U.S. Rep. Gene Taylor promised Tuesday to help frustrated Hancock County supervisors work their way through the Washington maze and unstop funding bottlenecks they say are hampering hurricane recovery.
Meeting with supervisors in the board room at the county governmental complex, Taylor listened to a litany of problems experienced by the county – inconsistency on the part of FEMA officials, the need for a new Health Department building and a county jail, and the lack of a home for the Emergency Operations Center.
All of those vital buildings were lost to Hurricane Katrina and still have not been replaced.
Gov. Haley Barbour and Taylor recently announced $200 million in federal grants for the county to spend on those and other major recovery projects, but no money has yet trickled down. “This $200 million is vital to Hancock County’s ability to bounce back after Katrina,” board President Rocky Pullman told Taylor.