Hood seeks to continue State Farm probe

Asks judge to remove prohibition
By ANITA LEE
January 24, 2008



Mississippi's current and former attorneys general are back on the offensive against State Farm insurance companies.

Attorney General Jim Hood is asking a federal judge to dissolve a court order that prevents him from continuing a criminal investigation involving State Farm. Hood said the investigation is not related to a 2006 criminal probe by his office into State Farm's handling of policyholders' Hurricane Katrina claims. Former Attorney General Mike Moore, a mentor to Hood, filed a sworn statement to back Hood's assertion that the 2006 investigation was not intended to coerce State Farm into a settlement of policyholder claims.

Court records indicate State Farm and Hood disagree over a subpoena for State Farm records Hood wants for his current criminal investigation. The investigation involves State Farm's handling of National Flood Insurance Program claims, also the subject of federal inquiries, according to a December letter State Farm wrote Hood objecting to the subpoena.

State Farm said the subpoena violates a January 2007 agreement with Hood to end a criminal investigation into the company's Katrina claims-handling practices in exchange for a global settlement with Coast policyholders.

Hood said the agreement applied to his 2006 investigation, but the company has no right to "blanket immunity from any criminal acts related to Hurricane Katrina."

U.S. District Judge David C. Bramlette III is expected to reconvene a hearing in Jackson to consider whether he should lift suspension of Hood's investigation.

State Farm has accused Hood of using the threat of criminal prosecution to coerce settlement of claims for policyholders represented by his political allies, including attorney Richard "Dickie" Scruggs and Moore.

Moore said in a sworn statement he and Hood did not use the threat of criminal prosecution to coerce State Farm into the proposed global settlement with policyholders in January 2007. Instead, Moore said, State Farm introduced the criminal investigation into settlement talks, not Hood. Moore said State Farm would agree to resolve policyholder claims only if the investigation ended.

Moore also has filed a separate document in a policyholders' lawsuit, describing his role as "facilitator and negotiator" between parties to the proposed global settlement. He said State Farm encouraged him to explain the settlement in a federal court hearing, after which U.S. District Judge L.T. Senter Jr. rejected the agreement. The Scruggs Katrina Group of attorneys already had reached a settlement with State Farm in November 2006 on behalf of 640 clients, which Moore says led to negotiations for a global settlement applying to all Coast policyholders.

Moore and Scruggs also worked together in the 1990s, while Moore was attorney general, to reach landmark settlement of a lawsuit they filed against tobacco companies on the state's behalf.

Scruggs and two other members of his Oxford law firm were indicted in late November on charges they conspired to bribe a state court judge in a dispute over legal fees earned from the 2006 settlement with State Farm. Jackson attorney John G. Jones filed the lawsuit in March, after his firm withdrew from SKG.

As a result of the federal indictment, the Scruggs attorneys also withdrew from SKG, which then changed its name to the Katrina Litigation Group.

State Farm has asked that Scruggs Katrina Group, and now the Katrina Litigation Group, be removed from policyholder cases, alleging ethical and legal improprieties. KLG also has denied any improprieties.

Senter, who is presiding over policyholder lawsuits filed in Gulfport, is expected to decide whether the KLG should be disqualified.

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Mississippi to Use Some Hurricane Aid for Housing Program

By LESLIE EATON
January 24, 2008

As Mississippi awaits a decision on whether it can spend $600 million of federal hurricane relief on a controversial plan to rebuild and expand a shipping port, the state has added $100 million of federal aid to a program to develop housing for low- and moderate-income workers.

The addition, which brings the housing program to $250 million, will produce more than 2,500 housing units, said Gov. Haley Barbour, who announced the increase on Tuesday.

Though it has been widely praised for the speed of its hurricane recovery effort, Mississippi has been criticized by religious and civic groups for slighting the needs of the poor. Congress gave the state $5.5 billion in hurricane recovery grants, with the proviso that half of it should be used to help low-income families, but critics say that less than a quarter of the money is being used that way.

