[FoCHAT] Important Road Home Articles: Shortfall and Applicants Lost in the Dust

Tue Nov 6 12:52:03 PST 2007

Important Road Home Articles

  Please come to our meeting this Wed. and/or next Wed. (no meeting the following week). Next Wed. our meeting will be filmed in entirety for COX10 TV airing in the near future.

  At both meetings, there will be time for short (2-min; please check the timing beforehand) comments by all newcomers and those stuck in the system. Points can be discussed more during and our normal post-meeting chatting. No meeting on Thanksgiving week.

  Check our website for details about when and where of our meetings.

  http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/11/compromise_includes_3_billion.html

  http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/11/road_home_progress_not_enough.html

  http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/11/compromise_includes_3_billion.html

  Compromise includes $3 billion for Road Home balilout
  Posted by Washington bureau November 06, 2007 1:43PM
  By Bill Walsh
  Washington bureau

  WASHINGTON - Congressional negotiators struck a deal on Tuesday to pour an additional $3 billion into Louisiana's Road Home grant program whose dwindling reserves threaten to slow the rebuilding of hurricane-damaged houses.

  House and Senate appropriators agreed to add the money in the $459 billion fiscal 2008 spending bill for the Department of Defense. If passed by both houses and signed into law, the money would be made available to cover a substantial portion of the projected shortfall in the Road Home program, which has so far committed $4.3 billion to 66,314 Louisiana homeowners out of 185,895 who applied.

  Gov. Kathleen Blanco has warned for months that without an infusion of new cash, the program will run dry by the end of the year and leave tens of thousands without any grants to rebuild from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Blanco has made numerous trips to Washington lobby for between $3 billion and $4 billion in new financing to close the financing gap in the Road Home, her top priority as she closes out her term
  .
  Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee made the announcement of the new financing Tuesday afternoon. Landrieu called the money "a shot in the arm for our recovery, and with the holidays approaching, provides much-needed peace of mind to those fearing the Road Home would be closed to them."
  Landrieu credited Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd, D-W.Va. and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., who heads up the relevant subcommittee, for helping to put the bailout together.

  The $3 billion earmark is designated as "emergency" spending, which means that lawmakers don't have to cut elsewhere in the federal budget to pay for it.
  President Bush has not said whether he would sign the bill and support among congressional Republicans remains uncertain. The president has threatened to veto several government spending bills saying they were bloated. But the defense bill contains money for military personnel, weapons systems, military equipment and other provisions the president supports.

  Congressional Democrats seem eager to move the legislation quickly. 

  "We have to finish that before we leave here this week," Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the Senate Majority leader, said in a speech on the Senate floor.

  The bailout doesn't fully plug the hole in Road Home's budget. The state is still counting on Congress to loosen the restrictions on $1.2 billion in money already appropriated to Louisiana for storm and flood mitigation. Blanco wants to use the money for Road Home instead.

  . http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/11/road_home_progress_not_enough.html

  Road Home progress not enough for many
  Posted by The Times-Picayune November 05, 2007 8:33PM
  By David Hammer 
  Staff writer

  In recent months, the Road Home's weekly progress reports have painted a picture of a once-struggling homeowner aid program that's turned the corner: More than 10,000 award letters going out each month, about 10,000 applicants collecting their money each month, disputed cases getting resolved in the required time. 

  It is true the program has kicked into high gear, with more than 67,000 grants closed so far. But Aundra Barnett of eastern New Orleans knows all too well that there are applicants who don't show up in the weekly numbers. She applied Sept. 14, 2006, and she spent the next 13 months trying to get an award letter. 

  She had not contested the amount of her grant, since she had nothing to contest. So she was never listed as an applicant in the program's "dispute resolution pipeline." 

