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April 28, 2006
Is FEMA History?
Ask this question of folks directly or indirectly affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita last year, and the response would likely be "it was history a long time ago."
Americans remember watching in horror last summer as New Orleans drowned on live television. FEMA was nowhere to be found then. Residents in the devastated areas of Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and southeast Texas didn't see FEMA for weeks in some cases after the storms went through. They went without electricity and running water, and wondered where the hell was their federal government?
Here in Houston, where the city compassionately opened its arms to thousands of Katrina evacuees, that generosity has been repaid by stalling and broken promises from FEMA and the feds. Money spent may never be reimbursed, and recently, FEMA decided to pull out of Houston all together, leaving the very real possibility that thousands of former New Orleans residents will be rendered homeless here when housing vouchers expire at the end of next month.
Meanwhile, back in Washington, where sometimes it is difficult to imagine anyone actually lives in the same world as the rest of us, today's Washington Post covers a new Senate report that has touched off Congressional debate over FEMA's future existence.
The report, titled "Hurricane Katrina: A Nation Still Unprepared" (how's that for understatement?), makes 86 recommendations to improve America's disaster response, the biggest of which is that FEMA "should be replaced by a new National Preparedness and Response Authority."
The Post piece continues:
"The new agency would recombine disaster preparedness and response activities, reclaim power over billions of dollars of state and local grants, gain responsibility for securing critical infrastructure, and restore an emphasis on natural, as well as terrorist, threats. Those functions and approaches were dispersed or downgraded by the Bush administration as FEMA was merged into DHS."
Predictably, the White House (you're doing a heckuva job, Brownie) rejected the Senate panel's recommendations, claiming "we are far better prepared today than we were this time last year, and we'll be even better prepared by June 1." Confidence-inspiring stuff from an administration that has so competently acquitted itself so far. Be afraid, be very afraid...
So, while the noise-makers in Washington yammer on at each other over what to do next, those of us on the Gulf Coast can only wait for the fast approaching hurricane season and pray we dodge the bullet. And the pundits wonder why Americans have no confidence in government these days.
Posted by houtopia at April 28, 2006 10:59 AM