As of Feb 9, 2006 there are FEMA owned trailers staged all over the south waiting to be installed to house hurricane victims.

Thousands are in their final destinations but for one reason or another have not been released to the homeowner for use. Typical reasons include:

• Lack of electrical or sewer hookups
• Lack of handicap accessible stairs or ramp
• Lack of inspection

In St. Bernard Parish FEMA and Council President Joey Defadda recently got in a snit when FEMA anounced that 4,400 trailers or 6,000 trailers requested had been delivered and Defadda replied that that was great but only 2,500 had been released to the homeowners pending installation. Contractors were working as fast as they could but FEMA had only enough workers to install 50 trailers per day. (at this rate St. Bernard could have its trailers in two more months, we'll see)

Thousands more are in staging areas scattered across five states. About ten thousand (the report says 9,000 to 12,000. I wonder why they don't even have an accurate count. ) are sitting on an airfield in Hope Arkansas awaiting delivery somewhere.

In November of 2007 we got an update on the trailers in Hope. They are still there, but now there are over 19,000 of them. FEMA can't get rid of them because ofthe formaldehyde problems. Between rental of the land and payments to contract maintenance workers they are getting expensive to store at over $1 million per month.