Mera Picou and Stanley Garofalo say they're still not finished repairing the damage caused when Hurricane Katrina's winds ripped through part of their property on North Rampart Street.  But they were shocked to see the Faubourg Marigny home on a list given to Eyewitness News, of homes a non-profit agency claims its contractors remediated. 

Using city and federal money, the New Orleans Affordable Homeownership program alleges to have gutted, boarded up and even cut grass in more than 1,000 homes.

“I would unequivocally say that's a false statement.  There was no help,” said homeowner Mera Picou.

“I think somebody's lining their pockets,” added Garofalo.

In 2007, Mayor Ray Nagin urged low income and elderly New Orleans residents to sign up for his home remediation program, a $3.5 million program run by New Orleans Affordable Homeownership, a non-profit group that is actually a city agency. 

A City Hall press release from last year says the remediation program uses "Community Development Block Grant funds to gut and board up to 5,000 homes of seniors and families with low to moderate income by year end 2007."

But did the program accomplish its goals?

Community activist and internet blogger Karen Gadbois started following New Orleans Affordable Home Ownership’s program shortly after its inception.

“The program may not be legitimate,” she said.  “I wanted to see this program work, and I didn't see it.”

Eyewitness News joined Gadbois in reviewing pages of material provided by the non-profit agency, that details every property it claims to have remediated.  One document even lists the cost.  Gadbois calls the information we found startling.

For example, city records show some duplexes in Hollygrove are owned by a man who lives on Carrollton Avenue and used to rent them out.  Under the plan's guidelines, that alone would likely disqualify him.  But the units haven't even been gutted since the storm.  NOAH still says its contractors did $5,000 worth of work to them.

On Jeannette Street, NOAH says it remediated a home in the 8900 block.  When WWL-TV went to find the house, a news crew found an empty lot instead.  A neighbor said the house had been torn down well before Hurricane Katrina.

NOAH documents also show a house remediated at 8741 Apple Street, a property that doesn't exist.  Also on the NOAH list is a house on Willow Street owned by Orleans Metropolitan Housing and Community Development, a charity connected to indicted Rep. William Jefferson and his brother Mose, who is also facing federal charges.

Eyewitness News also found a property on General Pershing Street in one set of records.  It is owned by Clourth Wilson, who happens to work for the City of New Orleans Safety and Permits Department.

When reached by phone at his City Hall office, Wilson told WWL-TV that New Orleans Affordable Homeownerhip did no work following the storm to his house.  He said all of the gutting and boarding up was done by him.

On the West bank, NOAH claims to have done almost $1,700 of remediation to a property at 1301 Brooklyn Avenue.  It's unclear if that property is an empty lot in that block or the warehouse behind it, which belongs to Mardi Gras World.

“I don't think those agencies or individuals or people were applying for free gutting,” Karen Gadbois said.

The owner of a home on Law Street said she didn't apply for help and NOAH didn't do remediation work, even though a NOAH sign recently popped up on the house, almost 12 months after the program shut down.

Gadbois said of the more than 100 properties she has reviewed, only two seemed to show signs of actual repair by NOAH.

So where did the money go?  And why do the non-profit’s own records raise so many questions?

NOAH’s executive director left the agency in late June.  Her interim replacement, Tonya Durden, e-mailed Eyewitness News on Friday, declining a request for an interview.

New Orleans recovery director Dr. Ed Blakely, who said the NOAH program pre-dated his time with the city, added that he actually shut down the program, because it got in the way of the city's code enforcement work.

“I think they did a pretty good job of gutting a lot of the housing in the city,” Blakely said.  “Whether their job was absolutely thorough or pristine, I'm not certain of that.”

Blakely showed Eyewitness News a file that he said NOAH has for every home with before and after pictures, and owner-supplied documentation.

Blakely said he has started an audit of the program to see if it should be continued, but he can't explain why WWL-TV’s research has led to so many questions.

Whether the houses you were talking about were gutted by volunteers or contractors or the contractors went to the wrong address, I have no way of knowing,” Blakely said.

But City Council housing committee member James Carter says it appears to warrant some investigating.

“We want to make sure all of the funding going to this program is operating like it is supposed to.”

Karen Gadbois called this program's intentions valuable to recovery, but said its execution is distressing.

“This one story was, for me, emblematic of the dysfunction of the recovery and the city’s engagement in the recovery, because this was a first step into putting resources into our housing stock,” Gadbois said.

Instead, Gadbois said she is still trying to find out just where the more than $3 million handed over by the federal government actually went.

In its contract with the city, NOAH lists 20 contractors it planned to use for the work.  According to the Louisiana Secretary of State, 13 of those contractors are not in good standing or haven't filed any paperwork with the state.

City Council president Jackie Clarkson said she plans to investigate NOAH's work beginning this Wednesday at the council’s weekly recovery meeting.