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New Orleans' recovery plan approved

BATON ROUGE, La., June 26 (UPI) -- The Louisiana Recovery Authority has approved New Orleans' citywide recovery plan, freeing up $117 million in federal aid for infrastructure repair.

The plan is expected to cost more than $1 billion, The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune reported. City officials were still unsure where the rest of the money will come from.

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Ed Blakely, head of the team that drew up the New Orleans Strategic Recovery and Redevelopment Plan, intends to get a bank loan secured by the federal aid. That means the city can begin work almost immediately even though the $117 million is to be paid in installments over a period of time.

Blakely also wanted the LRA to allocate more than half a billion dollars freed up by Congress and the Bush administration last month. New Orleans' share would be $324 million or about one-third of the cost of the recovery program.

The LRA postponed release of that money because it might be needed to help fill a $4 billion shortfall in the Road Home homeowner grant program.

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