Okay, I’m confused as I read this article in today’s T-P :
The Road Home program will provide residents up to $150,000 to rebuild or sell houses severely damaged by the storms. Using Community Development Block Grants overseen by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the program will pay homeowners for repair costs above what was covered by insurance policies, FEMA grants and Small Business Administration loans. But while the program allows up to $150,000 per homeowner in additional money, the total payout — insurance plus the grant — cannot exceed the home’s pre-Katrina value.
Now my understanding was that the Block Grants were just that, GRANTS. An SBA loan is a loan. I understand subtracting insurance proceeds and FEMA grants from the $150K, but to deduct the amount of an SBA loan? This is a concept concocted by, as I see it, delusional minds.
So, Betty went to the State’s Road Home site to look at the FAQs. On page 8 we found the pertinant question:
How does receiving an SBA loan affect the amount affect the amount of assistance I will receive?
What you receive from the SBA has no impact on the value of assistance you receive from The Road Home. Based on your SBA loan agreement, however, assistance you receive from The Road Home may be required to be used to repay any SBA loans.
This makes perfect sense, but why am I reading something different in the T-P? This is exactly the problem that all of us have here in SE Louisiana: bad freakin’ data! This is so unfair considering all that each of us is going through post-Deluge. We have been waiting for months for this first phase of reparations to be distributed, and now we cannot get accurate information. This cannot stand.
New Orleanians need an accurate database. The City’s is worthless, and so is the State’s. We cannot rely on what our paper reports to us. What is needed is an outside source.
And we still need to obtain the rest of the reparations our citizens deserve for the wrong decisions of the ACOE and the Guvmit, period! Justice for New Orleans!