A plan to increase emergency shelter space in Louisiana by upgrading public buildings so they can house hurricane evacuees was sent to the full Senate for debate Thursday.
Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration is pushing the proposal by Sen. Mike Walsworth as a way to save millions of dollars in evacuee transport money and to avoid the annual haggling with other states over whether they can take people in.
“I think it is important we build additional capacity here because I do not think we can continue to rely on the goodwill of these other states,” said Mark Cooper, the governor’s emergency preparedness director. Cooper noted some of the states that have taken in Louisiana evacuees also have been threatened by storms in recent years.
The Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee agreed without objection to Walsworth’s bill.
The measure would ask local emergency officials to recommend public places they think would work as shelters, like schools or government buildings. The state would improve buildings so they meet American Red Cross standards for shelters.
About $7.5 million is set aside in a separate bill to pay for building upgrades. Walsworth said under his bill, places that take the money for the improvements could be required by the governor’s emergency preparedness office to be used as a shelter.
Sen. Jack Donahue, R-Mandeville, said he was worried that communities would be forced to become shelter sites over the objections of local residents.
“I want to make sure that this bill does not dictate to the parishes that the state can come in, make them harden buildings and make them house these people. We can’t do that,” Donahue said.
He didn’t object to the bill after Walsworth assured him local decisions would guide the shelter locations.
“Your local people will determine what is able to be used for shelters, your local people, your own people,” Walsworth said.
Social Services Secretary Kristy Nichols, who oversees emergency sheltering in the state, said Louisiana residents were spread out to shelters in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Alabama, Tennessee and other states during Hurricane Gustav last year.
The cost to the state for helping evacuees leave was $29 million for bus transportation alone, she said, with additional costs for the evacuees who were moved by planes and trains. The costs are eligible for federal reimbursement.
Nichols said Walsworth’s bill was modeled after a 1992 Florida law that mandated the use of public facilities for shelters during disasters. She said Florida spent $50 million over a decade to retrofit those facilities to be used as shelter sites so the state doesn’t bus its evacuees around the country when a hurricane threatens.
Supporters of the proposal acknowledged it would take several years to inventory public buildings, determine which could be used for shelters and improve them so they meet standards.
Walsworth said he hoped federal money also could help cover the costs of upgrading buildings and said the state would put up additional money in later years for the improvements as well.—-Contact The Daily Reveille news staff at [email protected]