The Road Home’s final stretch

As of mid-October, the Road Home program has provided critical funding to more than 60,000 homeowners across Louisiana’s hurricane-hit parishes. With grants averaging $70,359, that’s more than 60,000 families who can now return home to a life of stability and productivity, contributing to the resurgence of our communities.

That effort should have put us at the halfway mark. That is, half of what FEMA initially estimated as the number of homeowners the Road Home would help.

But Louisiana’s need has proven much greater than any early estimates could fathom.

Today, nearly 185,000 applications have been recorded, putting our 60,000 closings at only one-third of that total. These homeowners also report more damage to their homes, covered by less insurance than FEMA’s original estimates, creating a funding shortfall of $3 to $4 billion.

The bottom line is this: as a result of the federal government’s estimates being too low, the Road Home program is on track to run out of funding as early as the beginning of 2008.

Is it wrong that more of our people need help than what FEMA predicted? Of course not.

It means initial funding, while unprecedented in its price tag, was simply not enough. It means pledges to do whatever it takes to rebuild Louisiana, however well meaning, are simply going unfulfilled. It means Louisiana simply needs more help.

That’s why this month I am leading a team to Washington, D.C., yet again, asking that Congress and the White House fully fund the Road Home program and help restore hundreds of thousands of homes wiped out by hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

I must thank the House and Senate leadership and our Louisiana Delegation for committing to fulfill our unmet needs. As a result of our earlier efforts on Capitol Hill this year, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Majority Whip Jim Clyburn and a delegation from Congress stood in St. Bernard Parish this August, pledging to form a new partnership for Gulf Coast recovery.

That pledge includes funding for housing which gives me great hope that Louisiana has not been forgotten.

But now the real battle begins as we work to gather enough support in Washington to deliver on this promise.

Without the necessary additional resources, thousands of hurricane victims will not be able to complete their rebuilding, and widespread blight and neglected homes will be a tragic legacy of this experience.

We have an opportunity to build on the momentum of the Road Home program by shoring up its budget. I hope you will join me in calling on Congress and the White House to finish the job.