Blanco: Road Home has enough money to pay eligible applicants

(AP) – Louisiana’s post-disaster housing program has all the federal money it needs to issue grants to eligible homeowners whose properties were damaged in hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Gov. Kathleen Blanco said Friday.

Blanco has made repeated trips to Capitol Hill and the White House to plead for more money to fund the `”Road Home” program, created after the storms to help Louisiana residents repair and elevate their homes. Most recently, Congress in October approved a new $3 billion, bringing the program’s total funding to $11.2 billion.

On Friday, Blanco thanked President Bush, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Congress for funding the program. She said homeowners who received money should be grateful they received grants – not loans that would have required repayment.

“We have never seen, in our country’s history, so much money being given directly to citizens,” Blanco said. “I say that so that our people understand the need to be thankful, and be grateful. This (money) is not something they inherited by divine right.”

The Road Home provides buyout or repair grants of up to $150,000 to homeowners with severe damage from Katrina or Rita, which struck south Louisiana in 2005.

The program began more than a year ago. More than 75,000 homeowners have received aid, and thousands more have applied for grants.

Andy Kopplin, head of the Louisiana Recovery Authority, said up to 159,000 could be eligible. All eligible homeowners will likely receive their grants by mid-2008, he said.