FEMA rejects Katrina Cottages

The Katrina Cottage, a 308 sq. ft. prototype dwelling designed by Marianne Cusato of New York, has received rave reviews since being displayed in mid-January at the International Builders’ Show in Orlando. The cottage — a permanent residence with a front porch, fiber-cement siding, gabled metal roof, and ingenious use of storage and other space — was reassembled in downtown Ocean Springs in late January and put on display for 30 days, after which it may be donated to a displaced family. The hope is that with help from companies that build modular or panelized houses, cottages could be produced in large numbers for $30,000 to $35,000, not including foundation and land costs. A family of up to four could live in the cottage while building a larger house. “Everybody — taxpayers, the community, property owners — wins if victims of a disaster can immediately live in a home they can be proud of and that, over time, becomes an asset rather than a liability,” Cusato said. Consequently, there was disappointment when Mayor Connie Moran announced Feb. 7 that “FEMA has declined to use Katrina cottages for the ‘transitional’ housing site we were considering in Ocean Springs.” Moran said of the Federal Emergency Management Agency: “They are stuck on mobile homes. We have to shake them out of that mindset.” FEMA reportedly received 40,000 requests for trailers in Mississippi by early February, and filled 34,560 of them, a rate much higher than in Louisiana. The trailers, however, appear to cost more than a small, well-built, traditional-style cottage. The New Orleans Times-Picayune reported that “the cost to taxpayers for the trailer’s 18-month ‘life cycle’ ” is $59,800. The comparison of trailers and cottages gets even worse, said Katrina cottage builder Jason Spellings, given that “when you drag a FEMA trailer onto our lot, immediately your property values begin to go down.” New Haven architect Robert Orr, head of the team that offered plans for Waveland during the Mississippi Renewal Forum, was told by one couple in a FEMA trailer that because the trailers are cramped and have tiny windows offering no real views, living in a trailer is hard on a person’s spirit. An impetus for building houses that fit the region’s traditions is a new publication from the New Urban Guild, The Gulf Coast Emergency Plan Book, available at www.mississippirenewal.com. Meanwhile, Habitat for Humanity is trying to build 100 houses designed to fit the look of South Mississippi as quickly as possible throughout the three coastal counties. One complication, Habitat participant Wendy McDonald noted in an article in the Biloxi Sun Herald, is that because of FEMA’s new flood elevation advisory maps, there are areas in Hancock County, the westernmost coastal county, where “it’s getting hard to find land where you won’t have to build on 18-foot pilings.”