“How many times can the federal government let down the victims of the hurricanes that ravaged the Gulf Coast two years ago?”

That is the question posed by an editorial in the Sunday NYTimes. Everyone is perhaps too aware of the answer. The Gulf Coast is housing 66,000 Katrina victims in FEMA’s huge trailer parks, ironically meant to protect people who lost everything to 175mph winds. The trailers’ inadequacies in the realm of security were just dwarfed by the contents of their walls and air. It has been revealed that the trailers are poisoning inhabitants with formaldehyde, a known carcinogen. The story that no one thought could get worse, just did.

“FEMA, which knew of the problem for more than a year, ignored warnings from its own staff and avoided addressing it because it was worried about being sued.”

FEMA has known about the rising formaldehyde levels (reported as up to 75 times the recommended safety threshold) since March 2006. Less than three months later, a man died of exposure to formaldehyde fumes who had previously filed complaints with FEMA.