6 Years Later, Katrina Victims Fight FEMA Debts

6 Years Later, Katrina Victims Fight FEMA Debts

USAToday | 12/28/2011

Excerpts:

NEW ORLEANS (AP) – “When the Federal Emergency Management Agency mailed out 83,000 debt notices this year to victims of Hurricane Katrina and other 2005 storms, one of the letters showed up in David Bellinger's mailbox. Bellinger, who is blind, needed a friend to read it and break the news that FEMA wants him to pay back more than $3,200 in federal aid he received after Katrina.

I nearly had a stroke," recalls the 63-year-old, who moved to Atlanta after the storm wrecked his New Orleans home. "I'm totally blind. I subsist entirely on a Social Security disability check. If I have to pay this money back, it would pretty much wipe out all the savings I have."

Many other Gulf Coast hurricane victims are in the same position, angry and frustrated at the prospect of repaying money they spent years ago as they tried to rebuild their lives.

FEMA is seeking to recover more than $385 million it says was improperly paid to victims of hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. The debts, which average about $4,622 per recipient, represent slightly less than 5 percent of the roughly $8 billion that FEMA distributed after the storms. At least some of the overpayments were due to FEMA employees' own mistakes, ranging from clerical errors to failing to interview applicants, according to congressional testimony.

But the agency says it is required by law to make an effort to recover improper payments, even if the recipient wasn't at fault. Last week, however, Congress approved legislation that would allow FEMA to waive many of the debts. President Barack Obama signed the measure - part of a $1 trillion spending package - into law last Friday.

FEMA spokeswoman Rachel Racusen said the agency is reviewing the law's provisions and developing a plan to implement them. It remains to be seen how many recipients of FEMA money could benefit from the change.

Sen. Mary Landrieu, a Louisiana Democrat who sponsored the provision, said disaster victims shouldn't be punished because FEMA was "dysfunctional."

Lubertha Haskin, a Gulfport, Miss., resident who turned 80 on Dec. 27, received about $8,000 from FEMA to repair some of Katrina's damage to her home and replace belongings. In October, FEMA sent her a debt letter that said her insurer had covered the same costs, a claim Haskin denies.

Haskin said she hadn't heard from the agency in five years and never suspected she could have to pay back the money. "I was knocked for a loop," she said. "I don't have that kind of money. I have a lot of doctor's bills and other bills to pay."

U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said the recoupment process is flawed. Many debt letters have been returned as "undeliverable," meaning some people moved and don't even know they owe money, he said.

"Most of these individuals went through a lot of trauma," Thompson said. "For our government to all of a sudden say, ‘We made a mistake, you owe us money,' that's not how it should be done.’ "

read full article:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2011-12-28/fema-debt-repayment/52252354/1
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The disaster of 2005 Hurricane Katrina on New Orleanians will resound in future history books, as thousands of victims drowned while waiting for help, as our president GW Bush, played golf. Now 6 years later they sent out over 83,000 bills to survivors from a dysfunctional FEMA division saying: “We made a mistake and you owe us thousands of dollars that we gave you in error.”

It is scandalous enough the callous way our government handled the storm, but to make the survivors relive their trauma of losing everything in the wake of the storm, then living in substandard, chemically treated trailers for months while waiting the clean-up of the city…then finally getting their lives back together, the y get a bill from FEMA for thousands of dollars 6 years after the event because of a clerical error THEY made.

This is not justice, but a gross caricature of the justice that every American should have a right to, but instead thy are handed a bill for what was a dysfunctional agency’s negligence. Where is the justice?

 

They should review the list and try to assist these folk. I disagree that George Bush did a disservice to these people , it was the NO mayor and a LA Governor who are to blame , the able bodied should of helped themselves , to me it shows how helpless people become when dependent on the Government .

 

$8 billion was paid to Katrina victims who 'qualified' for aid. $385 million of that was mistakenly paid to those who did not qualify for aid. Why should they not pay it back?

You pay a clerk with a $10 dollar bill. The clerk gives you change for a $20. by mistake.

Keeping the $10 error is STEALING.

 

LOL, have fun with that! A great portion of those affected were poor to begin with, and I doubt their situation has improved much.

I wonder if FEMA will go so far as to keep selling the debt to debt collection agencies?

