Why Louisiana handled Katrina so badly

[Preacherman]

Has anyone wondered why Louisiana handled the post-Katrina relief effort so badly, prior to massive Federal aid arriving on Friday? For the answer, look no further than this article in the Washington Post. It's very revealing if you read between the lines.

What Governor Blanco and her cohorts are trying to do is to maintain State control of the whole relief effort. My interpretation is: if the situation is Federalized, then FEMA and other agencies will control the billions upon billions of dollars in Federal aid that will flow into Louisiana. If the State government (historically one of the most corrupt in the USA) retains control, it can direct those funds according to its own priorities. Can anyone spell "boondoggle"? Can anyone say "patronage"? I smell several very large and hairy rats in the way Blanco is handling this... Note the "blame game" by several local officials in the second excerpt below, and you'll see that they're all trying to blame the Feds whilst weaseling out of their own responsibilities.

Note, too, that the governors of both Mississippi and Alabama had declared states of emergencies BEFORE Katrina hit, and were thereby able to mobilize federal assistance much more quickly and efficiently.

The article is four pages long, so please click on the link to read the whole thing if you're interested. I've taken two excerpts from it:

Behind the scenes, a power struggle emerged, as federal officials tried to wrest authority from Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D). Shortly before midnight Friday, the Bush administration sent her a proposed legal memorandum asking her to request a federal takeover of the evacuation of New Orleans, a source within the state's emergency operations center said Saturday.

The administration sought unified control over all local police and state National Guard units reporting to the governor. Louisiana officials rejected the request after talks throughout the night, concerned that such a move would be comparable to a federal declaration of martial law. Some officials in the state suspected a political motive behind the request. "Quite frankly, if they'd been able to pull off taking it away from the locals, they then could have blamed everything on the locals," said the source, who does not have the authority to speak publicly.

A senior administration official said that Bush has clear legal authority to federalize National Guard units to quell civil disturbances under the Insurrection Act and will continue to try to unify the chains of command that are split among the president, the Louisiana governor and the New Orleans mayor.

Louisiana did not reach out to a multi-state mutual aid compact for assistance until Wednesday, three state and federal officials said. As of Saturday, Blanco still had not declared a state of emergency, the senior Bush official said.

"The federal government stands ready to work with state and local officials to secure New Orleans and the state of Louisiana," White House spokesman Dan Bartlett said. "The president will not let any form of bureaucracy get in the way of protecting the citizens of Louisiana."

Blanco made two moves Saturday that protected her independence from the federal government: She created a philanthropic fund for the state's victims and hired James Lee Witt, Federal Emergency Management Agency director in the Clinton administration, to advise her on the relief effort.

In a Washington briefing, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said one reason federal assets were not used more quickly was "because our constitutional system really places the primary authority in each state with the governor."

Chertoff planned to fly overnight to the New Orleans area to take charge of deploying the expanded federal and military assets for several days, he said. He said he has "full confidence" in FEMA Director Michael D. Brown, the DHS undersecretary and federal officer in charge of the Katrina response.

Brown, a frequent target of New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin's wrath, said Saturday that "the mayor can order an evacuation and try to evacuate the city, but if the mayor does not have the resources to get the poor, elderly, the disabled, those who cannot, out, or if he does not even have police capacity to enforce the mandatory evacuation, to make people leave, then you end up with the kind of situation we have right now in New Orleans."

New Orleans City Council President Oliver Thomas acknowledged that the city was surprised by the number of refugees left behind, but he said FEMA should have been prepared to assist.

"Everybody shares the blame here," said Thomas. "But when you talk about the mightiest government in the world, that's a ludicrous and lame excuse. You're FEMA, and you're the big dog. And you weren't prepared either."

In Baton Rouge, Blanco acknowledged Saturday: "We did not have enough resources here to do it all. . . . The magnitude is overwhelming."

State officials had planned to turn to neighboring states for help with troops, transportation and equipment in a major hurricane. But in Katrina's case, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida were also overwhelmed, said Denise Bottcher, a Blanco spokesman.

This also goes some way to explaining the barrage of anti-Federal-Government and anti-Bush propaganda in the mainstream media. The latter is entirely supportive of the Democratic government in New Orleans and Louisiana, and anything that will deflect a true analysis of the massive shortcomings of the latter institutions in this disaster will be siezed upon eagerly.

Makes me sick, quite frankly.

 

[kbr80]

Behind the scenes, a power struggle emerged, as federal officials tried to wrest authority from Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D). Shortly before midnight Friday, the Bush administration sent her a proposed legal memorandum asking her to request a federal takeover of the evacuation of New Orleans, a source within the state's emergency operations center said Saturday.

Did the above happen before Katrina hit? If so, it is very telling.



I am going to try to make a timeline on disaster request, declarations of all involved. If any members would like to help, please do, also if any members have info, confirmed info on who, what, when, where declarations, aid, help were offered please email or pm it to me.

 

[Dannyboy]

Too many different threads...

So, I'll put this link in this one. Lots of interesting things about the problems in NO.

http://freewillblog.com/

 

[No4Mk1]

Excellent analysis.

