[StBernard] Many FEMA mobile homes being used, but some may never be

[Westley Annis]

FEMA MOBILE HOMES BY THE NUMBERS
Caddo Parish: 228 total, 105 occupied
Bossier Parish: 130 total, 57 occupied 
Claiborne, DeSoto, Natchitoches, Red River, Sabine and Webster parishes: 104
total, 60 occupied 
Source: FEMA

Many FEMA mobile homes being used, but some may never be
May 2, 2006

By Mary Jimenez
maryjimenez at gannett.com

Three Bush Goliath tomatoes growing in a pot on Gloria Durham's handicap
ramp on her FEMA mobile home are a sign that life goes on for the
58-year-old hurricane evacuee. Other pots filled with bell pepper plants,
egg plant, basil, dill, petunias and marigolds and shepherd's hooks that
hold chimes and wind flags, fill her small porch and decorate the outside of
her temporary home that sits adjacent to the non-stop traffic of I-20 at the
State Fair Grounds in Shreveport.

"They make me feel better," said Durham of her plants, speaking with a
strong south Louisiana accent common in her hometown of Chalmette. She lived
there from birth until Hurricane Katrina. "I'm real proud of those
tomatoes."

 
Durham and her husband are one of 15 residents that now live at the State
Fair Grounds where 20 Federal Emergency Management Agency's mobile homes
were placed last fall along with hundreds of others in north Louisiana.

According to FEMA, 212 emergency disaster mobile homes or travel trailers
were brought to and set up for occupancy in Caddo Parish. That's combined
with 130 units in Bossier Parish and a total of 104 more scattered
throughout the other five parishes in northwest Louisiana. For months they
sat empty, some still do, but many are filled with families and individuals
ready to take life on again.

"It's noisy but I'm getting used to it," said Durham, who is diabetic,
legally blind, needs dialysis and is wheelchair bound. "I don't think too
much about the future. I live for the next day. But as long as I hear from
my children each day, I'm happy."

Disability checks and Supplemental Security Income see the Durhams through
the month. They've already decided to stay in Shreveport, even after the
deadline for staying in the mobile home arrives.

"We like it here," she said.

According to FEMA 105 units are occupied in Caddo Parish, 57 in Bossier
Parish and there are 60 units the surrounding eight parishes in Northwest
Louisiana that are filled.

The occupancy numbers are floating numbers said Eric Schmidt, the FEMA
spokesman currently based in Shreveport to handle north Louisiana media
requests for information.

"People living in trailers or mobile homes aren't obligated to tell FEMA
exactly when they leave," he said. "If it's a commercial site, and they
leave, we don't know about that until someone from FEMA comes and knocks on
the door."

Residents of FEMA mobile homes/trailers enter into an 18- month agreement
with FEMA to live in the units free of rent and utilities from the date of
the declaration of the disaster by the governor, Aug. 29 for Hurricane
Katrina and Sept. 24 for Hurricane Rita.

"People will be allowed to stay beyond that date, but it will be on
case-by-case basis," Schmidt said. "We're looking at the eight-month
anniversary of Katrina and recertification teams are already going out to
help people in any way they can in finding jobs and getting their life
back."

The park or land owners where the units sit have also entered into a fixed
price per unit lease with the agency, but not for 18 months. Park owners
were given five or six month contracts to be renewed on a park-by-park basis
as the use and need for the units on the site were evaluated.

Some sites in Caddo and Bossier parishes that have never been occupied may
never be. One such site that has been concern to Keithville residents is
south Shreveport Mobile Villa on Barron Road, which has had 38 mobile homes
and 31 travel trailers at the site since September.

"That site has never cleared the necessary compliance with the state health
department," said Ron Webb, president of the Caddo Parish Commission. "It's
my understanding that his contract with FEMA has expired and it's very
possible it won't be renewed."

Another site in Bossier Parish, Pine Creek in Princeton, has had 66 mobile
homes empty since September. It's location -- not within walking distance to
basic needs like food and medical care -- and that it offers no access to
public transportation kept FEMA from placing evacuees there.

Other empty travel trailers/mobile homes either don't match with the needs
of evacuees requesting the disaster housing or may have utility problems or
need repairs said Schmidt.

The 18-month deadline is a date many at the Fair Grounds have already began
to think about.

"I'm happy to have a roof over our head," said New Orleans resident Bianca
Brown, from the lower 9th Ward. She lives in a three-bedroom mobile home at
the Fair Grounds with her three school-aged children. "I wish they could
have made it more permanent or maybe let us buy the home and move it
somewhere closer to home."

Brown, 29, moved into the mobile home, moderately furnished by FEMA, over
the weekend. For months she'd been staying in a three-bedroom home offered
to her temporarily by someone she'd met when she ended up in Shreveport
after the storm. It wasn't working out and the mobile home offer came just
in time.

"We're trying to make it home," said Brown, whose large extended family that
lived within blocks of each other in New Orleans is now scattered across the
United States.

Brown's mother lost the home she'd lived in 64 years and Brown's rent house
next door to her mother's is also gone.

"My mom is in Mississippi but she's supposed to be getting a mobile home in
Pinecrest (Shreveport). I have a sister at Pinecrest already. I think one of
my brothers is in Oklahoma."

Brown pauses, looking a little lost when trying to remember where her seven
other brother and sisters ended up.

"I'd like to have the family together," said Brown, who used FEMA assistance
checks to buy housewares and things her family needs and is now looking for
a job.

"I've met a lot of people who cry a lot and worry about the day-to-day life
issues, but you just to say, 'keep you head up and be happy your still
here.'"


CThe Times
May 2, 2006