The Federal Emergency Management Agency last week awarded more than $52 million of new funding to New Orleans to repair neighborhood streets in areas of the city most severely damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
The new round of funding follows FEMA’s award of $45 million in August for street repairs in the Lower Ninth Ward. To date, New Orleans has received a total of $128 million from FEMA for street and sidewalk damages.
Mayor Mitch Landrieu said much of the damage is a result of sitting water that put pressure on the street surfaces and subsurface water and sewer lines.
“This new funding will not solve all of our street and water problems, but it will go a long way helping resurface streets in some of our most impacted neighborhoods,” Landrieu said.
In addition to damage from the flood waters, FEMA agreed with New Orleans that its streets were further damaged during recovery efforts by heavy emergency vehicles and construction trucks.
Road and sidewalk assessments have been completed for 45 of the city’s 73 neighborhoods. Others are underway.
When Landrieu took office in 2010, he created a joint task force with officials from the city, the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board, FEMA, and the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness.
City, state, and FEMA officials have had 275 meetings and site visits since the task force was established, he said.
