Eric Umansky

What Brown Did For Us

The  Katrina debacle is  best understood as an  institutional failur;  pointing the finger at one guy's bumblings risks isn't particularly helpful. But oh what bumblings they were:

Marty Bahamonde, a FEMA regional director, told a Senate panel investigating the government's response to the disaster that he gave regular updates to people in contact with then-FEMA Director Michael Brown as early as Aug. 28, one day before Katrina made landfall.

In most cases, he was met with silence. In an Aug. 29 phone call to Brown informing him that the first levee had broke, Bahamaonde said he received a polite thank you from Brown, who said he would check with the White House.

"I think there was a systematic failure at all levels of government to understand the magnitude of the situation," Bahamonde said...

Later, on Aug. 31, Bahamonde frantically e-mailed Brown to tell him that thousands are evacuees were gathering in the streets with no food or water and that "estimates are many will die within hours."

"Sir, I know that you know the situation is past critical," Bahamonde wrote.

Less than three hours later, however, Brown's press secretary wrote colleagues to complain that the FEMA director needed more time to eat dinner at a Baton Rouge restaurant that evening. "He needs much more that (sic) 20 or 30 minutes," wrote Brown aide Sharon Worthy.

"We now have traffic to encounter to go to and from a location of his choise (sic), followed by wait service from the restaurant staff, eating, etc. Thank you."

(HT: Noah)

More Federal Confusion in Katrina Response

From Secrecy News:

WAS KATRINA A CATASTROPHIC EVENT?

On August 30, Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff designated Hurricane Katrina "an incident of national significance," and thereby activated the National Response Plan (NRP).

But did the Secretary also designate the Hurricane as a "catastrophic event," a special sub-category of emergency situations that entails the expedited deployment of emergency response capabilities?

The answer to this question is mysteriously hard to find.

Catastrophic events permit "an accelerated, proactive national response" and may include "mobilizing and deploying assets before they are requested via normal NRP protocols," according to the Catastrophic Incident Annex to the National Response Plan.

"A catastrophic event is any natural or manmade incident, including terrorism, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the population, infrastructure, environment, economy, national morale, and/or government functions."

"All catastrophic events are Incidents of National Significance." However, not all Incidents of National Significance are "catastrophic events."

So did the Secretary designate Katrina a catastrophic event, or not?

DHS won't say.

"When asked if Chertoff exercised his catastrophic incident authority in response to Hurricane Katrina, DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said it was too early to make a determination," wrote Chris Strohm in Government Executive Daily Briefing on September 8 in perhaps the only news story to address the issue.  See:   The answer to this question would help clarify whether the faulty government response to Katrina was a failure of planning or of personnel, or some combination of the two.

This is really part of a  larger  mystery/story around  the fed's response. Knight Ridder has been pinging Chertoff for ignoring the national emergency response plan and thus seeming to  delay  declaring an "incident of national significance." Meanwhile, the White House seemed at least unclear and gun-shy about drawing the lines between federal and state authority.  I don't know why all that was the case. Maybe any adminstration would have similarly fumbled. But I probably didn't help that by the time these big decisions needed to made in a split second, most of the pros had already  left the building.

Myths of the Convention Center

From the Times-Picayune:

Rumors of rampant violence at the Convention Center prompted Louisiana National Guard Lt. Col. Jacques Thibodeaux put together a 1,000-man force of soldiers and police in full battle gear to secure the center Sept. 2 at about noon.
 
It took only 20 minutes to take control, and soldiers met no resistance, Thibodeaux said. What the soldiers found - elderly people and infants near death without food, water and medicine; crowds living in filth - shocked them more than anything they'd seen in combat zones overseas. But they found no evidence, witnesses or victims of any killings, rapes or beatings, Thibodeaux said.

Another commander at the scene, Lt. Col. John Edwards of the Arkansas National Guard, said the crowd welcomed the soldiers. "It reminded me of the liberation of France in World War II. There were people cheering; one boy even saluted," he said. "We never - never once - encountered any hostility."

Whenever communications breakdown, "informal networks" take their place; that's better known as gossip. 

Bush Flubbed $ Cuts for Relief Workers

So suggests the non-partistan Congressional Research Service. Secrecy News has the story:

On September 8, President Bush issued a proclamation suspending the
minimum wage requirements for relief workers engaged in Katrina
recovery operations.