The new allocation may not dampen that criticism because the money is being transferred from another program that was supposed to help the poor by giving grants to low-income homeowners whose houses flooded in Hurricane Katrina’s storm surge. That program received fewer applications than expected, the governor’s spokesman, Pete Smith, wrote in an e-mail message.

The state has distributed about $217 million in grants to more than 3,000 applicants to that program, according to data from the Mississippi Development Authority. A larger program, which primarily serves wealthier homeowners, has distributed more than $1 billion to more than 15,000 homeowners.

Advocates for the poor said that they were concerned that not everyone who qualified for a rebuilding grant had received one, and that in any event the state was still not committing enough money to programs to replace low-income housing, to help renters or to assist people whose houses were damaged by wind rather than flooding.

“Washington is really examining how successful Mississippi’s recovery is for all of its citizens,” said Kimberly Miller, state policy specialist for Oxfam America in Biloxi.

Her group has urged the Department of Housing and Urban Development to reject the state’s bid to use hurricane recovery money to expand the port, in Gulfport, which was damaged by the hurricane.

The state has asked the agency to waive a rule that limits economic development spending to about $50,000 per job created.

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Former Miss. insurance commissioner joins Adams & Reese

January 22, 2008
By Rebecca Mowbray

Former Mississippi Insurance Commissioner George Dale has joined former Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Robert Wooley on the lobbying staff of the law firm of Adams & Reese LLP, further developing the firm's insurance regulation specialty.

Dale, the nation's longest serving insurance commissioner, was ousted in the Mississippi Democratic primary in August after eight terms and 32 years on the job amid public frustration over Hurricane Katrina. He is working in the firm's Jackson office as a non-lawyer senior governmental affairs adviser and a member of the governmental relations team.

In February 2006, Wooley, an attorney, joined Adams & Reese in Baton Rouge after he left his post as insurance commissioner six months after Hurricane Katrina and mid-way through his term. He works of counsel on the governmental relations team of the special business services group.

The New Orleans-based Adams & Reese is one of the largest law firms in the South with offices in Baton Rouge; Birmingham and Mobile, Ala.; Jackson, Miss.; Houston; Memphis and Nashville, Tenn.; as well as Washington, D.C.

In Louisiana, it has an impressive roster of insurance clients, including State Farm, Allstate, USAA, Audubon Insurance Co., Balboa Insurance Group, Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corp., the Property Insurance Association of Louisiana, Progressive Insurance Co., Louisiana Land Title Association, Humana Inc. and Oschner Health Plan.

In press release on his hire, Adams & Reese touted Dale's knowledge of the insurance industry and the governmental process. "George adds strength to our capabilities as specialists in insurance regulatory matters, in Mississippi and beyond .Â¥.Â¥. His presence will further develop and compliment our regional and national specialized governmental relations practice."

Dale said that he has always tried to work in the best interests of the people of Mississippi, and joining Adams & Reese gives him the opportunity to serve in a different capacity. "I will continue to look after the best interests of clients from Mississippi to Louisiana and Washington, D.C. due to the firm's regional footprint and strength of their governmental relations practice," he said in the release.

Bob Hunter, a former Texas insurance commissioner who is director of insurance at the Consumer Federation of America, said that Dale's new job at a law firm that represents so many insurance interests is another unfortunate tale of regulators caring more about the industry than the people who elected them.

"Nothing surprises me any more. The insurance industry and the regulators are so intertwined. We've had now two presidents of the NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissioners) go directly to lobbying jobs with the insurance industry, and we've had so many former insurance commissioners head off in that direction, it's disgusting. How can the public trust state regulation with all this going on?" Hunter asked.

In its release, Adams & Reese boasts about its tradition of hiring former elected officials and cites examples of former Congressmen, state representatives, judges and even a parish leader in its ranks. It does not mention Wooley.

Last year, audit problems at Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corp., which was created under Wooley's tenure as insurance commissioner, sparked probes by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor and then a federal grand jury.

