New Orleans, LA
FEMA obligates more than $51 million to help Xavier University of Louisiana reopen and rebuild after Katrina.

On August 26th or so, we felt like it was going to be just like any other storm, and we made our preparations for it and we felt like we were going to be back in a few days, we'd be back in a few days. But on August 29th the storm hit, we got a great deal of water. In some places, 4, 5, even up to 8 feet of water in some of our buildings. Every single building on campus was damaged. Some of the buildings had more damage than others. We had a lot of wind damage, but in terms of actual water damage, the flooding that comes from the bottom up, there were some buildings that had less. We had to redo everything. But it was a massive cleanout effort. 

In Janauary of 2006 we were back on campus, every office was functioning, we had students back on the campus in January of 2006. Without FEMAs assistance, we would have been so far behind. So just assisting us and housing people early on, that was great for us. So we couldn't have started the work without their assistance, and we could not have brought our faculty and staff back without them providing housing assistance for us. We're pretty much, we're about 95% back to the pre-Katrina level. We are optimistic that we will continue and we will be successful in the rebuilding.