(CNSNews.com) - The Bush administration is being widely
criticized for the emergency response to Hurricane Katrina and the allegedly inadequate
protection for "the big one" that residents had long feared would hit New
Orleans. But research into more than ten years of reporting on hurricane and flood damage
mitigation efforts in and around New Orleans indicates that local and state
officials did not use federal money that was available for levee improvements or coastal
reinforcement and often did not secure local matching funds that would have
generated even more federal funding.
In December of 1995, the Orleans Levee Board, the local government entity that oversees
the levees and floodgates designed to protect New Orleans and the surrounding areas from
rising waters, bragged in a supplement to the Times-Picayune newspaper about federal money
received to protect the region from hurricanes.
"In the past four years, the Orleans Levee Board has built up its arsenal. The
additional defenses are so critical that Levee Commissioners marched into Congress and
brought back almost $60 million to help pay for protection," the pamphlet declared.
"The most ambitious flood-fighting plan in generations was drafted. An unprecedented
$140 million building campaign launched 41 projects."
The levee board promised Times-Picayune readers that the "few manageable gaps"
in the walls protecting the city from Mother Nature's waters "will be sealed within
four years (1999) completing our circle of protection."
But less than a year later, that same levee board was denied the authority to refinance
its debts. Legislative Auditor Dan Kyle "repeatedly faulted the Levee Board for the
way it awards contracts, spends money and ignores public bid laws," according to the
Times-Picayune. The newspaper quoted Kyle as saying that the board was near bankruptcy and
should not be allowed to refinance any bonds, or issue new ones, until it submitted an
acceptable plan to achieve solvency.
Blocked from financing the local portion of the flood fighting efforts, the levee board
was unable to spend the federal matching funds that had been designated for the project.
By 1998, Louisiana's state government had a $2 billion construction budget, but less than
one tenth of one percent of that -- $1.98 million -- was dedicated to levee improvements
in the New Orleans area. State appropriators were able to find $22 million that year to
renovate a new home for the Louisiana Supreme Court and $35 million for one phase of an
expansion to the New Orleans convention center.
The following year, the state legislature did appropriate $49.5 million for levee
improvements, but the proposed spending had to be allocated by the State Bond Commission
before the projects could receive financing. The commission placed the levee improvements
in the "Priority 5" category, among the projects least likely to receive full or
immediate funding.
The Orleans Levee Board was also forced to defer $3.7 million in capital improvement
projects in its 2001 budget after residents of the area rejected a proposed tax increase
to fund its expanding operations. Long term deferments to nearly 60 projects, based on the
revenue shortfall, totaled $47 million worth of work, including projects to shore up the
floodwalls.
No new state money had been allocated to the area's hurricane protection projects as of
October of 2002, leaving the available 65 percent federal matching funds for such
construction untouched.
"The problem is money is real tight in Baton Rouge right now," state Sen.
Francis Heitmeier (D-Algiers) told the Times-Picayune. "We have to do with what we
can get."
Louisiana Commissioner of Administration Mark Drennen told local officials that, if they
reduced their requests for state funding in other, less critical areas, they would have a
better chance of getting the requested funds for levee improvements. The newspaper
reported that in 2000 and 2001, "the Bond Commission has approved or pledged millions
of dollars for projects in Jefferson Parish, including construction of the Tournament
Players Club golf course near Westwego, the relocation of Hickory Avenue in Jefferson
(Parish) and historic district development in Westwego."
There is no record of such discretionary funding requests being reduced or withdrawn, but
in October of 2003, nearby St. Charles Parish did receive a federal grant for $475,000 to
build bike paths on top of its levees.
Earlier this year, the levee board did complete a $2.5 million restoration project. After
months of delays, officials rolled away fencing to reveal the restored 1962 Mardi Gras
fountain in a four-acre park featuring a new 600-foot plaza between famous Lakeshore Drive
and the sea wall.
Financing for the renovation came from a property tax passed by New Orleans voters in
1983. The tax, which generates more than $6 million each year for the levee board, is
dedicated to capital projects. Levee board officials defended more than $600,000 in cost
overruns for the Mardi Gras fountain project, according to the Times-Picayune,
"citing their responsibility to maintain the vast green space they have jurisdiction
over along the lakefront."
Democrats blame Bush administration
Congressional Democrats have been quick to blame the White House for poor preparation and
then a weak response related to Hurricane Katrina. U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.),
ranking Democrat on the House Government Reform Committee, joined two of his colleagues
from the Transportation and Infrastructure and Homeland Security committees Tuesday in a
letter requesting hearings into what the trio called a "woefully inadequate"
federal response.
"Hurricane Katrina was an unstoppable force of nature," Waxman wrote along with
Reps. James Oberstar (D-Minn.) and Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.). "But it is plain that
the federal government could have done more, sooner, to respond to the immediate survival
needs of the residents of Louisiana and Mississippi.
"In fact, different choices for funding and planning to protect New Orleans may even
have mitigated the flooding of the city," the Democrats added.
But Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) suggested that Waxman "overlooks many other questions that
need to be asked, and prematurely faults the federal government for all governmental
shortcomings; in fact, local and state government failures are not mentioned at all in
[Waxman's] letter."
Davis wrote that Waxman's questions about issues such as the lack of federal plans for
evacuating residents without access to vehicles and the alleged failure of the Department
of Homeland Security to ensure basic communications capacity for first responders might
"prematurely paint the picture that these are solely, or even primarily, federal
government responsibilities.
"This is not the time to attack or defend government entities for political purposes.
Rather, this is a time to do the oversight we're charged with doing," Davis
continued. "Our Committee will aggressively investigate what went wrong and what went
right. We'll do it by the book, and let the chips fall where they may."
The House Government Reform Committee will begin hearings on federal disaster preparations
and the response to Hurricane Katrina the week of Sept. 12. The House Energy and Commerce
Committee is schedule to hold hearings on the economic recovery from Katrina beginning
Wednesday morning.
Louisiana Officials Could Lose the Katrina Blame Game By Jeff Johnson CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer
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Hillary Clinton, considered a potential White
House candidate in 2008, has taken a lead role in criticizing the Bush administration for
the sluggish early efforts to dispatch troops and relief supplies to hurricane-hit areas.
She wrote Bush a critical letter and visited New Orleans evacuees in the Houston, Texas,
Astrodome stadium. She held a major news conference before making the rounds of television
stations.
Clinton is pushing for the creation of an independent "Katrina Commission" along
the lines of the panel reluctantly named by Bush that issued a voluminous report on the
September 11, 2001 terror attacks.
"I think we sort of have lost track of the fact this is a government that has to be
accountable to the people of our country," Clinton told CNN. "This is not a
game. This has to be a serious inquiry that people have confidence in that will help us
understand what did go wrong. The sooner we know that, the better.
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