Mississippi school district awarded $7 million for Hurricane Katrina claims

From The Biloxi Sun-Herald: The Bay-Waveland (Miss.) School District has been awarded nearly $7 million after a federal arbitration panel ruled that Hurricane Katrina caused the damage to three schools in 2005. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) had denied the district’s claims to replace roofs at the high school and middle school, windows at the middle and elementary schools and siding at the high school. The evidence showed that a FEMA architect didn’t inspect the roof himself, but relied on the opinion of a roofing contractor who examined the roof soon after the storm and said it could be repaired rather than replaced.