Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Mobile Home Owners Offered Aid : Quake: FEMA will help restore up to 800 residences knocked off their foundations. But first the agency must find owners’ whereabouts.

City officials are having difficulty finding hundreds of mobile home residents displaced by last month’s earthquake who are now eligible for free repairs to their damaged dwellings.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will spend between $4 million and $6 million to restore up to 800 mobile homes that were knocked off their foundations in Santa Clarita during the Northridge quake, city officials estimate.

But in order for the work to be done, residents must first approve it. The city says many of them have disappeared.

“Who knows where all these people are?” said city spokeswoman Gail Foy. “But they’re gone, and somehow we’ve got to find them.”

Park managers and city officials say many residents are probably staying with relatives or in local motels but have failed to leave forwarding addresses.

Besides being raised and leveled, damaged homes will be better braced against wind and seismic shaking under the FEMA grant program. Residents who have already paid for such repairs or improvements may be eligible for federal reimbursements, officials said.

Nearly 10% of the 51,062 mobile homes in Los Angeles County were declared uninhabitable as a result of the quake, sparking renewed debate over whether costly additional safety measures should be required by the state.

In Santa Clarita, an estimated 1,800 mobile homes were rocked off their foundations, planning officials said. Several hundred are still down and without gas and water.

Art Henry, manager of Cordova Estates mobile home park in Canyon Country, said gas was being restored to many homes in his park as late as Tuesday. The restoration of service will probably bring former residents back to their homes.

“News travels fast,” he said. “So I think things will start coming together a little better now.”

City officials said they hope to have all the downed mobile homes restored by the end of March.