In a legislative audit advisory council hearing this fall on Citizens, Wooley testified that his "No. 1 priority was not to go to jail" as his three predecessors had. In December, when Wooley was again asked to appear before the committee, criminal defense attorney Edward Castaing Jr. appeared in his place and said that he had instructed Wooley not to testify until the state provided the documents on which questions would be based.

Hunter found the omission of Wooley's name from the release puzzling, given that Adams & Reese says it is trying to build its insurance practice.


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Structural engineer testifies in USAA trial

By ANITA LEE
SUN HERALD, January 15, 2008

GULFPORT -- A structural engineer admitted he changed a report that detailed Hurricane Katrina damage to a homeowner’s property, but told a jury he did so for accuracy and clarity rather than to downplay wind damage so USAA Casualty Insurance Co. would owe less money.

Structural engineer James W. Jordan reviewed several changes he made to the report completed by engineer Roverta Chapa, who actually inspected the property at Henderson Point on the Bay of St. Louis in Harrison County. Chapa and Jordan did not communicate before Jordan made the changes, which was against policy established by Jordan’s employer, Rimkus Consulting Group Inc.

Policyholders David W. and Marilyn M. Aiken claim Rimkus and USAA conspired to defraud them. They want their insurance claim paid in full, plus extra damages to punish the companies. Their lawsuit will resume this morning with testimony from Chapa.

Rimkus and USAA claim the Aikens are seeking more money than they deserve because federal flood insurance paid them policy limits for tidal surge damage, while USAA offered a check to cover what the wind could have destroyed. USAA and other insurance companies exclude such flood damage from coverage, which has led to hundreds of disputes between policyholders and insurers. However, this is the first case with claims of fraudulent engineering reports to reach trial in federal court.

The Aikens maintain a tornado destroyed their vacation home before 25 feet of water inundated the property.

USAA attorney Greg Copeland told the jury during opening arguments that the Aikens simply wanted to maximize their payments for Katrina damage. Their flood coverage totalled $278,000. USAA paid $178,205 in structural and contents damage on a policy that provided more than $680,000 in coverage.

But the Aikens’ attorney, George W. Healy IV, told the jury that evidence would show the companies “intentionally and with forethought came up with a plan to deny legitimate claims.”

Rimkus attorney David Ward said testimony will show the Aikens hired their own engineer because David Aiken accompanied the Rimkus engineer on his inspection and knew the engineer thought water had caused most of the damage. Ward told the jury they would hear firsthand about communications between Rimkus and USAA, so they should not believe Healy. “You can be the judge of the facts,” he said, “not the allegations.”

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Engineer: Tornado destroyed house



By PAM FIRMIN
Published January 19, 2008

GULFPORT -- Hours before Hurricane Katrina's storm surge arrived, the Henderson Point home of David and Marilyn Aiken had been hit by a tornado and was long gone, forensic engineer Charles Ivy told the court Thursday morning.

He agreed reluctantly under questioning by Greg Copeland, attorney for USAA Casualty Insurance Co., that the surge would have been enough to destroy the house if the house were still there.

The report Ivy prepared to back up his findings went under the microscope with intensive questioning by Copeland, who lost patience with the witnesses' often rambling responses and complained to U. S. District Judge L.T. Senter Jr., "He is not responding in any way."

"Repeat the question," Senter instructed.

The Aikens, represented by George W. Healy IV, are suing USAA and Rimkus Consulting Group Inc., which was employed by USAA, for conspiring to defraud them. They seek full payment of their $680,000 homeowner-insurance policy with USAA, which paid them $178,000.

Earlier testimony came from Rimkus engineers. One inspected the Aikens' property and the other later made changes to that report without communicating with its author, which is against the company's policy.

Rimkus attorney David Ward read verbatim from Ivy's pretrial statement that he got data for his report from a preliminary storm model, and questioned Ivy's reasons for not updating it when better data became available as time went on.

Healy's next witnesses were to be Rimkus employee Paul Coleman and USAA employee David Rummel.

