Here's what you need to do:

Register with FEMA. You can call 1-800-621-3362 or register on the Web site – www. fema.gov. They will ask for your property damage, name, address, social security number and then they will get an inspector out to assess your home.

If you feel like you need to personally meet with someone, FEMA will be opening disaster recovery centers in the area as soon as they can find places to put them.

“That will give the residents a place to sit down and talk face-to-face with someone from FEMA, someone from the Small Business Administration and the other state and federal agencies who are here to provide the recovery assistance,” said Don Jacks, the FEMA public affairs officer.

Only one person per household should call. Remember that is a totally different disaster declaration from Katrina, so you will need to re-register and you will get a new number. FEMA knows it is hard to get through. They just went in to a 24-hour call center operation mode Wednesday at 8 a.m. and the phones already are busy.

“We've had more than 70-thousand applications here in about 20 or 30 hours or so,” Jacks said. “The lines are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We would encourage people to call on what we would consider off peak times at 3 in the morning until maybe at 7 in the morning maybe at 10 at night or what have you but just keep trying.”

Four call centers are scattered around the U.S. and Puerto Rico expecting many calls. And if need be they will open even more like after Katrina when they took one and a half million calls.

The Federal government declared 37 parishes as disaster areas after aerial surveillance. The list of parishes is on www.fema.gov. It is always possible that more could be added if more damage is found.

“We look at how many homes are damaged, how many people can't to get back into their homes, how many homes are not in a safe secure and sanitary situation which is our priority,” Jacks said.

Also, FEMA money’s are not definitely going to cover your evacuation hotel bills.

“FEMA does not duplicate insurance benefits so they also look at areas for the possibility of insurance coverage’s on these disasters,” Jacks said. “Yes, indeed, they may have incurred the inconvenience of evacuation but those evacuations may have also saved their lives and the lives of their family.”

So, here's what you do when it comes to hotel bills: Save the receipts and let the FEMA representative know about your costs.

“As far as the hotels are going right now, we are looking at reimbursement of hotels,” Jacks said. “That's being looked at, I understand, from our individual assistance program people on a case by case basis.

“There were shelters open. There were many, many shelters open across the state of Louisiana. There were means for sheltering without going to a hotel, but what I would advise anyone to (do is) keep your hotel receipts and go ahead and reach out to FEMA.”

Keep in mind that the FEMA assistance date started Sept. 1st. That was Monday. That does not include the August weekend days of evacuation.

Now here's what FEMA might pay for:

Minimal home repairs up to around $5,000 if it costs more than that you will need to apply for a low interest loan from the small business administration. You will have to pay back that with interest.

There is also grant money which does not have to be paid back. That can replace personal items, such as bedding, clothing, dishes and the like that may have been lost in the hurricane.

There is also rental assistance.

If you can't move back into your home while it's being repaired, you could get rental assistance for up to 18 months. It will only be paid three months at a time.

You will have to find a rental unit at fair market value for your family. Let FEMA know what the monthly cost is.

There is also grant money for medical expenses that you may have incurred due to hurricane.

If your vehicle, which is the transportation used for work or school is damaged, there is some assistance to repair the car to a certain extent. FEMA is not in the business of buying you a new car.

There is also crisis counseling and that is free.

Disaster unemployment assistance also is activated and that is different from normal unemployment assistance. With this, it also applies to self-employed people as well as if a plant or factory is closed because of Gustav damage.

There is free legal assistance.

And mortgage assistance is available if you are about to lose your home because you’re out of work from the storm. FEMA can help with a few months of the mortgage payments.

Here are the differences from what happened during Katrina.

Remember that automatic check that many of us got? It was around $2,300. There is no expedited check this time. That was to help so many people with catastrophic damage get emergency needs met. This time, for Gustav, it's for people mostly in the eye path.

“There is critical assistance in the form of $500 and I just want to make this very clear that this is going to be extremely limited,” Jacks said. “First of all, you have to be away for seven days. You have to be from a parish that's still closed at this time and is going to be closed through Sunday. And then it's based again on a case-by-case basis on the critical needs of these people.”

Still, remember the total amount you can get is $28,800. And that will be in rare cases where you qualify for all those programs just mentioned. That quick $500 will be counted against the total amount for which you qualify.

“Federal disaster assistance is not designed to make someone whole again,” Jacks said. “It’s not designed to make someone like they were before the disaster. FEMA, better than anyone, understands the difficulty, the hardship that someone goes through following any kind of incident.

“But federal disaster assistance is designed by Congress to be a helping hand to be a leg up to help people get back on the road to recovery.”

And this big reminder from FEMA – people need to take personal responsibility and do the personal work to get their lives back together and prepare for the next one that could come.

“We may have another storm, another hurricane coming into Louisiana in the next week to 10 days to two weeks and to have that family plan to have that emergency kit, have that food and water available that will keep you and your family safe for up to three days.”

The designated parishes for the Gustav disaster declaration:

Acadia, Allen, Ascension, Assumption, Avoyelles, Beauregard, Cameron, East Baton Rouge, East Feliciana, Evangeline, Iberia, Iberville, Jefferson, Jefferson Davis, Lafayette, Lafourche, Livingston, Orleans, Plaquemines, Pointe Coupee, Rapides, Sabine, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. James, St. John the Baptist, St. Landry, St. Martin, St. Mary, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Terrebonne, Vermilion, Vernon, West Baton Rouge and West Feliciana.