LA Times: The Land of 10,770 Empty FEMA Trailers

Fair warning to American taxpayers...this story will hurt your wallet.

...After the Aug. 29 storm left thousands homeless on the Gulf Coast, officials in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama began calling for trailers to provide temporary shelter. More than 100,000 were requested, and somebody decided to create holding areas for the trailers outside the hurricane zone.

Today, legions of wide-bodied mobile homes sit empty at Hope's Municipal Airport, a sprawling former military base. After all these months, storm victims can't seem to get the trailers, which are proving a mixed blessing to Hope and Arkansas."

It just boggles the mind in this day and time," said Mark Keith, director of the Hope-Hempstead County Chamber of Commerce. "There are 10,770 trailers at Hope Airport. That's one for every man, woman and child in Hope, with a few left over to send to Emmet, down the road."...

WTSP in Tampa has a video showing the acres and acres of unused trailers.

On a related noted, BizzyBlog forwarded this USA Today story with a link to a GAO report documenting more fraud and abuse in disaster releif.

Big Government = Big Waste.