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Experts assert pre-surge tornado damage in USAA trial

Testimony in trial against insurer USAA




By PAM FIRMIN
Published January 17, 2008

GULFPORT --Testifying as expert witnesses, a meteorologist and a forensic engineer Wednesday afternoon described why tornadic force rather than storm surge was most likely responsible for the Katrina destruction of David and Marilyn Aiken's home in Henderson Point.

A lawsuit filed by the Aikens seeks damages and full payment of their $680,000 insurance policy with USAA Casualty Insurance Co., which paid them $178,000 in structural and contents damage. The suit claims USAA and Rimkus Consulting Group Inc., which was employed by USAA, conspired to to defraud them. Earlier testimony revolved around whether changes to a property report by structural engineer James W. Jordan were made to downplay wind damage so USAA would owe less money.

On Wednesday, Day 3 of the trial projected to last several weeks, presiding U.S. District Judge L.T. Senter Jr. frequently tried to move proceedings along, one time telling attorneys who haggled over details of intricate meteorological documents that it was "not necessary to go over every bit of the document" and later that "everybody's tired of hearing his jabbering back and forth."

Documents were provided by meteorologist Charles Barrere of Norman, Oka., formerly of the New Orleans area, who said they showed a tornado being tracked by the National Weather Service in New Orleans around 3 a.m. Aug. 29 most likely passed directly over the Aikens' house hours before the waters rose. The eight jurors were able to look at these on monitors in front of their seats.

Dr. Charles Ivy, a forensic engineer from Florida, said it was significant that 90 percent of the nails on surviving beams at the Aiken property were bent in a direction from north to south and that four sturdy frames still standing were "whipped toward the west, leaning toward the direction the water came from. If water caused the destruction, they would have been leaning toward the east."

Court begins today with cross examination of Ivy by USAA attorney Greg Copeland and Rimkus attorney David Ward.

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LA: State Farm Again Beating Up Katrina Survivors

by Ana Maria

There ought to be a national registry of child molesters and insurance company executives because I hold them in the same very low esteem.
- Congressman Gene Taylor

So, let's get this straight. Hurricane Katrina battered homes with its 175 mile-per-hour winds ripping them apart as if made of straw and spit. Then insurance companies like State Farm deliberately and wrongly failed to pay American families for the wind related damages to those homes and the cost of living expenses while the home was being repaired, damages that the wind coverage under homeowner insurance policies cover.

When insurance companies failed to cover the cost of those living expenses, the federal government picked up the tab for the expenses the insurance industry. This unintended insurance industry bailout cost the American taxpayer billions in taxpayer dollars.

Yep, that's what it is: an unintended insurance industry bailout which the American taxpayers funded when insurance industry execs betrayed its customer base in the name of pursuing the Almighty Dollar.

After denying families all or some or substantial amounts of their wind-related claims, after putting these families through an extracted living hell far worse than the damage of Katrina several times over, after forcing many--including U.S. Senator Trent Lott (R-MS) and Congressman Gene Taylor (D-MS)--to hire attorneys to sue State Farm, Allstate, and other insurance companies to obtain some funding for the damages caused by those 175 mile-per-hour winds which battered their homes for four hours BEFORE the water ever came ashore, AFTER all of that, State Farm now wants proof that whatever paltry sum of money it finally coughed up has been used to rebuild . . . or the company will cancel the insurance.

Are you kidding me?!

This is the same company that slipped a tiny clause into its homeowner policies, the same company whose agents were left flat footed when they themselves found out about the buried clause, the same company who never bothered to advertise or explain fully the implications of its "concurrent causation" clause--ya think that was deliberate?--the same company that simply sprung its buried clause on its many customers once the company knew full well that it would have to actually pay out for the Hurricane Katrina's damages. Ditto for the rest of Big Insurance companies. What unmitigating gall!

Congressman Gene Taylor's campaign website has this to say about the industry's buried clause.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, insurance companies purposefully and routinely denied homeowners payment for the wind damage that hurricane force winds had caused hours before the water ever arrived, wind damage that homeowner insurance policies should have covered.

