COCHRAN REPORTS $5.6 MILLION & EIGHT-MONTH EXTENSION
OF MISSISSIPPI DISASTER CASE MANAGEMENT PILOT PROGRAM

Extension Allows Mississippi Nonprofits to Continue to Aid Families Displaced by Katrina

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Following congressional directive authored by U.S. Senator Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), the Federal Emergency Management Agency this week approved the state of Mississippi’s application to extend its program to help the few thousand Mississippians who remain displaced by Hurricane Katrina to find new homes.

FEMA has approved an eight-month extension—through March 31, 2010—for the Mississippi Disaster Case Management Pilot Program and up to $5.6 million to work through the remaining open cases for families still in need.  Although the FEMA temporary housing program officially ended May 1, FEMA based the award on the 1,780 households remaining in FEMA housing as of early July.

“Mississippi has done very well in assisting families who lost their homes to Hurricane Katrina, but the job is not done.  This eight-month extension and additional funding give the state resources to settle the last remaining cases, most of which involve those who are elderly or disabled” Cochran said.

The extension is a direct result of an amendment added to the FY2009 Supplemental Appropriations Bill in June by Cochran, who is the ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee and serves on the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee that funds FEMA.

The program, administered by the Mississippi Case Management Consortium (MCMC), would have terminated in May despite significant success.  As of August 2008, about 10,000 Mississippi households remained in FEMA-provided housing.  But the case management program helped reduce this figure to approximately 2,000 by early 2009.

“I am confident that the nonprofit organizations that have been assisting Mississippians in FEMA housing will, with these new resources, redouble their work to serve those families whose housing needs remain unresolved more than four years after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast,” Cochran said.

MCMC has assisted eligible families, including those with health concerns, living in FEMA-provided temporary housing.  The program began with a $25.4 million FEMA grant.