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Post-Katrina trailer residents fearful as eviction day looms
FEMA, having pushed back its deadline several times, says the last 4,600 dwellings must be cleared by May 30. But many occupants are poor, ill or elderly, with no place to go, housing advocates say.
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Though federal law prohibited FEMA from providing emergency housing for longer than 18 months, officials repeatedly extended the deadline in acknowledgment of the scope of the destruction. At the same time, some local governments -- worried about blight and eager to move on -- used zoning and permitting rules to pressure trailer residents to get out of the units and into more permanent housing.
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In Louisiana, housing advocates point to state programs that have done little to help. A much-touted plan to build tiny, permanent "Katrina cottages" -- funded with millions in federal money -- has not produced a single unit.
A $869-million state program, also federally funded, targeted more than 18,000 damaged rental units, but had resulted in fewer than 1,200 repairs by late March, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper.