FEMA - Worst Run Govt. Agency?

[godhugh]

Certainly seems like it...

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/01/30/katrin ... index.html

[Mr. Sparkle]

The Interior Department offered FEMA 500 rooms, 119 pieces of heavy equipment, 300 dump trucks and other vehicles, 300 boats, 11 aircraft and 400 law enforcement officers, according to a questionnaire answered by a department official.

Interior law enforcement officers included special agents and refuge officers from the department's Fish and Wildlife Service.

OK, turning that down, seems almost criminal in it's stupidity.

[noxiousdog]

According to government officials, 1,322 people died from Katrina, all but 15 of the deaths occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Wait, so the count was roughly 1/2 of the low estimates and we're still trying to say FEMA is evil? Is blame that necessesary to make us feel better?

[The Preacher]

According to government officials, 1,322 people died from Katrina, all but 15 of the deaths occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Wait, so the count was roughly 1/2 of the low estimates and we're still trying to say FEMA is evil? Is blame that necessesary to make us feel better?

Tens and tens of thousands died, ND. FEMA just built fembots to replace them for the next census.

[godhugh]

According to government officials, 1,322 people died from Katrina, all but 15 of the deaths occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Wait, so the count was roughly 1/2 of the low estimates and we're still trying to say FEMA is evil? Is blame that necessesary to make us feel better?

Tens and tens of thousands died, ND. FEMA just built fembots to replace them for the next census.

Bah, the issue isn't how great it is that "only" 1,322 people died. It's whether or not FEMA turning down this assistance resulted in the death of some of those 1,322.

And in what world is 1,322 deaths a positive statistic for the government (local and federal)?

[Mr. Sparkle]

According to government officials, 1,322 people died from Katrina, all but 15 of the deaths occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Wait, so the count was roughly 1/2 of the low estimates and we're still trying to say FEMA is evil? Is blame that necessesary to make us feel better?

So incompetence is ok as long as "only" 1300 people died?

What does the body count have to be before you think there is a problem?

The early estimates on 9/11 were off by an order of magnitude... does that mean that terrorism isn't an issue?

[brettmcd]

Is there such a thing as a well run federal agency????? Sadly the rule at the governmental level seems to be waste and incompetance. FEMA is no different.

[godhugh]

Is there such a thing as a well run federal agency????? Sadly the rule at the governmental level seems to be waste and incompetance. FEMA is no different.

Heh, that's a good point. Which makes it even more exceptional that FEMA is the worst of the bunch .

[Defiant]

According to government officials, 1,322 people died from Katrina, all but 15 of the deaths occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Wait, so the count was roughly 1/2 of the low estimates and we're still trying to say FEMA is evil? Is blame that necessesary to make us feel better?

Just to point out:

More than 3,200 people are officially still unaccounted for nearly five months after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, and the state medical examiner wants the search to resume for those missing from the most devastated neighborhoods.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/01/18/katrin ... index.html

But FEMA's "evil"-ness* doesn't come from the death toll, but from it's incompetence. Just like car accidents aren't more evil than terrorism just because more people die in them.

(I think "evilness" is the wrong word and "incompetence" is the right one, but that would make the sentence boring.)

[noxiousdog]

They saved 1700 (or 3700, or 8700 depending on which estimate you listened to) more people than they expected to. That means they did 125% better than was expected.

The conjecture that more equipment and more manpower would mean more lives saved. That's not necessarily the case. It may just mean more expenses.

[Defiant]

They saved 1700 (or 3700, or 8700 depending on which estimate you listened to) more people than they expected to. That means they did 125% better than was expected.

FEMA was only expecting to save ~1,500 people?

The conjecture that more equipment and more manpower would mean more lives saved. That's not necessarily the case. It may just mean more expenses.

Whether it would have saved more lives or not, the delays and ignorance of FEMA was the result of incompetence, failed leadership and mismangement.

