"Based on these briefs and arguments, and on the evidence that Allgood, Davis, and others helping the Parish compiled and submitted to support the appeals, FEMA reversed its position and announced that it would provide complete funding for Unified’s sewage work and the vast majority of the funding needed for its debris removal efforts."

Jones Walker litigators Pepper Allgood and Dan Davis recently handled successful administrative appeals before the Federal Emergency Management Agency ("FEMA") for Jones Walker client Unified Recovery Group, LLC ("Unified").  One appeal will result in a $10.5 million recovery and the other should produce in excess of $24 million.

Unified is the post-Hurricane Katrina debris removal contractor for St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana.  St. Bernard hired Unified to remove and dispose of sewage from the Parish’s storm-damaged sewer lift stations and to remove storm debris that Katrina left throughout St. Bernard. Unable to pay for the work, St. Bernard looked to FEMA for federal funding under the Stafford Act. 

FEMA initially ruled that the prices in the St. Bernard/Unified contracts were too high, and announced that it would withhold tens of millions from St. Bernard’s disaster relief. This would have left St. Bernard without the means to pay Unified for more than $34 million worth of work that it had already performed.

St. Bernard Parish appealed FEMA’s ruling. Acting as attorneys for Unified, Allgood and Davis prepared the briefs submitted to FEMA to support the appeals, and Allgood traveled to FEMA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. for an oral presentation on the debris removal appeal. Based on these briefs and arguments, and on the evidence that Allgood, Davis, and others helping the Parish compiled and submitted to support the appeals, FEMA reversed its position and announced that it would provide complete funding for Unified’s sewage work and the vast majority of the funding needed for its debris removal efforts.