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Please click send a letter or fax to your Member of Congress urging passage of the Gulf Coast Civic Recovery Act.This bill was introduced in the 110th Congress, but was never called for a vote.
After Hurricane Katrina, White vigilantes roamed Algiers Point shooting and, according to their own accounts, killing Black men at will-- with no threat of a police response. For the last three years, the shootings and the police force's role in them have been an open secret to many New Orleanians. To date, no one has been charged with a crime and law enforcement officials have refused to investigate.
The facts are finally seeing the light of day. Now we must demand action.
View The Nation's video report below.
By MICHAEL NEWSOM - mmnewsom@sunherald.com
A bill with $439 million to restore the barrier islands and $80 million worth of housing vouchers to be divided between Mississippi and other states is headed to President Barack Obama’s desk.
The president is expected to sign the $106 billion defense appropriation containing the Mississippi funds after it passed the Senate 91-5 Thursday. Supporters had to overcome some GOP opposition to non-defense spending in the bill and some Democrats’ objections to war funding. The resistance was much stronger in the House, which passed the bill in a narrow 226-202 vote Tuesday.
U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran — ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee — pushed for the money. U.S. Rep. Gene Taylor, Sen. Roger Wicker and Gov. Haley Barbour have also been lobbying for the funds.
“We can be proud of the progress we have made since Hurricane Katrina, but there is still work to be done,” Cochran said. “The funding that was approved today will help storm victims find permanent housing, restore facilities that were damaged and protect the Coast from future hurricanes.”
With Obama’s signature, Mississippi would get $439 million toward fixing Hurricane Katrina’s heavy damage to the barrier islands, which weaken the effects of hurricanes that threaten Mississippi’s coastline. The work, which is expected to cost $1 billion total, was recommended in a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers study. “The barrier islands act as Mississippi’s first line of defense against the storm surge of a hurricane, and it is critical for their restoration to begin immediately,” Wicker said.
The bill also includes $80 million for housing vouchers. The money would go to households making $20,000 a year or less in several states hit by recent hurricanes. About $30 million of the total would allow Mississippi to fund 5,000 vouchers.
The bill also contains an extension of FEMA disaster-housing case management for the state until March 2010, as some, mostly elderly and disabled Katrina victims, still need help finding homes.
After Katrina, much of the local emergency communication infrastructure was down and in other cases, those who came from outside the area often weren’t using equipment compatible with what locals had, leaving them disconnected. But the bill also contains $100 million that would allow the state to finish a $177 million “Mississippi Wireless Interoperability Network” for emergency communications.
There’s also $49 million to repair the now-vacant Army ammunition plant at Stennis Space Center, which was built in the 1980s but closed by the Army after only a few years. During the 2005 round of the federal Base Realignment and Closure commission, it was recommended the plant be given to NASA, but Hurricane Katrina damaged it and it hadn’t been occupied for several years. The work could cost $114 million. Wicker and Cochran, the states two Senators, voted for the bill Thursday. In the House, U.S. Rep. Gregg Harper, from Central Mississippi, was the only Mississippian on Capitol Hill to vote against the money. In the House, Harper is the state’s lone Republican. Taylor and U.S. Reps. Bennie Thompson and Travis Childers, all Democrats, voted for the bill. Harper said he didn’t oppose the money for the Coast, but was against much of the measure’s non-defense spending.
Besides funding for wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the measure contains $7.7 billion aimed at preventing pandemics, $5 billion in loans to aid underdeveloped countries and $1 billion for a “cash for clunkers” program, which would give grants of up to $4,500 for car owners to trade in their gas guzzlers for fuel efficient vehicles.
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