[Dogstar]

Brettmcd wrote:

Is there such a thing as a well run federal agency????? Sadly the rule at the governmental level seems to be waste and incompetance. FEMA is no different.

Godhugh wrote:

Heh, that's a good point. Which makes it even more exceptional that FEMA is the worst of the bunch Wink.

I'd offer that while the overall agencies might not be as well run as we'd like (or even close to it), there's probably a substantial number of programs that are well run. There's probably also a large number of good, competent people working in those agencies. So before you start painting with such a large brush, I'd ask that you consider those things.

All that aside, FEMA has to be one of my top 5 agencies/department (or at least top 10) that I'd like to be among the most well-run in the government.

[noxiousdog]

They saved 1700 (or 3700, or 8700 depending on which estimate you listened to) more people than they expected to. That means they did 125% better than was expected.

FEMA was only expecting to save ~1,500 people?

They were expected to allow 3000-10000 to die.

Whether it would have saved more lives or not, the delays and ignorance of FEMA was the result of incompetence, failed leadership and mismangement.

Allegedly. They certainly make a good scapegoat. It's always handy to have someone to blame when tragedy strikes. It's better on the human psyche to put a face on your pain rather than just accepting that shit happens.

[Defiant]

Whether it would have saved more lives or not, the delays and ignorance of FEMA was the result of incompetence, failed leadership and mismangement.

Allegedly.

*cough*Convention Center*cough*
*cough*"Can I quit now?"*cough*

[noxiousdog]

Whether it would have saved more lives or not, the delays and ignorance of FEMA was the result of incompetence, failed leadership and mismangement.

Allegedly.

*cough*Convention Center*cough*

Is that what we're back to? It's the federal governments responsibility to spend billions to make sure people aren't uncofortable for too long?

[farley2k]

Allegedly. They certainly make a good scapegoat. It's always handy to have someone to blame when tragedy strikes. It's better on the human psyche to put a face on your pain rather than just accepting that shit happens.

The whole purpose of the agency is to be there to help with this kind of huge disaster.


Yes sometimes shit happens. But here locally when a 10 year old was kidnapped, raped and murdered we looked into how DHS works and wether the agency could be improved to prevent this kind of thing from happening. I guess you would have just said "shit happens"

[noxiousdog]

Allegedly. They certainly make a good scapegoat. It's always handy to have someone to blame when tragedy strikes. It's better on the human psyche to put a face on your pain rather than just accepting that shit happens.

The whole purpose of the agency is to be there to help with this kind of huge disaster.


Yes sometimes shit happens. But here locally when a 10 year old was kidnapped, raped and murdered we looked into how DHS works and wether the agency could be improved to prevent this kind of thing from happening. I guess you would have just said "shit happens"

Really? Did you fire the guy in charge of DHS and call them the worst run agency in the state?

I know that over the top hyperbole is what we do here, but by the most important measure, lives saved, FEMA did far better than expected. For that, Brown is a laughing stock and they're being called the worst run federal agency. That sounds like scapegoating to me.

[farley2k]

Really? Did you fire the 2 guys in charge of DHS and call them the worst run agency in the state?

Quite close. Actually the head resigned...I guess she had more respect than the head of FEMA.


But that doesn't really matter. What matters is that they did a through investigation to make sure the agency was doing the best job it could. Heck they want to help people!

Why isn't that same level of concern being shown by the Bush admin and Homeland security with regard to FEMA? Why don't they want to do better? Why is the Bush admin working against congress to find out information?

It boggles my mind that you can defend that kind of crap.

[noxiousdog]

Really? Did you fire the 2 guys in charge of DHS and call them the worst run agency in the state?

Quite close. Actually the head resigned...I guess she had more respect than the head of FEMA.

There's got to be more to that story. Link?

[Defiant]

*cough*Convention Center*cough*

Is that what we're back to? It's the federal governments responsibility to spend billions to make sure people aren't uncofortable for too long?