But in order to do so, he relied upon a statutory authority that
has been dormant for thirty years and that appears to be legally
inoperative.

"I find that the conditions caused by Hurricane Katrina constitute
a 'national emergency' within the meaning of section 3147 of title
40, United States Code," President Bush declared on September 8 as
he removed the Davis Bacon Act wage supports for workers in
Louisiana, and portions of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.

But this emergency statute was one of numerous authorities that
were rendered dormant by the National Emergencies Act of 1976, and
that can only be activated by certain procedural formalities that
were absent in this case.

In particular, the President must formally declare a national
emergency under the National Emergencies Act, and he must specify
which standby legal authorities he proposes to activate so as to
permit congressional restraint of emergency powers.

Strangely, however, President Bush proceeded as if the National
Emergencies Act did not exist.

The September 8 presidential declaration was "an anomaly,"
according to a new Congressional Research Service assessment, and
it did not follow "the historical pattern of declaring a national
emergency to activate the suspension authority."

"The propriety of the President's action in this case may be
ultimately determined in the courts," the CRS report stated
delicately.

The newly updated CRS report, written by Harold C. Relyea, traces
the evolution of emergency powers and includes a tabulation of
declared national emergencies from 1976-2005.

See "National Emergency Powers," Congressional Research Service,
updated September 15, 2005 (esp. pp. 18-19):

    

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/98-505.pdf

The President's September 8 proclamation is here:

   

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/09/20050908-5.html

Why would the President deviate from established practice in this
way?

One subject matter expert consulted by Secrecy News rejected the
idea that there was any self-interested motive at work, and noted
that the President had properly invoked the National Emergencies
Act in previous cases.

"I think it's just poor staff work at the White House," he said.

But if it was an innocent mistake, that doesn't mean it is an
inconsequential one.

"The hell-to-pay could come if a union or some affected worker
decides this [wage cut] was improperly done" and files a lawsuit
to challenge it, a possibility implicitly raised by the CRS above.

Meanwhile, taking the President's proclamation at face value, Rep.
George Miller and several dozen other members of Congress
introduced a bill to undo what the President has proposed.

H.R. 3763, introduced on September 14, would "reinstate the
application of the wage requirements of the Davis-Bacon Act to
Federal contracts in areas affected by Hurricane Katrina."

Katrina Oversight Watch

The watchdog folks at POGO have noticed  a bill just introduced in the House that would  allow no-bid contracting and (apparently) restrict auditing for contracts related to anything that's been declared a "national emergency."

At least the no-bid part seems reasonable, except for two things: First, there have been a whole lot of "national emergencies" that don't exactly well, seem like "national emergencies." POGO has a list--it includes "Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq."  Another, ongoing, national emergency is " Terrorist Threats – In response to 9/11 Terrorist Attacks." As POGO notes:

Presumably, this would apply to all homeland security-related spending and broad swaths of national security spending.

Then there's the second problem with mandating that oversight be scaled back: It's unnecesary. Here's POGO again:

Contracting officers already have enough authorities at their disposal to respond to the Katrina crisis. Senior procurement official David Drabkin underscored this after passage of the Homeland Security Act in a 2003 memo where he said: “Remember, you have many tools in your acquisition toolbox that allow you to respond to emergencies.”  Brigadier General Scott outlined the flexible procurement authorities as well in an October 2001 memo written to assist contracting officers working on the War on Terrorism.

Maybe POGO is wrong here; I'm not well-versed in this stuff. But they seem to have a pretty tight case. The other issue is whether the bill, introduced by Gov't Reform Committee Chair Tom Davis, is going anywhere. Again, I don't know. But  Davis seems to have a record of delivering. And one other thing: Davis as chair of the reform committee, will be leading one of the hearings into the government's Katrina response. Terrific.

Paying for Reconstruction

Those conservative Republicans complaining about the money being thrown around aren’t necessarily being miserly. The costs of rebuilding are going to be incredible and as Josh has being hammering home, it seems likely that the bills will be driven up, Rove-style, by a desire to help himself out for the history books a desperately to stave-off lame-duck status for just a bit longer.

