I hope a Gene O at A Sociable Loner won't mind be reproducing THIS important post here:
Help Color of Change push hurricane recovery into the national presidential debates with a few clicks of your mouse.
Join the Facebook Bring the Gulf Coast to the Debate Campaign.
The congressional hearing on the handling of housing funds mentioned in the AP article I linked to in this post would be held by the House Financial Services Committee or by its Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity.
Rep. Barney Frank chairs the full committee. Rep. Maxine Waters chairs the subcommittee.
Contact them and ask them to schedule the hearing.
Rep. Frank: (202) 225-5931
Rep. Waters: (202) 225-2201; fax (202) 225-7854: e-mail form
Mississippi has no representatives on the committee. Contact Mississippi Representatives Gene Taylor and Bennie Thompson and ask them request that members of the committee hold the hearing.
Rep. Gene Taylor
e-mail form
Washington: (202) 225-5722; fax (202) 225-7074
Mississippians can find numbers for his local offices at the very bottom of this page.
Rep. Bennie Thompson
e-mail form (His local office numbers are on the right-hand side of this page).
Washington: (202) 225-5876; fax (202) 225-5898
Financial Services Committee members.
Subcommittee Members.
Change the untruthful story that the governor and his allies are telling about our Gulf Coast hurricane recovery by telling the truth in your own way.
It's an excellent post. Please use the links and contact folks. Coast citizens need your help.
No, indeed. In fact, I encourage anyone and everyone who reads it to pass it on. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks. I appreciate it!
ReplyDeleteDOH!
ReplyDeleteJust went to send e-mails and found out that those forms are only supposed to be for constituents. Since that's the only way I've found to send e-mail messages to Waters and Thompson, I just used Wiki to look at their districts and then used the zipcode finder embedded in the forms to locate an acceptable zip. You need a street and city to do that. Anyway, I did that and made it clear at the end of my message that I'm not a constituent but would appreciate their help. sorry I didn't check those forms out first. Live and learn.
Not a problem at all.
ReplyDeleteThe diversion of $600 million in funds from housing to ports is a great deal if you're a big, multi-national corporation. But given the number of people still stored (you can't really call it "housed") in unhealthy FEMA trailers, and the unavailability of affordable housing on the coast, not to mention the uncompensated losses of those who have soldiered through it all, it seems that the people of South Mississippi are getting a bum deal.
ReplyDelete$600 million buys 5000 new affordable single-family homes and apartments. Or it goes a long way to cut into the losses of those who have been undercompensated by insurance or who have not met the previous assistance criteria.
Congress should pass a $600 million appropriation outright if port investment is that crucial and let the money set aside for helping people recover from Katrina do just that.
James Polk
http://newamericanvillage.blogspot.com/
For more information on Gulf Coast Housing and how Governor Barbour has shortchanged the poor in the recovery, read the report put together by the Steps Coalition.
ReplyDeleteHere is the link.
http://www.stepscoalition.org/