Katrina Rebuilding in Tuscaloosa?

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By Tiffany Craig

M60o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr Katrina Rebuilding in Tuscaloosa?

Published: Thu, August 16, 2007 - 4:32 pm
Last Updated: Thu, August 16, 2007 - 9:32 pm

What do Alabama Football and Hurricane Katrina have in common? Not much until you find out that hurricane tax breaks for rebuilding spread as far north as Tuscaloosa.

Alabama's seafood capital is known for shrimping and outspoken people! Jeff Hamilton shook his head when we told him the news. "The whole country's crooked, retarded and ignorant. That's basically the end of it. If you got money, they help you out. If you don't, they won’t."

News 5 took some video of post-Katrina construction in Tuscaloosa to hurricane ravaged Bayou La Batre. Lat Vail looked puzzled, "They're not rebuilding in Tuscaloosa! They haven't lost anything. You have to lose to rebuild."

Eleven Alabama Counties are part of what's called the Gulf Opportunity Zone Act or Go Zone. It's designed to encourage investors to help fund rebuilding of commercial and rental property along the Gulf Coast. It stretches up West Alabama, more than 200 miles from the water!

Stacy Gilder doesn't need a map to make up his mind. "They were nowhere near where Katrina hit! So, why would they need the tax break? That's just something to make their pockets fatter, that's it."

Construction crews are not building Katrina cottages. According to the Associated Press, T-Town is sprouting luxury condos worth up to a million bucks near Bryant-Denny Stadium!

Bayou La Batre Mayor Stan Wright says bring some of that down here. "I'd love to see those condos built here but I guess they'd rather go have them in Tuscaloosa and watch the football game. Is it illegal? No. Is it morally right? I don't know but they took advantage of it and it looks like they won."

Here's a list of counties in Alabama and Mississippi that are in the Go Zone

Alabama: Baldwin, Choctaw, Clarke, Greene, Hale, Marengo, Mobile, Pickens, Sumter, Tuscaloosa, and Washington.

Mississippi: Adams, Amite, Attala, Choctaw, Claiborne, Clarke, Copiah, Covington, Forrest, Franklin, George, Greene, Hancock, Harrison, Hinds, Holmes, Humphreys, Jackson, Jasper, Jefferson, Jefferson Davis, Jones, Kemper, Lamar, Lauderdale, Lawrence, Leake, Lincoln, Lowndes, Madison, Marion, Neshoba, Newton, Noxubee, Oktibbeha, Pearl River, Perry, Pike, Rankin, Scott, Simpson, Smith, Stone, Walthall, Warren, Wayne, Wilkinson, Winston, and Yazoo.

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