 

To all:

To say that the 'rogue' president GW Bush was not directly responsible for the pain, anguish and suffering of New Orleanians during and after Hurricane Katrina, is attempting to shove respnsibility away from another republican presidential failure and on to anyone else they can. Same for 9/11...even casual red-eye travelers heard about a plot to hijack planes and fly them into buildings preceding 9/11. As president of the United States GW Bush was solely responsible for both failures, that amounted to over 7,000 deaths.

We could go on for all of Bush's 8 years as the out of touch, Yalie 'cheer- leader,' drunken sot, rehabbed moron, who the United States Supreme Court gave the presidency to in 2000. That's when all our problems began, with the Messenger of Death which is Bush...how many deaths is he directly responsible for?

All roads lead back to Bush.

 

TOTAL national debt increase under 8 years (96 months) of Bush $4,899,100,310,608.44
That is $51,032,294,902.17 per month

Total national debt increase of national debt under b.o. [34 months] $4,499,021,927,484.11.

That is $132,324,174,337.77 per month.

The insane b.o. is wasting money at a rate 2.6 times Bush and SPENDING was a major complaint that liberals had about Bush. And before any loony liberal tries the standard excuse, there was not one penny not paid by Bush but paid by b.o. NOT A PENNY. THE FAMOUS LIBERAL LIE that Bush's wars were off budget has nothing to do with increasing the national debt. The first YEAR of the war was 'off budget' because it was not planned in the budget the previous year. But every cent spent was paid and/or added to the national debt. b.o. has not paid a cent owed from Bush. All b.o.'s waste, IS b.o.'s waste.
Another way to look at it. ALL presidents, Washington thru Bush, 220 years, racked up $10 TRILLION in debt. b.o. has racked up $4.5 TRILLION of new debt, in 34 months.

Bush was bad, b.o. is much, much worse!

 

They can't sue the hurracaine, but they can get some monies off the ones who polluted their gulf with oil.

 

Agent, if you mistakenly wrote a check to someone for $1800 instead of $180 should they be able to keep the extra money?

 

Then why doesn't President Obama wave his wand and make it right for these people ? or will their let the government do it mentality hurt them again

 

Hi, we're the government and we're here to help.

 

The taxpayers will never see the bulk of that money again.

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the Feds won't bother to send more notices, they will do the exact same thing that they do to defaulted student loans, and IRS overpayments....they'll keep tax refunds from now until judgment day until the debt is paid off (with reasonable interest).

 

The student loan bubble burst is next.

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hey, if they can't pay, Uncle Sugar will just keep their refunds until they can. hell, it's not like it's real money.

 

So the tax refunds are NOT "real money"?

That doesn't pay back the debt???

 

Of course the govt won't get back a fraction of the money they overpaid, but it's absolutely necessary for them to try. People who don't have it will be written off.

This thread is just a thinly veiled excuse to bash George Bush.

 

none of it is real, just electronic fund transfers. when a trillion dollars got printed for TARP, it wasn't printed. the Fed just added zeros to banks' accounts. don't you wish we could do that?

why didn't TARP cause inflation? $2T had just vanished. $1T from the housing market, and $1T from the stock market correction.

OTOH, if they can't afford to make any payment, most of their refund would be Earned Income Credit. "money" that they didn't have to begin with.

 

They have to make the 53% bar first.

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GW, Congress, and 0 for that matter, had/have very little control over the bureaucracies that really run the country.

 

LMAO so you agree that the government was to blame, but the blame stopped at the state level? That might be an acceptable notion pre civil war, but these days national disasters are handled by the national government.

 

everyone with a paycheck has withholding....unless they play the exemptions right.

 

Not if it takes five years for anyone to notice. Though to be fair anyone that was filing fraudulent claims is certainly in the wrong, but that regress should be taken up criminally (if the payment was large enough), and not presented as a bill. Fraud is a crime in this nation, debt isn't.

 

Never understood why folks that owed the fed didn't file a W-4 with lots of exemptions? For that matter I try my darnedest to file a return with -0- in the taxes due/owed on my return with my leaning toward owing a little vs being owed. Them bleeps aint gonna keep my money interest free. Dang I almost sound right wing there.

 

It's doubtful the 80 yr old woman in the OP gets a tax refund. Or anybody on disability. The money will be written off... but first they've gotta prove they can't pay it back.

It's the American way!!!

 

Anybody who's on the IRS' radar, i.e., owes them money, couldn't get away with upping their exemptions very long. Where other agencies might be easy to fool, IRS agents are pitbulls with nothing to do but come after your money.