Katrina: Four Years and Billions Later, Work Remains

Courtesy Main Street United Methodist Church

The Main Street United Methodist Church just after Katrina hit and today. The church is dedicating its new steeple this Sunday.

by Ronni Mott
August 28, 2009

On Aug. 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina roared inland from the Gulf of Mexico, virtually flattening the Mississippi Gulf Coast. In New Orleans, the storm proved what experts already knew: The city's levees were inadequate in the face of Katrina's wrath, leaving 80 percent of the city flooded. In the end, the storm displaced more than 1 million people and killed 1,836. The estimated economic impact totaled more than $81 billion.

Four years later, there seems to be few objective measures of how successful the overall recovery has been. The many facets of recovery—public and private—tell vastly different stories.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency says the federal government has spent more than $9.5 billion in Mississippi alone, which includes $2.6 billion paid to nearly 20 thousand policyholders through the National Flood Insurance Program. The Gulf Opportunity Act provided financial incentives for businesses to rebuild or expand as far north as Columbus, and the Port of Gulfport is using nearly $6 million in federal funds to expand. Gulf Casinos came back almost immediately.

A huge part of the effort came from the 750,000 volunteers from 1,000 different organizations, providing everything from drinking water, to shelter, to medical and mental-health care, and child-care to those in need. FEMA put more than 43,000 temporary housing units in Mississippi; all but 455 of them are now gone.

But there's no denying the inequity of the situation for many on the coast who are still struggling to rebuild. Four years after the storm, billions of dollars allocated to rebuild low- and moderate-income housing has yet to materialize, and entire neighborhoods remain vacant. Individual and small-business insurance claims have been particularly prickly, leaving many with no choice but to abandon the area. School enrollment is down by more than 2,500, and only five of the 16 schools destroyed by the storm have been rebuilt.

The economic downturn hasn't helped, either. Tourism is filling only half the hotel rooms, and those shiny new casinos are seeing their revenues fall as well.

There continue to be bright spots in the recovery, however. On Sunday, the Main Street United Methodist Church in Bay St. Louis is dedicating a new storm-resistant church steeple. Katrina ripped off the original 100-year-old copper steeple and hurled it into the street. The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency says that $200 to $300 million worth of new construction projects are in the works.

"There will still be some projects that won't be complete by this time next year, especially the massive water and sewer projects in Biloxi and Gulfport," MEMA Executive Director Mike Womack told the Sun Herald. "Part of the reason is that you can't tear up your city's water and sewer all at once. We'll still have projects that are ongoing three or four years from now."

See additional Jackson Free Press Hurricane stories.