The recovery efforts for the gulf coast region after the devestation by Hurricane Katrina are being hampered by the lack of low cost housing units available. Most of those who lived in lower end housing in the gulf region have found it hard to rebuild and easier to relocate to another part of the country.

The House of Representatives are looking to extend housing subsidies to encourage the development of low cost housing in the gulf region to entice builders to rebuild low end housing. Now the trick will be to see if those people will move back.

I know that in Atlanta, we absorbed many families displaced by the hurricanes and most of them have now integrated into the community and have no plans to move back anytime soon. The lack of economic opportunities compared to a vibrant city like Atlanta make the return much harder to do.

The tax provisions are scheduled to expire at the end of 2008, a date that Reps. John Lewis, D-Ga., and Jim Ramstad, R-Minn., said won’t provide enough time to develop the housing needed to replace the tens of thousands of units destroyed or severely damaged by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005.

“We need to make some tax-law adjustments in order to start the hammers pounding and get the bricks and mortar laid,” said Lewis, chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight for the Ways and Means Committee.

The shortage of low- and moderate-income housing threatens the recovery of New Orleans and other Gulf Coast communities, said Ramstad, the panel’s ranking Republican. “This is simply unacceptable. This is wrong and must be corrected as soon as possible,” he said. via the Times Picayune.

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