TigerU.com :: View topic - Evacuees protest FEMA notice

TigerU.com

The Quad - Evacuees protest FEMA notice

BenKenobi - Sun Jan 29, 2006 1:15 am
Post subject: Evacuees protest FEMA notice

Quote:

BAKER — Some hurricane evacuees at the 572-unit trailer park on Groom Road are worried and angry about notices that say they will have to buy their propane after Jan. 31.

About 40 people gathered Friday morning in front of a church across from Renaissance Village, the Federal Emergency Management Agency trailer park established for New Orleanians and others displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

Read more at: http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/2246561.html

Trunks - Sun Jan 29, 2006 4:19 am
Post subject:

your link broke its self.

but it was still cashed on google.

BAKER — Some hurricane evacuees at the 572-unit trailer park on Groom Road are worried and angry about notices that say they will have to buy their propane after Jan. 31.

About 40 people gathered Friday morning in front of a church across from Renaissance Village, the Federal Emergency Management Agency trailer park established for New Orleanians and others displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

The trailers have electric lights but propane is used for bathing, cooking, refrigeration and heat. The notices indicate that FEMA will no longer pay the cost for the propane.

Some residents — about 1,650 are at the trailer park — said FEMA is reneging on its agreement.

“They promised us that everything would be free for 18 months,” said Wilbert Ross, president of the village council.

He organized residents of the village, urging them to leave the FEMA property to air their concerns. They gathered around the TV camera, listened to Ross and others, and talked to the media.

No FEMA representatives were present, and FEMA spokesmen did not return phone calls to The Advocate on Friday afternoon.

Joseph Griffin hung back from the crowd. He lived near City Park in New Orleans and said he was disappointed that no one from FEMA was outside the trailer park to answer residents’ questions.

This is the second time propane has surfaced as an issue at Renaissance Village. In November, FEMA also notified the residents they would have start paying for their propane, but FEMA representatives told the residents and Gov. Kathleen Blanco that the earlier announcement was a mix-up and continued paying.

At the time, a flier showing that a Baton Rouge company would deliver 7.5-gallon tanks for $47.50 each, was circulating.

“I just want to know if we’re going to have pay for the propane. I mean, I knew we’d eventually have to pay for something,” Griffin said Friday.

There are other concerns.

Griffin said he’s also heard rumors that the communal kitchen, which serves three meals daily, will close in February and the bus service that takes residents to shop and run errands could end.

“These are nice living quarters, but a lot of people don’t have a car. It’s going to be hard for a lot of people to get around,” he said.

Yolanda Gibson lived on the West Bank in New Orleans. “I’m not dependent on the kitchen, but a lot of people are,” she said.

Gibson said she’s grateful to have a roof over her head, but she said the park’s rules are restrictive.

Specifically, she said, residents have been threatened with eviction if they talk to the media. The park also has a fence.

“Sometimes it feels like a concentration camp,” she said.

Gordon Band showed up at Friday’s gathering just before noon. A former resident of Mid-City New Orleans, Band lives at Elm Grove Village, a smaller FEMA park off Blount Road in Baton Rouge.

“I figure if anything happens here, it’s going to affect us, too,” he said.

Band said he’s not bothered about the prospect of paying for his own propane. At first, Band said, it was an issue because he didn’t have transportation to go buy it.

“I’m grateful for what I’ve got,” said Band, who plans to relocate permanently to either Baker or Zachary. “I’m tired of flooded cities. I lived through Betsy, too.”

Band said he decided to go to the Renaissance event because he wants to keep up with what’s going on, but when he heard organizers call the event a protest, he tossed his cigarette and walked away.

“I don’t want anything to do with a protest,” he said.

Wait, what I want to know is don’t the FEMA trailers have appliances that also use electricity. They make it sound like the water heater, and refrigerator are LP only. That would be very unusual.

LEstay - Mon Jan 30, 2006 10:32 am
Post subject:

This is what happens when people depend on the government... end all welfare!

Tombo - Tue Jan 31, 2006 2:11 am
Post subject:

^ Yeah, I think welfare started a few generations ago or whenever because it's supposed to just help people out if they are in desperate desperate need which provided if u have an education u really shouldn't be in that situation but now there's an entire generation of fucking slobs who just live off of it as if they were destined to have it. People who just go to the store and get cigs and cheetos with foodstamps. Bullshit. End welfare, fuck it I don't need it. I don't crank babies out every ten or eleven months, I'm not sick or disabled damn it I went to school.

BenKenobi - Tue Jan 31, 2006 2:21 am
Post subject:

I can't say I'd want to end welfare.. I was on food stamps and WIC in Louisiana, and it was a great help.. It's a lot easier to try and better your life, when you're not starving.. When I move back, I'll probably reapply for food stamps and have WIC transferred back to Louisiana.. Any help I can get while trying to build a small business helps.

Ending it won't solve anything.. There just needs to be a way to stop the abuses...

Of course, I'm gonna have to tell myself, much like when people bitch about Katrina evacuees increasing crime, and wasting FEMA money, etc etc, that I'm one of the few that uses the system, but doesn't abuse it. I'm not "pumping out babies," .. I have a job *and* co-own a business.. One of these days, I'd love to go back to school and get an education...

LEstay - Tue Jan 31, 2006 10:47 am
Post subject:

Yeah these Katrina evacuees in Houston are learning what real justice is about... not catch and release. I hope the HPD locks them up UNDER the jail.

BenKenobi - Tue Jan 31, 2006 11:49 am
Post subject:

Yeh.. nothing burns me more than people who abuse the same things that I take advantage of .. Makes me look bad, cause then I get lumped into the same group they're in..

Trunks - Tue Jan 31, 2006 4:16 pm
Post subject:

BenKenobi wrote:

I'm not "pumping out babies," ...

This is a pretty common misconception.
Family size is about the same for families on welfare than not.
Additionally if you do your taxes correctly you get the same (if not more) benefit for having children. So to say that people on Welfare / Aid programs have kids and get more money, is not different than anyone else who has kids.

In fact most states end up having an even greater cash benefit for foster children. So if you were really in the Program to make some cash you would load up on foster kids not raise your own on welfare. And the foster kids you can send back when your sick of them!

LEstay - Tue Jan 31, 2006 4:40 pm
Post subject:

Trunks wrote:

Additionally if you do your taxes correctly you get the same (if not more) benefit for having children.

He tells the truth. Although Earned Income Credit is only based on 0-2 kids, you do have the $3200 personal exemption for each child plus $1000 child tax credit for each child under 17.