NEW ORLEANS — Nearly four years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, housing for the Gulf Coast’s most vulnerable residents remains scarce and continues to mar other significant progress made in the region so far, experts told a Congressional field hearing yesterday and today.

While community groups and local leaders have made enormous strides in rebuilding and reclaiming many neighborhoods throughout the Gulf Coast, federal and state aid programs — most notably the Road Home program — have failed to live up to their promise.

“The progress of housing recovery at the community level has been very uneven and has led to racial and social inequities,” Dominique Duval-Diop, senior associate in the PolicyLink office in New Orleans, said at Thursday’s hearing. “We may have missed the opportunity to create sustainable and resilient communities — communities that are able to initiate and invest in their own recovery and redevelopment.”

The Congressional field hearings are being conducted by Rep. Maxine Waters, chairwoman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity. The hearings will continue place today at Lawless Memorial Chapel, Dillard University, 2601 Gentilly Boulevard, New Orleans.

Other experts who testified included:

• Davida Finger of Loyola Law Clinic
• Allison Plyer of the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center
• Laura Tuggle of Southeast Louisiana Legal Aid
• James Perry of Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center
• Cynthia Wiggins, a public housing resident
• Angela Patterson of Unity of Greater New Orleans
• Anita Sinha of the Advancement Project

The experts look at a wide range of issues, including:

• The difficulty homeowners faced in navigating the Road Home program
• Significant New Orleans rent increases since 2005
• Ongoing difficulty for elderly, disabled, and low-income households who formerly lived in HUD-assisted homes that have still not been replaced
• Fair housing violations that are prevalent post-Katrina.
• The growth in the homeless population from 6000 to 12,000 since Katrina.

In 2007 and 2008, PolicyLink undertook major studies of the three major housing rebuilding programs: the Road Home homeowners program; the Multifamily Rental Program (funded through Low Income Housing Tax Credits and Disaster CDBG funds); and the Small Rental Repair Program.  Significant challenges remain in each of those programs.

In particular, the Road Home grant formula has had a more negative effect on those whose damage estimates were higher than their home value. Those whose damages were greater than their pre-storm home value - 47.3% of all applicants rebuilding in place - fell on average $69,000 short of the money they need to rebuild.

This was a particular problem in low-income, predominantly black neighborhoods in New Orleans. More than 60 percent of households in New Orleans East and the Lower 9th Ward have gaps over $40,000, compared to 49 percent citywide and 33 percent statewide. The average rebuilding cost gap for those communities were $65,000 and $68,000, respectively — a mammoth sum for low-income residents struggling to come home.

But insufficient government programs are far from residents’ only concerns, Duval-Diop says.

“Many recipients face insufficient rebuilding grants, contractor fraud, a high-cost environment, inability to access additional credit, and home-title succession challenges that delay or deny funding for the home repair.,” she said. “Our analysis found that the

majority of homeowners choosing to rebuild in place did not have sufficient resources to fully recover their homes.”

For more information on Gulf Coast rebuilding, please visit www.PolicyLink.org

A recap of this week’s equity news.

“Defying economy, New Orleans keeps rebuilding,” - Los Angeles Times

The numbers aren’t so dismal here as pre-Katrina residents continue to return, creating a constant demand for construction. Nearly $35 billion in federal aid doesn’t hurt either.

Reporting from New Orleans — This city is a rarity in 2009: a place full of hard hats and big building projects and subcontractors roaring around in pickup trucks. A city where home prices have dipped only slightly, and where the unemployment rate is 5.3% — compared with 8.1% nationwide.

New Orleans, it seems, has largely dodged the Category 5 recession pummeling the rest of the country, thanks to its unique post-Katrina economy. For locals accustomed to bad luck and trouble, the good news can feel a little strange.

  ”Reinventing America’s Cities: The Time Is Now,” - The New York Times

THE country has fallen on hard times, but those of us who love cities know we have been living in the dark ages for a while now. We know that turning things around will take more than just pouring money into shovel-ready projects, regardless of how they might boost the economy. Windmills won’t do it either. We long for a bold urban vision.

With their crowded neighborhoods and web of public services, cities are not only invaluable cultural incubators; they are also vastly more efficient than suburbs. But for years they have been neglected, and in many cases forcibly harmed, by policies that favored sprawl over density and conformity over difference.

“Congress Approves Budget,” - The Washington Post
$3.5 Trillion Spending Plan Paves Way for Obama Goals

Congressional Democrats overwhelmingly embraced President Obama’s ambitious and expensive agenda for the nation yesterday, endorsing a $3.5 trillion spending plan that sets the stage for the president to pursue his most far-reaching priorities.

