Wednesday, August 29, 2007

A Great Paper Asks About Fairness: Two Years On

Editorial From The "Times-Picayune" in New Orleans, August 29, 2007 TREAT US FAIRLY MR PRESIDENT

Louisiana had three times more damaged homes and seven times more severely damaged homes than Mississippi. Universities in this state had three times as many students displaced and had four times the losses of Mississippi's campuses. Louisiana fisheries suffered almost 75 percent of the damage done by Katrina, and our hospitals lost 97 percent of the hospital beds closed by the storm.

Yet in every case, Mississippi ended up with a disproportionate share of aid. Housing grants, for instance: Mississippi got $5.5 billion in Community Development Block Grant money for its 61,000 damaged homes. Louisiana, with 204,000 damaged homes, got $10.4 billion. If the aid were given out proportionately, this state would have gotten twice that much.

LINK TO FULL TEXT AT NOLA.COM

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