Commentary: Road Home success problem indicates population surge

The Road Home program has a success problem.

More people are applying than expected, which is good because it indicates repopulation will be more robust than expected.

But the heavy homeowner demand could drain the $7.5 billion allocated to the program before satisfying all claims. That likelihood was first pointed out in this space Jan. 29.

The Road Home can't catch a break. It accelerated payouts 33 percent to a record pace of 444 per week as of April 30 but no one noticed. That's because it's still too slow and because it took eight months to get up to this speed.

The Road Home program has been bogged down by clunky bureaucracy and its own faulty home valuations, which delayed thousands of closings. It also doesn't have incentive to hustle any harder because the state was soft in negotiating its contract.

An even greater emerging concern as the payout pace quickens is the increasing potential for swindlers to skim more of the dwindling proceeds. It's probable such bogus applications have already helped swell the applications beyond initial estimates of 123,000.

Complicating the issue is title searches have been eliminated at a time when they are most needed.

More money can and will be allocated to The Road Home program. Yet alarmists are acting Chicken Littleish about the projected shortfall.

Take for instance, Roger Villere Jr., chairman of the Republican Party of Louisiana, who can bang the GOP party drum better than anyone else and thus is no stranger to rhetoric.

The breathless way he posed five questions to Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco regarding the shortfall Wednesday in an e-mail blast sent statewide sounded as if he had uncovered a scandal. Other political figures have acted similarly.

With apologies to the governor, I'll take a whack at answering Villere's five questions.

Question 1: What is the amount of the expected shortfall in the Road Home Program?

Answer: $2.3 billion or so.

Do the math. It's simple.

The average award paid so far through 13,753 closings is $75,070. If the average holds for all applications received through April 30, The Road Home will fall $2.3 billion short of the roughly $9.8 billion needed.

Question 2: What is the administration's plan to solve the problem?

Answer: Hope for more federal money. (Not a great plan, governor. We'll need to reallocate CDBG money.).

Question 3: Which administration official first discovered the shortfall?

Answer: This shortfall is no secret. It was first pointed out in CityBusiness Jan. 29.

Here's where it grows really dramatic.

Question 4:What did the governor know - and when did she first know it?

Answer: Hey, that's two questions, Roger.

Prior to Rep. Bobbie Jindal's letter bringing this matter to the attention of the public, when did Gov. Blanco plan to inform the citizens of Louisiana about this problem?

Answer: Please refer to the answer to Question 3.

The success of The Road Home program in attracting homeowners to return to Louisiana is to be applauded. It's a success problem if we underestimated the pull of home on our beleaguered populace. The focus should be on fully funding all legitimate homeowner applications while rooting out all the scammers.

Taking off

The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival is already a major hit this year at the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport.

On the Monday following the first Jazz Fest weekend, 14,490 people passed through security checkpoints making it the third- busiest day since Katrina.

Here is the summary of the top five:

Date Event Number

1. March 27 Cardiologists 14,996

2. Nov. 13, 2006 Realtors 14,695

3. April 30 Jazz Fest 14,490

4. Feb. 9 U.K. charters 14,422

5. Dec. 1, 2006 U.K. charters 14,406

"I think next Monday (May 7) will be even bigger," said Kevin McCarthy, federal security director for the Transportation Security Administration at the airport.

Gross profits

Received unbidden last week a sample of one of the nastiest tobacco products ever marketed but apparently there is a segment out there in need of "dissolvable tobacco." It's a hard snuff tobacco product that promises "real tobacco satisfaction with no spitting." I take that to mean the goo melts in your mouth. I'm a cigar smoker but just the thought of a plug of chaw dissolving in my mouth made me queasy. Ugh.

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