Although I do not currently live in Lakeview(just one zip code over), a friend suggested that I post this information to this forum, given that it affects all homeowners in the NOLA metro area who are rebuilding and hoping to stay. This is a letter to the editor of the T-P that they chose not to print.

The 31.7% rate increase in homeowner's insurance rates requested by the Citizens insurance plan does not sound so bad under the circumstances, but this statewide average increase does not accurately reflect what the increase really means to those homeowners in the Katrina/Rita affected areas of the state. Rate increases are granted based on a statewide average. According to the LA Dept. of Insurance, our homeowners insurer, Farmer's was granted a statewide 33.4% increase, effective January 16, 2007. We could have lived with that increase, but, the actual increase to us was over 300%! This increase will add $400 per month to our mortgage, which we cannot afford. . Farmers only paid us $3,600 for damage from Katrina. We did not contest this amount because the majority of our damage in Mid-city was from flooding. If something is not done now to ensure that affordable insurance is available for residential and commercial properties, all of our efforts to rebuild will be for naught; no one will be able insure the properties that they have rebuilt, and certainly no one will want to buy a home or start a business here. All of the money spent on levees, coastal restoration, infrastructure repair, pay raises, etc. will be thrown away if no one can afford to live here. This issue must be addressed by our state and federal government now or there will be no recovery.

I want everyone to know that according our agent, these types of increases are going to affect everyone in 2007. Our policy just happens to renew in January so we got the bad news first. It is nearly criminal that the state allows this type of hocus pocus when it comes to setting rates. If the state AVERAGE increase is 31.7% for Citizens and in our case 34.4 percent for Farmers, but the actual increase to us was over 300% the insurers are obviously lowering the rates in other areas of the state or playing with the numbers. The state needs to do something about this now. This info needs to get out to everyone in the Katrina/Rita affected ara of the state so that we can demand that our government address this issue now before it is too late. . . if it is not already.