  STAFF PHOTO BY ELIOT KAMENITZ
  Aundra Barnett of eastern new Orleans has yellow road home award letter, right, and the notice she also received saying she never showed up for her interview. "My back's up against a wall." she said. "I've exhausted all my money waiting on the Road Home.
  Barnett is among a group of unknown size who applied early in the Road Home's difficult tenure, back when the program struggled to handle even the most straightforward applications, and then were apparently lost in the shuffle. 

  "I exhausted my savings, my 401(k) and I'm two months behind on the car note," Barnett said last month, before a newspaper reporter asked about her case and her award letter finally arrived. "My back's up against a wall. I've exhausted all my money waiting on the Road Home. And they just try to pacify me by saying, 'You're going to get a letter in two weeks.' They keep saying that and it never happens." 

  Aging files 

  For months, the Citizens Road Home Action Team, or CHAT, a group of homeowner activists, has been complaining about "aging files" that appear to have no disputes or mitigating factors holding them up. 

  This week, the state legislative auditor chimed in, criticizing Road Home contractor ICF International for failing to report on aging cases and other items in the program's weekly "pipeline reports." 

  "The Pipeline Report provides information on progress made and the number of homeowners in each stage of the process. However, it does not have sufficient information on problems and issues encountered, corrective actions taken, aging of cases or explanations for delays in the process," wrote Assistant Legislative Auditor David Greer, who heads up Auditor Steve Theriot's performance review team. 

  The state's response: The auditor is asking for too many detailed, complex items to be reported publicly. Those other detailed reports exist, they're just used by the state and its contractor in private, not for public consumption, according to a printed response to the audit by Suzie Elkins, director of the state's Office of Community Development, which oversees ICF's contract. 

  The auditor's office was not satisfied with that response. Greer wrote that the pipeline reports are the most comprehensive public disclosures the program offers and, as such, "should be detailed enough to provide the information necessary to assess the program's progress." The audit also dismisses the idea that the pipeline reports shouldn't be so detailed by pointing out that OCD's contract with ICF explicitly requires the contractor to report the items the auditor wants to see included. 

  Applicants in limbo 

  Barnett's situation is a case in point: By not tracking the number of cases that are aging but not in dispute resolution, an unknown number of applicants find themselves in limbo but not included in the program's pipeline data. 

  Several times since she resolved a concern about the pre-storm value of her home in the Chimneywood subdivision, Road Home advisers have told her an award letter was being processed. They kept telling her "you're good to go," and a letter would arrive in two weeks. 

  That happened for the fourth time in September, she said, but on Sept. 27, the program sent her a letter saying, "Our records indicate that you have not contacted the Road Home program to take the next step required to process your application." If she didn't respond in 30 days, the letter said, her application would be considered inactive. 

  That made Barnett nervous because the program had just announced that applicants would have until Dec. 15 to hold a first appointment or they would be deemed ineligible. Her first appointment was more than a year ago, she said, but a letter like this made her wonder whether the Road Home had lost her file. 

  Mike Taylor, head of OCD's Disaster Recovery Unit, said on Oct. 25 that the program's internal records showed Barnett had been sent an award letter twice. Last week, she received two letters, one dated Oct. 26 and another dated Oct. 14 but stamped for the mail Oct. 30. The state offered no explanation for why Barnett got a letter telling her the Road Home was trying to get in touch with her and she hadn't responded. 

  On Monday, the Road Home called Barnett and told her she should be going to closing soon. 

  "It's been a long, long battle, and my heart goes out to the people who are being strung along like I was," said a relieved Barnett, a neighborhood watch organizer who says she wants to start working with CHAT so she can share her Road Home experiences with others. 

  In the audit, Greer and his staff recommend ways the Road Home can be more open about its progress. The audit suggests the pipeline reports could include the average amount of time between the program's most significant steps, the number of quality control evaluations done by the Road Home and the number of homeowners who have actually received their money. 

  David Hammer can be reached at dhammer at timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3322

  Melanie Ehrlich
  Co-Chairman, CHAT

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