State Farm's concurrent clause states "where wind acts concurrently with flooding to cause damage to the insured property, coverage for the loss exists only under flood coverage."

Taylor's website continues.

Insurance companies had buried in their policies a clause that they refer to “concurrent causation.” Insurance companies denied legitimate wind damage claims based on this buried clause. In effect, the concurrent causation clause said that after the four hours of hurricane force winds that hit the Gulf Coast before the water ever got here, if there was one 2x4 left standing and the water knocked it down, the insurance company would call the damage “concurrent”—meaning at the same time. The insurance company would then use the fact that water had also cause some damage to deny homeowners the right to be paid for the wind-related damage to their property.

AFTER all of this, the company now wants to put Katrina's families through some kind of inspection, provide proof of rebuilding, or be dropped for coverage. In plenty of cases, State Farm didn't bother to provide the money for all of the repairs that wind damage required much less the cost-of-living expenses those families incurred after the storm.

Some of that paltry sum of money it may have provided went to buy groceries to feed little Johnny or a few diapers for little Janie or perhaps some clothes for the elderly grandmother when hurricane winds blew her clothes all over South Louisiana.

A Hurricane Katrina victim leaves no doubt that he would like a visit by the State Farm insurance adjuster in Gulfport, Miss., last year. State Farm said Wednesday it will stop writing homeowner polices in Mississippi as fights a number of Katrina-related lawsuits.
Steve Helber / AP file

State Farm, which some around here call Snake Farm, has already stopped writing new policies in Mississippi. Now the company is moving on to our friends and family members in South Louisiana. Congressman Gene Taylor is so very right to equate insurance company execs with child molesters. I also hold in the same low esteem those who aid, abet, enable in substantial manner like their high priced fancy corporate lawyers and law firms dedicated to protecting and defending these two-fisted greedy gutted goons in Gucci suits.

Note: For an easy-to-read explanation, read Concurrent Causation: The Buried Clause in Homeowner Insurance Policies. More entertaining, though, is a short video excerpt from his Insurance Reform Town Hall meeting held last August in which Taylor explains this utterly inconceivable hidden clause that is the culprit of tremendous misery in the Katrina-ravaged region.

© 2008 Ana Maria Rosato. All rights reserved.
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State Farm Wants Proof Hurricane-Damaged Homes Won't Be Left Vacant

(Photo courtesy FEMA/Mark Wolfe.)
Contributor: Shane Myers
January 8, 2008


NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- State Farm is warning that it will cancel homeowner policies for about 6,000 of its customers in south Louisiana if they aren't able to demonstrate that their storm-damaged homes are occupied and are being rebuilt.


State Farm spokesman Gary Stephenson said says the company's goal is to work with customers who want to stay in Louisiana and rebuild their homes.

The company began inspections last April of homes and apartments that generated 75,000 claims following hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. The company said it has inspected 50,000 so far and expect to continue through August.

State Farm wants to make sure that people are indeed using their claims checks to rebuild, so that the company isn't stuck with the extra risk of insuring vacant or poorly maintained homes. Homes that are abandoned are at higher risk for claims because of fires, vagrants, water pipe leaks, theft or vandalism.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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Most of $4.5B in Gulf Coast aid unspent

By Brad Heath, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — Three-quarters of the billions in federal money earmarked to replace schools, firehouses and other public works after the 2005 Gulf Coast hurricanes still haven't been spent, a sign that key pieces of the region's recovery effort are languishing in red tape.

Reports from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), provided to USA TODAY, show it has approved $4.5 billion worth of infrastructure projects in Louisiana and Mississippi. Only about $1 billion of that total has been spent.

Much of the rest is sitting in state accounts waiting to be parceled out to the local officials responsible for the rebuilding work, slowed by a complex tangle of local and federal rules.

"It's time for local governments to start making the tough decisions about what they're going to build back and start moving forward on the permanent recovery," said Robert Josephson, FEMA spokesman.

