FEMA, Slow to the Rescue, Now Stumbles in Aid Effort

[dissention]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/17/na...rtner=homepage
FEMA, Slow to the Rescue, Now Stumbles in Aid Effort

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER and ERIC LIPTON
Published: September 17, 2005

BATON ROUGE, La., Sept 16 - Nearly three weeks after Hurricane Katrina cut its devastating path, FEMA - the same federal agency that botched the rescue mission - is faltering in its effort to aid hundreds of thousands of storm victims, local officials, evacuees and top federal relief officials say. The federal aid hot line mentioned by President Bush in his address to the nation on Thursday cannot handle the flood of calls, leaving thousands of people unable to get through for help, day after day.

Federal officials are often unable to give local governments permission to proceed with fundamental tasks to get their towns running again. Most areas in the region still lack federal help centers, the one-stop shopping sites for residents in need of aid for their homes or families. Officials say that they are uncertain whether they can meet the president's goal of providing housing for 100,000 people who are now in shelters by the middle of next month.

While the agency has redoubled its efforts to get food, money and temporary shelter to the storm victims, serious problems remain throughout the affected region. Visits to several towns in Louisiana and Mississippi, as well as interviews with dozens of local and federal officials, provide a portrait of a fragmented and dysfunctional system.

The top two federal relief officials in charge of the effort both acknowledged in interviews late this week that they too have listened to the frustrated voices of local officials and citizens alike, and find their complaints valid.

"It is not happening fast enough, effective enough and it is not impacting the people at the bottom as quickly as it should," said Vice Adm. Thad W. Allen, standing along the waterfront in New Orleans on Friday. "I have heard frustrations."

[gldstwmn]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/17/kat...nse/index.html

A disturbing view from inside FEMA
Worker: Decision-makers lack disaster experience

The video clip is a must see.

[irishgrl]

Originally Posted by gldstwmn

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/17/kat...nse/index.html

A disturbing view from inside FEMA
Worker: Decision-makers lack disaster experience

The video clip is a must see.

well, thats what happens when you enfold an agency inside another and fire all of the trained personnel and replace them with all your buds....

Im Glad Monkey Boy's poll numbers are down...

[dissention]

Originally Posted by irishgrl

well, thats what happens when you enfold an agency inside another and fire all of the trained personnel and replace them with all your buds....

Read this:

Disaster at FEMA
http://valleyadvocate.com/gbase/News...oid=oid:125880
by Joshua Micah Marshall - September 15, 2005

Of all the sad tales of cronyism and ineptitude emerging out of the Katrina catastrophe, probably none is more telling than the history of FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) under the oversight and management of President Bush.

So let's review the outlines of the story, beginning with the President's inauguration in January 2001. Like everything in the second Bush White House, the surest clue to how the administration would proceed was to find what the Clinton White House had done and then expect the opposite.

President Clinton appointed the first FEMA director with actual emergency management experience, James Lee Witt. Witt went on to reshape the organization into what was seen as a model government agency. Clinton even gave FEMA cabinet status.

Bush lowered the agency's status and put it in the hands of his chief political fixer, Joe Allbaugh, who went about dismantling much of what Witt had built. As he told Congress in May, 2001: "Many are concerned that federal disaster assistance may have evolved into both an oversized entitlement program and a disincentive to effective state and local risk management. Expectations of when the federal government should be involved and the degree of involvement may have ballooned beyond what is an appropriate level."

Tapping Allbaugh, a political operative with no clear experience for the job, was the first clear sign of the importance the new administration attached to the agency's responsibilities. And that attitude influenced hiring pretty much down the line. As his general counsel, Allbaugh picked his old college roommate Michael D. Brown, another political hire with no emergency management experience whatsoever.

Brown was a GOP party activist who had worked for the previous decade as a commissioner with the International Arabian Horse Association. His job was to run horse shows. But by 2000 things at the IAHA were getting rocky for Brown. Indeed, he would soon be fired for what the Boston Herald describes as "a spate of lawsuits over alleged supervision failures."

But he was already thinking about his next gig. Brown told friends that a good job would be in it for him if Bush won in November 2000--as indeed it was.

Once Brown was at FEMA, it was onward and upward. By the end of the year, Brown was promoted to deputy director; his replacement as general counsel was Mark Wallace, another lawyer and political operative who came up through Jeb Bush's political campaigns down in Florida.

This was in the period that FEMA was being folded into the new Department of Homeland Security. But it was also during the buildup to the Iraq war. So once American troops were on the ground in Iraq, Allbaugh resigned from FEMA. And with the help of now-Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, he set up New Bridge Strategies, a consultancy to cash in on the Iraqi contracts bonanza.

On Allbaugh's departure from FEMA, Brown became director, in charge of federal domestic emergency management in the United States.

That left Brown--only a couple years out from getting fired from the job running horse shows--in charge of domestic emergency management for the federal government during the war on terrorism.

Once he was in charge, Brown kept up the same level of professionalism in hiring practices. His No. 2 at FEMA--Chief of Staff Patrick Rhode--was an advance man for Bush-Cheney 2000. His deputy chief of staff, Scott Morris, was a "media strategist" with Maverick Media, Bush adviser Mark McKinnon's ad shop down in Texas.

Now, in the wake of Katrina, it seems even Allbaugh may be getting back into the act. But not for the government, mind you. According to The Washington Post, he was already on the scene in Louisiana "helping coordinate the private-sector response to the storm" as early as Aug. 31--even beating a lot of FEMA staffers to the scene.

Since this is domestic influence-peddling, rather than work in Iraq, Allbaugh's shop is the Allbaugh Co. And a quick look at his client list gives you some sense of why he was on the scene so quickly down on the Gulf Coast.

Back in March of this year, Allbaugh signed on as a lobbyist for Halliburton subsidiary KBR to "educate the congressional and executive branch on defense, disaster relief and homeland security issues." Another client, the Baton Rouge-based Shaw Group, already has a new headline on its site: "Hurricane Recovery Projects--Apply Here!"

Now that Michael Brown has resigned from the FEMA job, maybe the Allbaugh Co. will offer him a new job. After all, he and Allbaugh were college roommates. And I bet the Allbaugh Co. is hiring.