The Katrina housing coordination picture
Thus far we've been able to report in a fair amount of detail on the separate Katrina housing relief efforts of the various organizations and agencies, but it has been hard to figure out who is getting all these efforts to work together, and how. Now, maybe, a little light on the subject:
The Congressional Republican site GOP.Gov is displaying periodic "White House Task Force On Hurricane Katrina Response" reports of the type we found a few days ago on Sen. Lieberman's Web site. The most recent such report on GOP.Gov's extensive and informative Katrina page is a Sep. 9 edition. This is a "who's doing what" report, one federal agency at a time. There's an extensive HUD section full of small pithy announcements that are worth the attention of housing professionals generally. There is also significant information here for folks trying to figure out how the housing disaster response is being coordinated. The HUD section of the Sep. 9 White House report says this (all text sic):
So what is this "Joint Housing Solutions Center"? Well, we have enough scrapings from the Web to at least begin to answer the question. It's a centralized public-private collaboration that was also apparently activated for last fall's Florida hurricanes. We've already posted mentions of it here... here... and here establishing that Charles "Hank" Williams, HUD's Deputy Assistant Secretary for Multifamily Housing, was loaned to FEMA about two weeks ago to "chair" the JHSC in Baton Rouge and that he is now its "co-chair," though we don't know who else is now sharing that leadership with him. The folks at NLIHC were told that the JHSC works closely with another entity, the Housing Area Command, which is headed by FEMA's Brad Gair. Gair is referred to in this NYT article as "head of FEMA's hurricane housing task force," but that could of course be a loose description of the same thing. He was described in a Tuesday 2/The Advocate news story as "FEMA housing area commander." Mr. Gair, in any event, appears to be the man in charge of building these very large evacuee camps using thousands of mobile homes. FEMA's Sep. 8 announcement of five large private housing contracts stated:
It's hard to know to what extent the current Hurricane Katrina JHSC may or may not be operating according to previous plans for such entities, but it may be helpful to look through a 2004 report posted by the Florida state governor's office that describes a "Joint Housing Solution Center" as an element of planning against future hurricanes. Start at Page 10 of the report for detailed description of the center's role in combining four categories of aid: state and local; federal; "non-profit/faith-based," and private. There's considerable discussion of specific federal hurricane recovery plans and federal agencies' roles that may offer some insight at least into the patterns that were set up to be followed before Hurricane Katrina swamped so very many plans.
Some more recent documents suggest that in fact the current JHSC is following something similar to the Florida template. Yesterday's HUD press release, on Secretary Jackson's visit to Baton Rouge and the damaged areas, includes a description of
The Congressional Republican site GOP.Gov is displaying periodic "White House Task Force On Hurricane Katrina Response" reports of the type we found a few days ago on Sen. Lieberman's Web site. The most recent such report on GOP.Gov's extensive and informative Katrina page is a Sep. 9 edition. This is a "who's doing what" report, one federal agency at a time. There's an extensive HUD section full of small pithy announcements that are worth the attention of housing professionals generally. There is also significant information here for folks trying to figure out how the housing disaster response is being coordinated. The HUD section of the Sep. 9 White House report says this (all text sic):
HUD has established the Hurricane Recovery and Response Center (HRRC), an emergency management division chaired by the Federal Housing Commissioner Brian Montgomery serving as Operations Lead. This HUD entity will serve as a command post with staff from every program office including Housing, Public and Indian Housing, General Counsel, and Public Affairs. The HRRC will report directly to the Secretary and is housed at HUD Headquarters. The HRRC has dispatched over 20 HUD specialists with expertise on disease abatement, manufactured housing, reconstruction, and community planning with plans to dispatch over 30 more individuals. In addition, to the Joint Housing Solutions Center co-lead Hank Williams; the HRRC has dispatched Bryant Applegate to serve as lead in New Orleans.(There's a HUD bio of Mr. Applegate here. In quieter times he's in charge of the HUD initiative on removing "regulatory barriers" to affordable housing. Brian Montgomery is the new Assistant Secretary for Housing - Federal Housing Commissioner.)
So what is this "Joint Housing Solutions Center"? Well, we have enough scrapings from the Web to at least begin to answer the question. It's a centralized public-private collaboration that was also apparently activated for last fall's Florida hurricanes. We've already posted mentions of it here... here... and here establishing that Charles "Hank" Williams, HUD's Deputy Assistant Secretary for Multifamily Housing, was loaned to FEMA about two weeks ago to "chair" the JHSC in Baton Rouge and that he is now its "co-chair," though we don't know who else is now sharing that leadership with him. The folks at NLIHC were told that the JHSC works closely with another entity, the Housing Area Command, which is headed by FEMA's Brad Gair. Gair is referred to in this NYT article as "head of FEMA's hurricane housing task force," but that could of course be a loose description of the same thing. He was described in a Tuesday 2/The Advocate news story as "FEMA housing area commander." Mr. Gair, in any event, appears to be the man in charge of building these very large evacuee camps using thousands of mobile homes. FEMA's Sep. 8 announcement of five large private housing contracts stated:
The Housing Area Command includes FEMA, the private sector contractors and partners from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the American Red Cross. Their primary goal is to secure emergency housing for all displaced disaster victims. The command will also develop plans for longer-term solutions to address housing needs in the wake of a storm that affected 90,000 square miles. The immediate site of the work will be the hardest hit states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.As we've noted previously, NLIHC was told that the JHSC "comes up with 'ideas' about what to do" while the Housing Area Command "is supposed to implement the ideas from the Joint Housing Solutions Center." Knowledgable readers, do please step in and correct any misunderstandings here.
It's hard to know to what extent the current Hurricane Katrina JHSC may or may not be operating according to previous plans for such entities, but it may be helpful to look through a 2004 report posted by the Florida state governor's office that describes a "Joint Housing Solution Center" as an element of planning against future hurricanes. Start at Page 10 of the report for detailed description of the center's role in combining four categories of aid: state and local; federal; "non-profit/faith-based," and private. There's considerable discussion of specific federal hurricane recovery plans and federal agencies' roles that may offer some insight at least into the patterns that were set up to be followed before Hurricane Katrina swamped so very many plans.
Some more recent documents suggest that in fact the current JHSC is following something similar to the Florida template. Yesterday's HUD press release, on Secretary Jackson's visit to Baton Rouge and the damaged areas, includes a description of
the Joint Housing Solutions Center that includes more than 20 agencies, including HUD, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Red Cross, the Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity.A Sep. 7 report of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, posted on Reliefweb, says in part:
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has invited voluntary agencies with strong disaster housing repairs/construction expertise or resources to participate in the Joint Housing Solutions Center to address the massive and complex sheltering and rehousing needs caused by Hurricane Katrina to facilitate contributions of ideas, solutions, and resources from all levels of government and all sectors of society.A Sep. 2 FEMA press release includes this:
FEMA is setting up a Joint Housing Solutions Center to bring together public, private and voluntary agency stakeholders to develop innovative funding and streamlined operational partnerships to address the short and long-term housing needs of disaster victims.Afraid this is still not a very complete picture, but hope it helps. Readers, if you can tell us more about these entities, and especially what roles they envision for the owners and developers of apartments, subsidized and otherwise, please use the comments section below or write to us.
posted by Martha Bridegam at 11:27 PM
<< Home