[lbo-talk] where the disaster funds went

[Maria Gilmore]

For what it's worth, I vividly remember an episode of PBS's "Nova" in 
the the last couple of years that was all about what a hit from a 
strong hurricane would do to New Orleans.   Lots of interviews with 
lots of people who have been trying to plan for literally years for 
what was recognized by all as a totally catastrophic event should it 
happen; the city being literally in a bowl and what that means in the 
case of flooding, the disasterous consequences of levees giving way, 
it was all in it.    Those people I am sure knew quite well that 
there would be no way to avoid extensive flooding, since billions of 
dollars had not been spent to reinforce the levees or come up with a 
way to pump trapped water out of the bowl.   I'm sure they knew the 
only thing they could hope to do was to minimize loss of life, by 
getting as many people out of the city as possible.  Amazingly, over 
1 million did successfully get out of there before the storm hit.   I 
saw a figure on CNN stating a guesstimate of around 97,000 people 
still in NO when Katrina hit.    I am sure many if not most of them 
were there because they couldnt leave for some reason.   I am sure 
there are local disaster planners and FEMA people alike who are 
outraged there was no money for evacuating people without the means 
to leave on their own.     What has happened is no surprise to 
them.    Many have known this would happen for years.    It was a 
matter of having the resources to do what was necessary to protect 
the area and the citizens...those resources were never available.


>Bush took New Orleans disaster funds and used them for the Iraq war 
>and for his tax cuts
>
>by Allen J. Burton
>
>Experts knew this was coming, and all the preparations ground to a 
>halt because Bush stole New Orleans' disaster preparation money so 
>he could use it for his Iraq debacle:
>
>New Orleans had long known it was highly vulnerable to flooding and 
>a direct hit from a hurricane. In fact, the federal government has 
>been working with state and local officials in the region since the 
>late 1960s on major hurricane and flood relief efforts. When 
>flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, 
>Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control 
>Project, or SELA.
>
>...after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a 
>trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending 
>pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming 
>at the same time as federal tax cuts -- was the reason for the 
>strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 
>2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of 
>hurricane- and flood-control dollars.
>
>Newhouse News Service, in an article posted late Tuesday night at 
>The Times-Picayune web site, reported: "No one can say they didn't 
>see it coming....Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, 
>serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation."
>
>In early 2004, as the cost of the conflict in Iraq soared, President 
>Bush proposed spending less than 20 percent of what the Corps said 
>was needed for Lake Pontchartrain, according to a Feb. 16, 2004, 
>article, in New Orleans CityBusiness.
>
>On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for 
>Jefferson Parish, Louisiana; told the Times-Picayune: "It appears 
>that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle 
>homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the 
>price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be 
>finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that 
>this is a security issue for us."
>
>Also that June, with the 2004 hurricane season starting, the Corps' 
>project manager Al Naomi went before a local agency, the East 
>Jefferson Levee Authority, and essentially begged for $2 million for 
>urgent work that Washington was now unable to pay for. From the June 
>18, 2004 Times-Picayune:
>
>"The system is in great shape, but the levees are sinking. 
>Everything is sinking, and if we don't get the money fast enough to 
>raise them, then we can't stay ahead of the settlement," he said. 
>"The problem that we have isn't that the levee is low, but that the 
>federal funds have dried up so that we can't raise them."...
>
>About $300,000 in federal money was proposed for the 2005 
>fiscal-year budget, and the state had agreed to match that amount. 
>But the cost of the Iraq war forced the Bush administration to order 
>the New Orleans district office not to begin any new studies, and 
>the 2005 budget no longer includes the needed money, he said."
>
>The Senate was seeking to restore some of the SELA funding cuts for 
>2006. But now it's too late.
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