Thursday Katrina picture

Yes, today it's an all-Katrina look at new items on the Net:

- The National Multi Housing Council is asking members to write to Congress, saying that private apartment owners have not been properly called on to house disaster victims, and most particularly that the address of the functioning registration site for vacant units, www.hurricanehousing.net, has not received anything like sufficient government publicity. The NMHC appeal is also asking for regulatory waivers and tax breaks to help the industry house disaster victims -- but this paragraph occurs early in its bulletin:

We are requesting that the government utilize the current housing stock of apartments as a means to provide hurricane evacuees with housing. Our members are ready, willing and able to assist in this crisis. In an effort to do this, we need the government to broadly publicize the www.hurricanehousing.net website.

The attached sample letter adds, regarding the "hurricanehousing.net" address:

At present, this link has yet to be publicized as a vehicle for housing the evacuees. This clearinghouse of available housing is accessible to anyone; the federal government, charitable organizations, state and local housing agencies and the evacuees themselves.

Our own previous items about trouble registering private units to help disaster victims are linked from here and here.

- FEMA today posted a summary of Alabama disaster aid, including the opening of the "Birmingham Interim Housing Facility," progress clearing debris, and other news including this:

Alternate temporary housing resources remain a high priority. More than 2,640 pre-placement interviews to assess unmet housing needs have been completed. Officials say that 352 travel-trailer units now house 1,056 displaced individuals. Additional units are being readied and deployed daily...

Other recent FEMA releases include fresh disaster declarations for Hurricane Rita.

- Newsday reports today on the manufactured home contracting situation.

- NLIHC estimates 71% of housing units lost to Katrina were low income.

- Criticism of eminent domain being often stereotyped as conservative, here nevertheless is Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., on Kelo and her fear that poor people could lose homes in the New Orleans reconstruction.

- Today HUDCLIPS posted new editions of forms that were redrafted last March regarding relocation assistance to businesses/organizations and homeowners being required to move "as a direct result of acquisition, rehabilitation or demolition for a Federal project or a project in which Federal funds are used." (Spanish-language editions here and here.)

[UPDATE: Mixed picture in California on whether public housing administrators will jump evacuees to the tops of waiting lists... Abandoned/tax-seized properties in Baton Rouge may be converted to house Katrina victims.]