Senator questions some New Orleans Katrina aid requests
Kingfisher
Hurricane Katrina questioned whether post-storm requests by New Orleans city
officials for golf carts, air conditioners and travel assistance were
necessary.
Documents released Thursday by Republican aides to a Senate committee show
that New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin's administration also asked for hundreds of
laptop computers, patrol cars, handcuffs and guns for police. The flooded
city was ransacked by some looting after the August 29 storm, and many of
its police cars and other vehicles and equipment were destroyed.
"They struck me as not the typical request," said Sen. Susan Collins,
R-Maine, chairing a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Committee hearing that examined Federal Emergency Management Agency's
response operations.
"Are these typical of the requests that you would expect to get from state
and local governments to FEMA in the aftermath of a disaster?" Collins
asked.
Responded Scott Wells, FEMA's top coordinator in Louisiana: "I think this is
an indication of a lack of understanding -- this came from the local
level -- of what FEMA is there for, what we can do."
He added: "We got, literally, hundreds and hundreds of requests like this,
intermingled with valid requests."
A call to Nagin's office for a response was not immediately returned.
But e-mails from state officials also released by the Senate indicate
confusion over how to ask for enough resources to ensure that needs were
met.
"I am going to ask if there isn't some blanket 'FEMA do everything possible
everywhere' request," Stephanie Leger, a Washington-based aide to Louisiana
Gov. Kathleen Blanco, wrote in a Sept. 3 e-mail.
"FEMA, while I know they are great, sound like they could really hit us hard
if we don't ask for the kitchen sink," Leger wrote in the message to Blanco
chief of staff Andy Kopplin.
The documents detail requests from city officials immediately after the
storm, including:
a.. One hundred laptop computers, 200 Crown Victoria cruisers, 300
bulletproof vests, 400 hundred semiautomatic guns, 1,000 handcuffs, 1,500
military boots and 2,000 uniforms for city police;
a.. Ten gas-powered golf carts to transport firefighters around staging
areas at the Zephyr baseball field in New Orleans;
a.. At least one air conditioning unit for City Hall offices.
A month later, in October, city and state officials asked for more
Katrina-related aid, including:
a.. A miniature bus for Nagin and approximately 20 employees to travel to
Shreveport, La. The request on Oct. 11 noted that the bus needed to come
with fuel, meals and lodging. It was rejected by FEMA as "not within the
best financial interest of the federal or state government," according to a
request document.
a.. A taxi ride from a Baton Rouge hospital to a local shelter for one
person. That request was returned to Louisiana state social services
officials for "local action."
FEMA preparations faulted
The Senate hearing also focused on whether FEMA officials were adequately
prepared to respond to the storm.
At issue was a June 2004 memo by regional FEMA leaders warning that their
national emergency response teams were unprepared for a major disaster, and
were operating under outdated plans.
FEMA has said that the teams were redesigned in May to make them more
responsive, changes that spokeswoman Nicol Andrews said "certainly addressed
the process of making them more efficient and effective."
Noted Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Connecticut: "Look, bottom line, it would
appear, from your statements, that FEMA was lacking a plan, communications,
appropriate personnel and various other assets that deal with a catastrophic
disaster of this kind."
"I can't help believe that trained and ready teams, people who have worked
together, would not have made some difference in a positive way," said
William Carwile, who retired from FEMA in October after helping coordinate
the agency's Katrina response in Mississippi. Carwile also wrote the 2004
memo.
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