Ironic, isn't it? Alabama is noted for so many bad things, including poor education. Yet this is the position on which this mayor has decided to take a stand: CORDOVA, Ala. – James Ruston's house was knocked off its foundation by tornadoes that
May 30, 2011

Ironic, isn't it? Alabama is noted for so many bad things, including poor education. Yet this is the position on which this mayor has decided to take a stand:

CORDOVA, Ala. – James Ruston's house was knocked off its foundation by tornadoes that barreled through town last month and is still uninhabitable. He thought help had finally arrived when a truck pulled up to his property with a mobile home from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Then he got the call: Single-wide mobile homes, like the FEMA one, are illegal in the city of Cordova.

The city's refusal to let homeless residents occupy temporary housing provided by FEMA has sparked outrage in this central Alabama town of 2,000, with angry citizens filling a meeting last week and circulating petitions to remove the man many blame for the decision, Mayor Jack Scott.

Ruston and many others view the city's decision as heartless, a sign that leaders don't care that some people are barely surviving in the rubble of a blue-collar town.

"People have to live somewhere. What's it matter if it's in a trailer?" asked Felicia Boston, standing on the debris-strewn lot where a friend has lived in a tent since a tornado destroyed his home on April 27.

Scott has heard all the complaints, and he isn't apologizing. He said he doesn't want run-down mobile homes parked all over town years from now.

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