State and local officials overseeing the recovery say they are moving as quickly as they can to get the projects finished. Many require months of planning and construction, and navigating federal rules has sidetracked hundreds of projects, said Andy Kopplin, the outgoing head of the Louisiana Recovery Authority.

"Very simply, it's dramatically slowed down the infrastructure reconstruction process. It slows down the recovery," Kopplin said. "Are we satisfied with the rate of construction? Absolutely not. We'd like it to be double that. But the biggest challenge in spending the money has been FEMA's process."

FEMA's public assistance program gives money to states, which generally use it to reimburse local governments for projects once they're complete. That process has created obstacles for New Orleans and other communities, where local laws say money must be in place before work can begin. The city has borrowed $460 million to cover upfront costs.

"This is the first time we've had any significant dollars to push these projects forward," Mayor Ray Nagin said. As a result, he says, rebuilding work should accelerate this year.

Work also was delayed by mistakes in figuring how much repair individual buildings need and how much each would cost, Kopplin said.

More than half of the 27,000 projects in Louisiana have been revised at least once, a process that can take from a few hours to several months, he said.


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Stuck on Stupid: More Katrina Funds Being Wrongly Diverted

Wind or Water?
Image from Mississippi Insurance Forum

by Ana Maria

Are you kidding me?! Taking $3.5 million of Katrina money that the elected representatives of the good people of America stipulated for law enforcement and spend it on the state's capitol, a full three hour plus ride from the Katrina-ravaged Mississippi Gulf Coast? Good grief!!!?!?!?! What is wrong with these priorities?

Recently, I took a trip to Jackson, Mississippi, where the governor intends to spend the money. Everything looked . . . normal. What a joy to ride around and see the area's bright neon lights of area's businesses. Gas stations everywhere. Shopping malls, car dealerships, the works. I even stopped a cop to ask for directions.

Yeah, I still take it for granted that the cop is there to help. I'm from a small town where hearing sirens gives me thrills, not chills. See, police sirens remind me of . . . Mardi Gras! That glorious season from January until the day before the Catholic season of Lent begins. To this day, when I hear sirens, I think of that first. What can I say, childhood socialization is very powerful. ;)

I know, I know. You may be thinking to yourself, "Uh, yeah, honey. What else do you see in a city except those disgusting neon signs trying to grab our attention and blurring the beauty of the skyline? Where in the world has this woman been living?!" And the answer is . . . inside the Katrina-ravaged region, my friend. For ten months now, I've been living in the Katrina-ravaged region, and it is NOT Fun City, USA, either.

Our cities have had to battle with the Republican White House to waive the 10% matching funds requirement usually accompanying federal grants to municipalities. The compassionless ones sitting in the White House and their counterparts in the previously Republican-controlled Congress didn't see fit to use the brains God gave them to waive the requirement automatically--as had been done in other disasters such as 9/11. No ma'am, the American people had to elect a Democratically-controlled Congress for this kind of compassion and common sense to be implemented.

When Hurricane Katrina devastated, demolished, and destroyed homes and businesses throughout the Mississippi Gulf Coast, our tax base was blown away with 175 mile-per-hour winds. Indeed, Hurricane Katrina blew away our home, places of worship, businesses, community centers, schools, businesses, and government buildings (jails, court house, police stations, fire stations, libraries, etc. and so forth).

Then, the Republican-lovin' insurance industry decided to have its way with us as well. Insurance companies like State Farm, Allstate, and Nationwide deliberately failed to pay on wind-related damages to our homes and businesses. Since May 2007, off course, I have written extensively on how the insurance industry purposefully betrayed its customers with abandon denying their wind damage claims and the devastating financial impact this betrayal has had on the every day lives of those of us living with decisions of those corporate greedy gutted goons. [See my diaries at Daily Kos for a quick read through my writings.]

Months ago, Barbour was trying to divert $600 million of low income housing monies to refurbish the Port of Gulfport. Now, the port needs financial help, that is certain. However, the elected representatives of the American people had appropriated for low income housing. Take a drive from one end of the Mississippi coast line to the other and you'll see a whole lot of nothing going on—to paraphrase the infamous words of Jerry Lee Lewis.

