quickly enough to the housing needs of the displaced people.

<http://go.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=9630864&src=rss/domesticNews>
(more at link above)

[celestia671]

1. I think I saw some of those today...

I was on the way home from work and saw a bunch of travel trailers parked in front of a mobile home park. Kinda small though.

[MichiganVote]

2. Time to hide the poor folk

[wordout]

3. "Get your headlines ready we're gonna deliberately fuck this up !

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rex_84

[UncleSepp]

6. I used to think that was next to the end of all batshittery

Now, I'm not really so sure. I still doubt any evil intent behind readying relocation facilities - it might have been a really good thing if these "camps" had been up, running, and prepared to feed and house people. Apparently, if something like Rex 84 exists, it isn't very well organized.

That's exactly the part that creeps me out in these recent days. It doesn't take evil to turn a relocation camp into a death camp - all it takes is incompetence and a desire to cover one's own behind, and that we have aplenty.

[gulfcoastliberal]

4. No surprise - Pensacola people are still living in trailer towns from Ivan

Ironically, one of them is right next to a Lowes. Another is across the street from the Navy hospital. Many have satellite dishes. So they've been in those things for about a year now. Funny how FEMA responded so differently in an election year in FL.

[shadowknows69]

5. something I just thought of

I'll bet there will be problems with these people being able to vote in the next couple elections. You heard it here first.