 

[riverdog]

Nice find, great article. An historical analysis of the last week (8 days) in Louisiana will be very interesting. The article is another great read.

 

[fedlaw]

If the State government (historically one of the most corrupt in the USA) retains control, it can direct those funds according to its own priorities.

Coming from Illinois, I resent the implication that Louisiana is even a contender for the title of most corrupt state.

 

[thorn726]

it can direct those funds according to its own priorities. Can anyone spell "boondoggle"?

now this whole thing, i agree with you guys, and am not at all suprised

 

[Rockstar]

Can you spell "Democrat"???

 

[Graystar]

Has anyone wondered why Louisiana handled the post-Katrina relief effort so badly

It's been less than a week after the storm and already people are saying things were handled badly. Against what measure? What other catastrophe as extensive as this one has had a better response, and who's metrics were recorded such that the current response can be measured against it?

One of the biggest problems with this country is this must-have-it-now attitude that we suffer from. Everyone expects everything to occur instantly for them. Welcome to reality. We're not gods who can simply reach down and scoop tens of thousands of people off of roof tops. And we can't simply will the water out of Louisiana. We are human...we can do what is humanly possible, and that's all.

I believe that no amount of realistic and practical readiness could have prepared us any better for this disaster. Lots of people and lots of equipment got going as soon as was humanly possible, and have been going 24 hrs ever since. The response was as good as it could get considering the vast extent of the disaster.

 

[Preacherman]

The following statement was issued by Bishop-Emeritus Gracida of the Diocese of Corpus Christi, TX.

Bishop Gracida: DON'T BLAME PRESIDENT BUSH

Shortly after I was installed as Bishop of Corpus Christi on July 11, 1983, Monsignor Robert Freeman, Director of Catholic Charities, asked me for permission to accept an invitation from the Mayor of Corpus Christi to become a member of the Disaster Emergency Response Team of the City. I gladly gave him permission. Subsequently he kept me informed every year of the work of the Team. The Team established a plan for a secure headquarters with electric generators, water food and communications equipment. The devised a plan to organize all elements of the City's infrastructure to be ready to meet any challenge posed by another hurricane like Celia which had devastated the City in 1969 when the City did not have such a Team in place.

That Team went into action last Friday when Corpus Christi was informed that our City's request to receive evacuees from New Orleans had been approved. Within hours the facilities to receive the evacuees were ready and the infrastructure was ready to serve them. As you can see from the attachment to this email, today, thirty hours later the evacuees are safely in the facilities planned for them.

I was born in New Orleans and spent the first seven years of my life there. I was a student in the General Pierre Gustave Touton Beauregard Elementary School. I still have fond memories of my childhood there. We lived in the Lakeview section of New Orleans and our home was just a few blocks from Lake Pontchartrain, the area most flooded. I have many relatives and friends who live in New Orleans.

I watched in shocked disbelief as the horror of the flooding of New Orleans unfolded before the eyes of the Nation and the world. I listened and watched the tragedy on all the major networks and cable channels. Not once did I hear any reporter mention a Disaster Emergency Response Team in the City of New Orleans. Not once did I see or hear any city official other than the Mayor who did not once describe what the City of New Orleans officials were doing. All he did was complain about the failure of the Federal Government of be in the City as soon as the levee broke. The police of New Orleans complained to television reporters that they were without any contact with their supervisors and had no food or water. There was total governmental and organizational chaos.

It was the responsibility of the City of New Orleans government to provide ALL of the emergency response for the first 24 hours and to request and coordinate the specific help expected from the State of Louisiana and the Federal Government. It was the responsibility of the Governor of Louisiana to provide immediately the first help through the deployment of the National Guard of Louisiana which should have been activated and on standby duty ready to move into the coast of Louisiana to cope with the damage to be expected from Hurricane Katrina. The Governor of Louisiana was strangely invisible during the week following the break in the levee.

Governor Rick Perry set an example of how the Governor of Louisiana should have acted. Within a matter of hours after the levee broke, Governor Perry set in motion throughout Texas the Emergency Response plans of the major cities and the rest, as they say is history. The response of the people of Houston, Dallas, Beaumont, and Corpus Christi shows how effective good planning can be in meeting the challenge of natural disasters.

God forbid that we should be subjected to another terrorist attack such as 9/11 but it is good to know that at least some cities are prepared. It is shameful that the media of the left and the Bush-haters in our society have chosen to put all of the blame for the tragic events of the past week in New Orleans on President Bush. He responded quickly and in a proper way. The total governmental confusion in New Orleans was an obstacle with which all agencies outside of Louisiana had to cope.

Well said, your Excellency!

 

[Aguila Blanca]

kbr80 --

I'm sorry I don't have a link for you, but don't lose track of the statement by the New Orleans "Director of Homeland Security" (Ebbets?) right after the levee broke, that they would have it repaired within a couple of hours.

 

[Owen]

Isn''t a Bishop "Your Eminence?" or is that a Cardinal?

 

[wingman]

Peter Principle

The theory that employees within an organization will advance to their highest level of competence and then be promoted to and remain at a level at which they are incompetent.