The photo from Coastal Cowboy's Mississippi Insurance forum? TODAY, you can go up and down plenty of streets of any city along the Mississippi Gulf Coast to see lots that remain looking just as the picture looks. Images like this could reflect the remains of what is left of someone's beautiful middle class home or a booming business.

See, businesses can't get up and running without two things. First, all things insurance from being paid for the wind damage to their businesses to purchasing affordable and available insurance on their buildings, goods, and business income. Second, they need employees to staff their businesses.

However, without housing for their employees and employees' families, the businesses are up the creek without a paddle. Can't build affordable housing when insurance is unaffordable or unavailable. Watch the short video of Tish Haas Williams, Hancock County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director, to get the message that businesses the insurance barriers removed and need it to thrive. Tish expresses this sentiment in no uncertain terms, and yes, that means passing Congressman Gene Taylor's multiple peril insurance legislation which now requires action from the U.S. Senate.

We need financial assistance just to get to our knees, as Waveland Mayor Tommy Longo says. Help us to our knees, and we'll get to our feet, Longo told the crowd at an early morning Katrina memorial this past August, the second anniversary of the storm.

So, this becomes our dilemma. We need the money for plenty of things, Congress appropriates it, and Republican Haley Barbour tries to squirrel away some of it for other purposes. This is crazy, particularly since the rest of the country thinks the Gulf Coast is back up and running as if Katrina were but a nightmare many years ago. Heck even folks here in the state of Mississippi think we're back up and running. With the governor himself acting as if we're so up-and-running that he can divert money for other needs, how else are the folks suppose to think? Short of coming down here and driving the beach road or through any of the beach towns where lot after lot after lot remains empty, who is going to drive home the point that we're all still working on making our vibrant recovery dream come true? Clearly, the most logical one for that important job is our very own Governor Haley Barbour. He should be the PR ambassador of our plight, our needs, and the torch bearer of our vibrant recovery dreams.

When it comes to this latest financial diversion, I completely agree with state representative Diane Peranich in her assessment of this disturbing new development in the way that the Governor is handling Katrina monies.

Rep. Diane Peranich, D-Pass Christian, who had not heard about the grant to the city of Jackson, said Thursday that South Mississippi should get all of the money, which the governor controls, because the federal government gave it for Katrina recovery.

"If he has given $40 million, it is still not enough, and the money was allocated from the federal government for that purpose," Peranich said. "I would hope that any of the monies were given for law enforcement on the Coast would go to the Coast.

"We're very grateful for the support and help that we have gotten, but we are not whole." Peranich said she hoped the remaining $3.5 million would be spent in South Mississippi. There are still many problems at the Harrison County jail, and many departments along the Coast need to replace their equipment, she said.

I am certain that there are plenty of unmet needs outside of what the Congress has addressed. I am equally certain that Governor Barbour's expert lobbying skills and connections can easily be put to great use to go to his buddies in the White House to obtain the needed funding without this shell game that is hurtful.

More than that, though, I know that down here inside Katrina Land, we are weary. We've been beaten up by Katrina, betrayed by our insurance companies, abandoned by FEMA, and neglected by the White House except at photo op time. We're tired and exhausted just putting one foot in front of the other. My very first blog entry was titled "Like Walking Through Glue." Those sentiments remains true today.

I just wish that when Governor Barbour tries to run off with money that should go to the Gulf Coast, his feet were glued in place. Perhaps then we could see all the money already given for our needs flow more quickly to the Mississippi Gulf Coast rather than stuck inside the Governor's hands.

With so many unmet needs for which these funds can legitimately address, we deserve an intelligent use of these funds as had been intended when Congress gave us the money with the flexibility to address our needs based on our own priorities. When it comes to setting those priorities, the White House and Mississippi's governor's mansion continue to exhibit their gears are purposefully stuck on stupid.


© 2008 Ana Maria Rosato. All rights reserved.
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