The Federal Emergency Management Agency is forgiving anemergency $6 million loan it provided to the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office after Hurricane Katrina. Sheriff Newell Normand said money covered twopay periods following the 2005 storm.
"We just did that in trying to figure out how long our delaywould be in getting our economy up and running," Normand said Thursday.
The principal and interest were initially due at the end of2010, but FEMA allowed a five-year extension. The Sheriff's Office had not madeany payments is it pursued forgiveness, and the debt had grown to $7.2 millionwith interest.
The announcement of FEMA's write-off came from U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu's office.
FEMA is forgiving a total of $286.7 million in CommunityDisaster Loans across south Louisiana after Landrieu-authored legislation changedthe formula by which the agency could provide the relief. Landrieu's announcement states that the old formula, among other problems, "failed to recognizenecessary expenses (and) penalized communities for revenues that are otherwisededicated."