Litigation

NCLEJ and Colleagues File Lawsuit Against FEMA on Behalf of Katrina/Rita Victims Asserting Due Process Violations

NCLEJ and a coalition of public interest and pro bono counsel have filed Ridgely v. FEMA, a class action lawsuit challenging FEMA's policies and practices of (a) terminating housing assistance payments to pay for housing for persons displaced by hurricane's Katrina and Rita, the vast majority of whom are low-income and many of whom are persons of color, without providing adequate written notice and an opportunity for a pre-termination fair hearing; (b) seeking to recover alleged overpayments of prior FEMA assistance without providing adequate written notice and an adequate fair hearing process; and (c) refusing to pay housing assistance to otherwise eligible displacees who FEMA believes were previously overpaid any FEMA assistance.

The case was filed in the federal District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. For press release click here.

As this case shows, adequate notice and an opportunity to be heard before termination, the basic due process protections that the Center won in Goldberg v. Kelly, are crucial because of what has been reported to us as an alarmingly high rate of erroneous determinations of ineligibility resulting in terminations of eligible displacees or attempted recoveries from persons who were in fact not overpaid. Loss of housing assistance can readily lead to eviction and homelessness. A fairer system will give persons faced with termination a fair chance to challenge the termination before they lose assistance.

Lead counsel on the case is the firm of Weil, Gotschal & Manges, LLP. Other co-counsel with NCLEJ are The Public Interest Law Project; Loyola University New Orleans College of Law; the Mississippi Center for Justice; Steptoe & Johnson LLP; the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty; and Texas Appleseed.