Housing Shortage Is Slowing Down Louisiana Recovery

Soaring Rents Drive Out Residents

Thomas Marr spent 11 months patrolling Baghdad in the gun turret of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle. He returned home to Kenner, La., just in time to face eviction from his mobile home park.

"I came home from one war zone to this," said Marr, 39, who plans to start over again in Austin, where his wife and two children sought refuge from Hurricane Katrina.

The permanent relocation of evacuees has already shrunk the local labor pool in the New Orleans area. Now, 2 1/2 months after Katrina hit on Aug. 29, a second exodus may be developing as many longtime residents are forced out by a housing squeeze that has caused rents to surge by as much as 100 percent.

Many landlords are seeking to reclaim and renovate units abandoned by tenants who fled the storm, which wiped out 200,000 houses in the area, a third of the pre-Katrina total. Other owners are reaping a rent windfall from the shortage or clearing out trailer parks to lease land to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which needs spots to temporarily house the displaced. Fueling the shortage is competition from thousands of people contracted by FEMA to come to New Orleans for recovery work.

"The economic repercussions are profound," said Bruce Katz, director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Washington-based Brookings Institution. "The recovery is going to be slowed. Your workforce is not going to be reliable."

A moratorium on evictions that Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D) imposed expired Oct. 25. The next day, constables in the New Orleans area were serving record numbers of notices telling tenants to leave. While renters get their day in court, most lose because state and local laws allow eviction without cause for those on month-to-month leases or if the landlord can claim the dwelling is destroyed, tenant advocates say.

"Early evidence suggests that 10,000 evictions will be filed in November," said Mark Moreau, co-executive director of Southeast Louisiana Legal Services, which represents tenants. That's a year's worth in the metropolitan area under normal circumstances, he said.

"The economy isn't going to work if lower-income people don't have access to housing," Moreau said.

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has asked the city council and state legislature to consider limiting the amount landlords are allowed to raise their rents.

"The housing challenge, both temporary and long term, is the No. 1 issue," Nagin said. "Pre-Katrina, you could rent a decent place for $400 or $500 a month. Now, some landlords are charging $1,000 or $1,500."

If anything, the situation may get worse. A measure that passed the state House of Representatives on Nov. 9 would permit a landlord to evict tenants who left under mandatory evacuation and haven't made rent payments. The owner could dispose of anything deemed ruined after posting a notice on the door.

After complaints from tenant groups, amendments are under consideration for the Senate version that include requiring the landlord to document claims that possessions were ruined.