There's still a difference between, as you euphemisitcally put it, FEMA making sure people aren't uncomfortable for too long, and FEMA being unaware of the existence of tens of thousands of people for several days.

[farley2k]

Really? Did you fire the 2 guys in charge of DHS and call them the worst run agency in the state?

Quite close. Actually the head resigned...I guess she had more respect than the head of FEMA.

There's got to be more to that story. Link?

It really doesn't matter. The point is that Iowa was willing to look hard at the agency because we want to do better.

Why would any rational person be opposed to making FEMA better? Why would anyone be against looking at the government response? Yet the White House is trying to prevent just that kind of look. Why?

[Defiant]

Why would any rational person be opposed to making FEMA better? Why would anyone be against looking at the government response? Yet the White House is trying to prevent just that kind of look. Why?

Maybe because uncovering more stuff like this will only injure morale. And if morale is injured, the terrorists win.

[farley2k]

Why would any rational person be opposed to making FEMA better? Why would anyone be against looking at the government response? Yet the White House is trying to prevent just that kind of look. Why?

Maybe because uncovering more stuff like this will only injure morale. And if morale is injured, the terrorists win.

I have to say I never found those emails to be all that damaging. Seriously they were whiney and maybe a bit clueless but they are personal emails so that is what one should expect.

[noxiousdog]

It really doesn't matter. The point is that Iowa was willing to look hard at the agency because we want to do better.

Why would any rational person be opposed to making FEMA better? Why would anyone be against looking at the government response? Yet the White House is trying to prevent just that kind of look. Why?

You're completely off topic.

We were talking about:
"FEMA - Worst Run Govt. Agency?"
"OK, turning that down, seems almost criminal in it's stupidity."
"Which makes it even more exceptional that FEMA is the worst of the bunch"
"But FEMA's "evil"-ness* doesn't come from the death toll, but from it's incompetence. Just like car accidents aren't more evil than terrorism just because more people die in them."
"Whether it would have saved more lives or not, the delays and ignorance of FEMA was the result of incompetence, failed leadership and mismangement."

So the criminal, worst run, incompetent, ignorant, pooly lead, and mismanaged govt. agency was still able to cut the death count in half.

I just find that more a commentary on society than on FEMA.

[brettmcd]

Brettmcd wrote:

Is there such a thing as a well run federal agency????? Sadly the rule at the governmental level seems to be waste and incompetance. FEMA is no different.

Godhugh wrote:

Heh, that's a good point. Which makes it even more exceptional that FEMA is the worst of the bunch Wink.

I'd offer that while the overall agencies might not be as well run as we'd like (or even close to it), there's probably a substantial number of programs that are well run. There's probably also a large number of good, competent people working in those agencies. So before you start painting with such a large brush, I'd ask that you consider those things.

All that aside, FEMA has to be one of my top 5 agencies/department (or at least top 10) that I'd like to be among the most well-run in the government.

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

[farley2k]

So the criminal, worst run, incompetent, ignorant, pooly lead, and mismanaged govt. agency was still able to cut the death count in half.

I just find that more a commentary on society than on FEMA.

Que?

I wasn't aware those estimates were written in stone and that somehow the brave, hard working members of FEMA fought day and night to reduce those estimates. Heck, maybe I just don't understand concept of estimates.

Seriously how did they "cut the death count in half"? Unless those were confirmed dead that FEMA somehow resurected it was all estimates.

So FEMA did better than the estimates - does that mean we should look to see if they could do even better? If you run a 400m relay and beat your estimated time do you just quit? Or do you try to better that?

[Defiant]

So the criminal, worst run, incompetent, ignorant, pooly lead, and mismanaged govt. agency was still able to cut the death count in half.

I just find that more a commentary on society than on FEMA.

Or possibly, on the failure of initial estimates of death tolls?

(Edit: Perhapsthe government agency that makes initial estimates is the worst evar?)

[noxiousdog]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

[brettmcd]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

You mean those interstates that are ten years and millions of dollars over budget on projects here in my state? Try again.

