Louisiana officials say FEMA too slow on
housing
September 11, 2005
BATON ROUGE, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Louisiana officials charged on Sunday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was not moving fast enough to bring in temporary housing for the displaced victims of Hurricane Katrina, more than 58,000 of whom are still in temporary shelters throughout the state.
"We have a real concern right now with the assistance we're getting from FEMA on temporary housing," Jeff Smith, deputy director for emergency preparedness with the state Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, told reporters.
"We do not feel that process is moving fast enough. We feel like there needs to be trailers rolling and things happening that are not moving as fast as they should be at this point," Smith said.
Earlier this week FEMA awarded $100 million contracts to two companies, Shaw Group <SGR.N> and Fluor Corp. <FLR.N>, for the establishment and construction of temporary housing sites.
A spokesman for Smith's department said those companies were still largely in the process of finding locations to place housing, though they were moving in some trailers.
Smith said he, presidents of some local parishes and federal relief coordinator Vice Admiral Thad Allen met on Saturday in New Orleans and had a "frank discussion" about the problems still facing the region.
Allen said on Sunday that the housing situation was a top priority for the recovery program.
"We need to think about the evacuees that are in shelters, moving them to temporary housing and finally to permanent housing," Allen said on Fox News Sunday.
But Smith said there was still a bit of bureaucratic opposition from officials who wanted precise figures from the state on demand for housing the displaced.
"There's not going to be a perfect way to do it but certainly we feel like there needs to be some temporary housing that improves the situation they're in now," Smith said. "We will make mistakes, we will get some people mad but we've got to get rolling."