NEW ORLEANS -- Many of the thousands of homeowners in the Lower Ninth Ward, one of the hardest-hit areas in the city, lacked flood insurance because the neighborhood in theory was supposed to be relatively safe, local insurance agents and residents said.
Most of the area sits outside the "high-risk" flood districts designated on federal maps used for insurance, and so, unlike homeowners elsewhere in this low-lying city, most in the Lower Ninth Ward were not legally required by lenders to buy flood coverage.
Those federal insurance maps, however, were based on a vastly mistaken assumption: that the levees and flood walls protecting the neighborhood from inundation would remain intact. When the levees breached near the Lower Ninth, the floodwaters ravaged countless homes unprotected by flood insurance, and many neighbors wonder whether anyone will have the wherewithal to rebuild.
. . .
"I lost two jobs with Hurricane Katrina," said Cynthia Minor, 45, a pharmacy technician who lives nearby. "I don't have any money to rebuild. Who does?"
Among the key factors determining whether a homeowner buys flood insurance are the complex maps created by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and adopted by communities.
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We'll try dumping haloscan and see how it works.