[noxiousdog]

Que?

I wasn't aware those estimates were written in stone and that somehow the brave, hard working members of FEMA fought day and night to reduce those estimates. Heck, maybe I just don't understand concept of estimates.

Don't you think the expected response time of FEMA went into the estimates? I'm not even taking the fooling 10K, or the 1st day 5K.

I'm using the later in the week 3k estimate.

Seriously how did they "cut the death count in half"? Unless those were confirmed dead that FEMA somehow resurected it was all estimates.

People should be judged on whether they exceed or fail to meet expectations. The expectations were that we'd see 3000+ dead. FEMA was able to reach enough people early enough that the actually number was half of expected.

This isn't to say that that is FEMA's entire mission. They also need to put a public face on the situation. Clearly they have had significant issues with that, but considering the type and rabidity of the opposition, I'm not convinced anyone could have come out looking good.

However, FEMAs primary responsibility is to save lives in the aftermath of such a disaster. We had a CAT 4 hurricane hit a major city, and lost only 1300 people. If you were asked the week previous to Katrina if you'd take that kind of loss or roll the dice again, you'd take that number every single time.

So FEMA did better than the estimates - does that mean we should look to see if they could do even better? If you run a 400m relay and beat your estimated time do you just quit? Or do you try to better that?

I don't know why you keep saying this. Surely you understand the difference between 'wanting to do better' and 'the worst ever?'

[ChrisGwinn]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

You mean those interstates that are ten years and millions of dollars over budget on projects here in my state? Try again.

Which projects are you referring to?

[brettmcd]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

You mean those interstates that are ten years and millions of dollars over budget on projects here in my state? Try again.

Which projects are you referring to?

494/694, which they have been working on for pretty much my entire life it seems.

[ChrisGwinn]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

You mean those interstates that are ten years and millions of dollars over budget on projects here in my state? Try again.

Which projects are you referring to?

494/694, which they have been working on for pretty much my entire life it seems.

While there's certainly plenty of work happening on 494, I'm not aware of any current 494-related projects that are ten years over schedule, and I'm not seeing anything that would meet that description on the MNDOT site.

That said, doesn't most of the actual construction/planning/etc. for interstate happen at the state level?

[brettmcd]

Please then name all these 'well-run' federal plans and agencies. I cant think of one that I would give that much credit to.

Interstate highways?

You mean those interstates that are ten years and millions of dollars over budget on projects here in my state? Try again.

Which projects are you referring to?

494/694, which they have been working on for pretty much my entire life it seems.

While there's certainly plenty of work happening on 494, I'm not aware of any current 494-related projects that are ten years over schedule, and I'm not seeing anything that would meet that description on the MNDOT site.

That said, doesn't most of the actual construction/planning/etc. for interstate happen at the state level?

Someone tried to point out that the interstate highways is an example of a well run federal agency, which again I highly disagree with, doesnt matter where the planning is done.

[ChrisGwinn]

Someone tried to point out that the interstate highways is an example of a well run federal agency, which again I highly disagree with, doesnt matter where the planning is done.

Sure it does. If the federal government doesn't do anything other than write checks, then the success or failure of any given project doesn't really have anything to do with whether the agency is well run or not.

How about the Coast Guard? They seem to do a pretty good job.

[brettmcd]

Someone tried to point out that the interstate highways is an example of a well run federal agency, which again I highly disagree with, doesnt matter where the planning is done.

Sure it does. If the federal government doesn't do anything other than write checks, then the success or failure of any given project doesn't really have anything to do with whether the agency is well run or not.

How about the Coast Guard? They seem to do a pretty good job.

If you just right checks and dont follow up to make sure the money is spent well, or a project is planned well thats a pretty good definition of a poorly run organization.

As for the coast guard, they fall under the cost overrun problems all parts of our military still have, you know, $300 hammers, $1000 dollar toilet seats and all that.

Government by its very nature is innefiecient in almost all things it does, but in the case of the military and a VERY few other things, its the only body that can do it.