Republicans are calling for cut in spending elsewhere to at least partially offset the Katrina free-for-all. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that on a conceptual level—it all depends of what you cut (Medicaid would be bad, but a few farm subsidies…you wouldn’t hear me complain). Not that either will happen. But here’s another possibility I haven’t seen mentioned: Repealing some of Bush’s tax cuts.

Pretty obvious why Republicans haven’t mentioned it. And actually, not shocking that Democrats haven’t seem too either. Nobody’s going to get much love for focusing on the bill. But, and maybe I’m just being naïve, might repealing some of those cuts, particularly ones targeted at the wealthy, be both good policy and good politics?  Why don't Democrats bring that up? 

ABC Sandwiches Bush

From the daily Nightline newsletter: ABC Television will devote its entire prime time schedule (Eastern time) this evening to Katrina and the growing questions about America's readiness to respond to a major disaster. ...

At 8 p.m. ET, Ted Koppel hosts a "Primetime" special edition, "Moment of Crisis: System Failure," a moment-by-moment chronology of what went so terribly wrong in the horrific days following Katrina's strike on the Gulf Coast. This was America's first major test of emergency response since 9/11, a test that has received failing grades.

At 9 p.m., we broadcast a live presidential address. President Bush issues a blueprint for the mammoth rebuilding job ahead in a speech to the nation from New Orleans, his fourth visit to the hurricane zone since the White House began taking criticism for the slow federal response to Katrina.

At 10 p.m. a "Primetime" special "Ready or Not: The Next Big One" examines the government's readiness for three potential catastrophic disasters -- a pandemic outbreak of avian flu; terrorists detonating a nuclear device in a major American city; and a major earthquake in the San Francisco Bay area.

Ted Koppel returns at 11:35 p.m. for a special edition of "Nightline" to examine the lessons learned from all the missteps in the wake of Katrina.

Can't be the kind of coverage the WH was hoping for.

This Open White House

Excellent, a White House official will be taking questions from the public--via Ask the White House--on the government's relief effort. So which official has been picked to  step up the plate and answer the questions that need answering?  Perhaps Michael Chertoff? The new Coast Guard guy? OK, maybe they're busy. So no doubt it's an underling who's been involved in the response.

Riiiight. Meet Jim Towey, Director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiative. The questioning begins at 2pm.
 

(Disclaimer: Towey seems to have  a good resume, and I'm not criticizing him. I'm just being a naive idealist and wishing that the WH would occasionally, you know, host really substantive chats.)

Keeping Track of Katrina Contracting

POGO is logging all the stories about it here; now if they could only start linking to the contract awards themselves.

FEMA Confiscated Hospital Relief Supplies?

That's what one  hospital offical told Bob Herbert:

It was the stuff of nightmares. Poisonous water moccasins were swimming in the filthy water of the flooded first floor, and snipers, rats and even a 12-foot alligator were roaming the treacherous area just outside the hospital's doors....

The patients and staff at Methodist could have been evacuated before Hurricane Katrina hit. But instead they were condemned to several days of fear and agony by bad decision-making in Louisiana and the chaotic ineptitude of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Some of the patients died.

Incredibly, when the out-of-state corporate owners of the hospital responded to the flooding by sending emergency relief supplies, they were confiscated at the airport by FEMA and sent elsewhere....

Everybody's suffering would have been eased if the emergency relief effort mounted by the hospital's owner, Universal Health Services in King of Prussia, Pa., had not been interfered with by FEMA. Company officials sent desperately needed water, food, diesel fuel to power the hospital's generators and helicopters to ferry in the supplies and evacuate the most vulnerable individuals.

Bruce Gilbert, Universal's general counsel, told me yesterday, "Those supplies were in fact taken from us by FEMA, and we were unable to get them to the hospital. We then determined that it would be better to send our supplies, food and water to Lafayette [130 miles from New Orleans] and have our helicopters fly them from Lafayette to the hospital."

You can't blame FEMA central, let alone the White House, for ever screw-up by the agency. Some things are going to go wrong--and some people are going to screw-up--in massive emergency operations. (Think D-Day.) The question is whether there was a pervasive pattern and whether that in turn, as would seem likely, had anything to do with the fact that FEMA has been so weakened recently.  So, let's do the counting later. But it appears to be  another example to add to the list.