Voting along party lines, the House and Senate approved budget blueprints that would trim Obama’s spending proposals for the fiscal year that begins in October and curtail his plans to cut taxes. The blueprints, however, would permit work to begin on the central goals of Obama’s presidency: an expansion of health-care coverage for the uninsured, more money for college loans and a cap-and-trade system to reduce gases that contribute to global warming.

Can you believe it’s been almost three years? Three years since the levee breaks? Three years since the Superdome? Three years since President Bush making promises in a generator-lit Jackson Square?

But three years out, where are we? How much progress has really been made? According to a new report released today by PolicyLink, we’ve seem some progress the past year, but not nearly enough — especially when it comes to the bedrock issue of housing for Louisianans. Far too many residents still can’t afford to rebuild their homes or find an affordable place to rent.

The new report, “A Long Way Home: The State of Housing Recovery in Louisiana 2008,” shows that while some progress has been made during the past year, thousands of residents who want to return home are facing a critical rental housing shortage, inadequate rebuilding grants and a recovery plagued by red tape and ever-changing rules.

The report (which I co-authored along with my colleagues Kalima Rose and Dominique Duval-Diop) analyzes the three major federally funded housing recovery programs – the Road Home (for homeowners) and the small and large rental programs (for renters). Together, these programs allocate nearly $12 billion in federal recovery funds to restore housing in Louisiana.

Some key findings:

• In New Orleans, 4 of every 5 Road Home recipients rebuilding their homes did not get enough money to cover their repairs. Statewide, more than 2 of every 3 face the same predicament.
• Statewide, the average Road Home applicant fell more than $35,000 short of the money they need to rebuild their home. The shortfall hit highly flooded, historically African-American communities particularly hard.
• Nearly 40,000 low-income homeowners received an average of about $27,000 each from an additional Road Home grant program designed to help vulnerable residents.
• Renters still face huge hurdles—only 2 in 5 damaged affordable rental units statewide will be repaired or replaced with recovery assistance. In the New Orleans metro region, it’s an even more dismal rate of 1 in 3.
• The national credit crunch and personal financial vulnerability keeps many mom-and-pop landlords from being able to rebuild through the small rental repair program. Meant to restore more than 10,000 rental homes, the program has completed only 82.
• Nearly 28,000 families nationwide still rely on disaster rental assistance, with 14,000 in the greater New Orleans metro region alone. There will not be nearly enough affordable rental units on the market by the time the assistance runs out in March 2009.

The election season provides another chance to put the issue of Gulf Coast rebuilding at the forefront of our national dialogue. Let’s hope we’re at a very different place in the process come Year 4.

As you can probably tell from previous EquityBlog posts, one of the highlights of this year’s Regional Equity ‘08 Summit was the plenary panel surrounding “Trouble the Water,” a post-Katrina documentary that earned the top documentary prize at the Sundance Film Festival.

For those who haven’t had a chance to see any clips or hear the heroic stories of Kim and Scott Roberts — the young New Orleans couple at the heart of the film — please take a minute (actually, six and a half minutes) to watch this video dispatch on the Entertainment Weekly web site. You won’t want to miss this film when it is finally released later this year (Check back here and the film’s site for release news)

A crowd of more than 1,000 packed the Grand Ballroom at the Regional Equity ‘o8 Summit Thursday to see clips of “Trouble the Water,” a powerful new documentary about post-Katrina life in New Orleans.

Executive producer Danny Glover joined with the film’s directors, Carl Deal and Tia Lessin, and the film’s subjects, Kimberly and Scott Roberts for a passionate and inspiring discussion about the film and the issues of equity and equality is raises.

The documentary follows Kim and Scott for more than a year as they face the storm (via gripping hand-held camera work as they were still trapped in their home by floodwaters) and try to recover and start a family. Critics are already raving about the film, including awarding it the Grand Jury prize for best documentary at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

As Glover pointed out, though, the Roberts’ story is not just an tale isolated to post-storm New Orleans. It reflects the inequity and injustice we see all over the country.

“In Detroit, Chicago, New York, communities have been left behind,” Glover said. “This is an epidemic.”

Lessin said she hopes the film can serve as a catalyst for equitable change across the country, as activists, advocates, policymakers and people from the faith community come together to watch the real life struggles of Kim and Scott and strategize ways to create more and better opportunities for all people.

To find out more about the film, please visit the film’s homepage, www.TroubleTheWaterFilm.com.

Producers are eying a late summer or early fall theatrical release.

For more information about what PolicyLink is doing to help Louisiana recover more equitably and how you can help, please check out www.PolicyLink.org/Communities/Louisiana.