[StBernard] St. Bernard recovery issues

Westley Annis Westley at da-parish.com
Wed Dec 23 19:52:56 EST 2009


it's a shame, all these multi-million dollar projects and our local economy
has not benefited


SJK


-----Original Message-----
St. Bernard recovery issues
Reported by: Natasha Robin, Reporter
Email: nrobin at fox8tv.net
Last Update: 12/22 10:45 pm

St. Bernard - As just about every parish deals with a budget shortfall for
2010, St. Bernard is no exception.

But the parish has some unique challenges ahead.

While the recovery process still continues from Katrina, funding from the
federal government is running out.

2009 brought new fire stations, streets, and parish buildings to St.
Bernard; all important milestones in the recovery.

The federal funding that helped pay for some of the projects is about to run
out, so 2010 will bring a different challenge.

While residents see a lot of construction going on around them, the parish's
pocket is suffering.

Parish President Craig Taffaro says community disaster loans have carried
St. Bernard for the past two years but 2010 looks lean.

"We face basically about an $8 million shortfall. We were able to balance
the budget by putting some cuts in place and the balancing of the budget is
done because we are not able to do some of the things operationally we are
not able to do."

Taffaro says repair and maintenance on parish vehicles will not be done and
sanitation services will probably be cut.

On top of the budget crunch, a major component to the parish's recovery is
still missing.

Those who came home after the storm do have access to this temporary medical
clinic along Judge Perez. Still, the lack of a more comprehensive facility
poses a critical challenge.

"My mom's on oxygen and in order to get her from home to the hospital we
have to make sure we have enough oxygen tanks, it's just terrible," says
resident Johnna Letendre.

Plans for a new hospital have been underway for more than a year but the
board has yet to decide where it will even be built. Taffaro says that
decision should be made in 2010.

"Now once that last piece of the puzzle is put in place, all of the behind
the scene things that have been going on, the design of the hospital, the
equipment revues, the marketing. That package has started to be put
together. you'll see things ramped up," says Taffaro.

But he concedes it will take at least 18 months to build a hospital. The
parish's goal now is to have a medical facility up and running by 2011.

Civic leaders hope a new hospital and other venues will tempt former
residents, many of them who ended up in St. Tammany, to once again call St.
Bernard home.

Taffaro says right now the population in St. Bernard is about 41,000. Before
Katrina there were 67,000 people who lived in the parish.




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