FEMA wants its relief money back (2)

I have a friend whose family hails from Louisiana, near Texas--deep, deep in Red America. He's relating to me the ongoing experience of his dad, a hard-working dyed-in-the-wool conservative Republican, with the Federal Emergency Management Agency after Hurricane Katrina.

The adjacent Louisiana cities of Lake Charles and Sulphur were ordered evacuated for almost two weeks.

During that fortnight, FEMA announced a 1-800 number over TV and radio that residents could call to have $2,000 in emergency aid deposited directly into their checking accounts. Everyone in his family does so. My friend's dad, a good Christian whose business damage was paid for by insurance, gave away the money to workers of his who were impoverished by the flood.

Only now, months after that, some people, including his dad - but not everyobody! - got a letter asking them to prove they were citizens and that their houses were damaged. His father replies: he is a citizen, and his home wasn't damaged, his business was.

Now, the city of Sulphur is pestering him, via certified letters, to prove he is a resident, and FEMA has been pestering him claiming he has not provided information they requested, then making more requests for information, which he has been honoring.

Writes my friend: "The upshot is that FEMA offered Gulf Coast residence this aid money when they were evacuated with no strings, and now they come back with these mysterious requirements and start selectively trying to get the money back from random people by demanding proof that they meet requirements for aid that they didn't know were in place when they called the 1-800 number."

I'll be following the story. Email me at rperlstein@ourfuture.org [1] if you have more information. And be sure to forward this post to your friends who still think George Bush is the bee's knees.