Post-Disaster Housing Through the Lens of Litigation: The Katrina Housing Justice Docket

Abstract

This Article discusses post-disaster housing rights violations and corresponding litigation following the 2005 Gulf Coast hurricanes. The Introduction offers a brief reflection, at the ten-year anniversary of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, on post-disaster work at the Law Clinic of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law. It also presents a synopsis of post-disaster housing data with a focus on race and poverty. The article discusses the Katrina Housing Justice Docket (Housing Docket) - the author’s compilation of seminal lawsuits related to post-disaster housing rights litigation focused on the Greater New Orleans area and the State of Louisiana.

De-constructing the Housing Docket provides a means for understanding where and how the post-disaster housing rights of low-income people were disputed. The primary goal of this article is to offer a road map of legal contestations to others engaged in post-disaster lawyering for vulnerable populations. The hope is that by building this record, attorneys and other advocates will also build more collective knowledge to achieve justice-oriented outcomes post-disaster.

Keywords: Hurricane Katrina, housing law, disaster law, law and poverty