FEMA trailer Totally Explained

Everything about Fema Trailer totally explained

The term FEMA trailer, or FEMA travel trailer, is the name commonly given by the United States Government They provide intermediate term shelter intended to function longer than tents used for immediate shelter after a disaster. They serve a similar function to "earthquake shacks" erected to provide interim housing after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
   FEMA trailers have become part of the cultural landscape and language of New Orleans and other Gulf Coast communities, along with MRE's, toxic mold, Katrina refrigerators, Flood Insurance, and Levee Failure. Throughout the city of New Orleans, they've been the only habitable dwellings in some neighborhoods which received extreme flood damage from the recent storms. FEMA trailers have become a common sight, even in neighborhoods that received moderate flood or wind damage, such as Jefferson Parish.
   FEMA trailers remain the property of the U.S. Government and are to be returned after use; however, in 1995 some Florida residents after Hurricane Andrew "bought their FEMA trailers for an average of $1,100 each." many of these disaster areas were suffering from an extreme housing shortage. The widespread extent of the rebuilding effort caused a shortage of building contractors and materials throughout the region, which further delayed the construction of new housing, and required existing apartments or motels to house the incoming construction workers. In New Orleans, the failure of the levee system inundated the city with standing flood water for several days after the storms. Even one inch of standing flood water is enough to cause an outbreak of toxic mold throughout an entire dwelling. This is especially true because the storms took place in the heat and humidity of the New Orleans summer, ideal conditions for mold spores to flourish. Residents were prevented from returning home and gutting their houses for weeks by local government officials, until basic infrastructure for water and electricity were restored to the city. This gave mold colonies time to expand and cover sections of wall that were not flooded. Concentrations of indoor mold spores pose a serious health hazard and can even cause illness in people with weakened immune systems, such as the elderly and young children.
   Flood damage of this type requires the complete removal and replacement of carpeting, flooring, insulation, and sheet rock. Flood damage beyond a few inches may also destroy furniture, appliances, and other personal belongings. Almost all of these homes also received additional water damage from roof damage, so that roofs also needed to be replaced or repaired.
   In coastal communities, such as Gulfport

Trailer culture

In general, most Katrina Victims appreciate their trailers and commend FEMA for creating the trailer program. So far, all FEMA trailers have been issued to storm victims without charge. FEMA trailers are manufactured from plastic, aluminum, and particle board. As such, they're somewhat flimsy and require more maintenance than a permanent structure. They are also poorly insulated, offer little sound insulation, and are known to sway in high winds.
   Nevertheless, most FEMA trailer occupants had been living in their cars, tents, FEMA subsidized hotels, partially gutted homes, or sharing the crowded homes of relatives before receiving their trailers. As such, the relative personal privacy of a trailer is seen as a vast improvement. FEMA trailers are considered surprisingly spacious, although they've very little storage space for personal belongings.
   Many trailer occupants consider their trailers actual homes, and have affectionately personalized their trailers with curtains, paintings, and houseplants. During the Christmas season, many FEMA trailers have been elaborately decorated with Christmas lights. FEMA trailers have been similarly decorated during Halloween, Easter, and other holidays. Trailers have also been decorated with political statements, sometimes praising and other times satirizing local government officials and FEMA itself.
   FEMA trailer parks have developed into small communities. In New Orleans and other Gulf Coast cities, extended families often live near each other in the same neighborhoods, and several trailer parks are located near the same neighborhoods. As such, many members of the same family live in different trailers in the same parks. Neighbors frequently convene to have barbecues, crawfish boils, and parties for watching Saints Football.

Controversy and problems

However, FEMA's handling of the FEMA trailer program is among the long list of criticisms of the Federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina. Until the summer of 2006, nearly a year after the storm made landfall, many storm victims were still waiting to receive the trailers that they'd applied for. Some storm victims were still living in "temporary" FEMA-subsidized hotels, when they were forcibly evicted by FEMA, even though they hadn't yet been assigned a trailer. This left hundreds of storm victims effectively homeless.
   The private companies contracted to install and maintain the FEMA trailers have criticized FEMA for the tremendous amount of paperwork and lack of coordination within the program.
   But the harshest criticism has come from the storm victims. FEMA is routinely criticized by local residents and local new media for slow response times and bureaucratic errors within the program. FEMA discourages trailer occupants from performing maintenance on their own trailers. But in order to have maintenance performed on a FEMA trailer, an occupant must call a FEMA 1-800 or 1-866 "FEMA Trailer Maintenance" number for the region, produced by formaldehyde emissions from manufactured materials used in construction of the trailers. Residents have reported breathing difficulties, persistent flu-like symptoms, eye irritation, and nosebleeds. Tests on a number of FEMA trailers by the Sierra Club showed some 83% had levels of formaldehyde in the indoor air at levels above the EPA recommended limit. Congressmen Henry Waxman and Charlie Melancon have requested FEMA test trailers and address the issue.
   Some have questioned whether the FEMA trailer program is cost-effective. Some critics have alleged that the millions of dollars spent on temporary housing could have instead been directly spent on repairing and replacing flood-damaged homes. In neighborhoods with moderate flood damage, the money spent on trailers could have been allocated to the homeowners themselves so that their homes could be repaired more quickly. However since there was such an urgent, immediate need for housing to respond to the largest natural disaster to ever hit the United States, (External Link

) the FEMA trailer was a quick fix to an immediate need for housing. Still, throughout the region, FEMA took so many months to install FEMA trailers that they were installed on properties AFTER the homeowners had completed all of the repairs to their homes, thus rendering the trailers unnecessary. In places like New Orleans East and Plaquemines Parish, where nearly every building had been destroyed, money could have been spent on the rapid construction of large numbers of permanent homes, especially prefabricated structures.

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