[Enough]

Someone tried to point out that the interstate highways is an example of a well run federal agency, which again I highly disagree with, doesnt matter where the planning is done.

Sure it does. If the federal government doesn't do anything other than write checks, then the success or failure of any given project doesn't really have anything to do with whether the agency is well run or not.

How about the Coast Guard? They seem to do a pretty good job.

If you just right checks and dont follow up to make sure the money is spent well, or a project is planned well thats a pretty good definition of a poorly run organization.

As for the coast guard, they fall under the cost overrun problems all parts of our military still have, you know, $300 hammers, $1000 dollar toilet seats and all that.

Government by its very nature is innefiecient in almost all things it does, but in the case of the military and a VERY few other things, its the only body that can do it.

All large organizations suffer from similar issues, government or not. Ever worked in a cube farm?

[russellmz]

james lee witt must be turning over in his grave*

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline ... /witt.html

What were they unable to do in this case that FEMA previously would have been able to do?

… I'll give you an example. In the 1993 flood, I personally called every single governor, every single member of Congress in each of those states on a weekend. When we had an approaching storm like Hurricane Floyd that was sitting off of the Florida coast -- huge. I was talking to the National Hurricane Center in Florida. I said: "What is this going to do? What do we need? What do we need to expect? Can you tell me whether this is going to make landfall? And at what category is it going to be?" And they kept telling me it was bigger than Andrew in size. And so I set up video conference capability of all the hurricane-risk states. I was doing video conference calls with every state, sometimes twice a day. I called every single governor. I called a lot of the mayors, … and I said: "You make sure that you're talking to the state. You make sure that whatever resources we need to provide you pre-event of the hurricane that that we had it pre-staged for you." They evacuated 4 million people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lee_Witt

By 1996 an Atlanta Journal-Constitution editorial said that "FEMA has developed a sterling reputation for delivering disaster-relief services, a far cry from its abysmal standing before James Lee Witt took its helm in 1993. How did Witt turn FEMA around so quickly? Well, he is the first director of the agency to have emergency-management experience. He stopped the staffing of the agency by political patronage. He removed layers of bureaucracy. Most important, he instilled in the agency a spirit of preparedness, of service to the customer, of willingness to listen to ideas of local and state officials to make the system work better."[2]

*yeah, i know he's alive.

[Poleaxe]

PBS

Leo Bosner- Watch Officer, FEMA National Response and Coordination Center

In this current crisis, did you see specific examples of DHS [Department of Homeland Security] bureaucracy interfering with FEMA's ability to respond to Katrina?

Definitely. I know this because I work in the Information and Planning Section. This happened last year during the Florida hurricanes and happened even worse this time. Our job in the Information and Planning is to get information that the operational managers need to run the disaster, meaning if someplace is short of ice or short of water, or if someplace says they need more emergency teams, or if the medical teams say, "Well, we have medical teams here, but they don't have any satellite phones; we don't have any vehicles to take them someplace," our job at FEMA at the headquarters here is to act quickly and get those resources to them and get things moving, and get the information to the decision makers to do those things.

Well, what happened especially in the early stages of Katrina, was at FEMA we were getting peppered with questions from Homeland Security. And at first we sort of took it in stride. There would be questions: "Well, where are the teams located? Send us a map. Do this, do this." OK, we'd get the information for them.

But the questions would become sometimes more and more detailed: "Well, what exact kind of work are these teams doing? Give us a description. Send us a whole position description of what they're doing." It's getting very bureaucratic, and it's interfering with our work. We're there on 12-hour shifts trying to get the things done for the operational people, and it's like our sleeve is being tugged every little two minutes. And we have to answer it because it's Homeland Security, and they require an answer with questions that clearly were much too detailed to have any operational significance to these people. They weren't going to do anything with the information.

What was this a result of?

I think it was a result of two things: Number one, the people at the Homeland Security Department who have never been involved in a disaster, in emergency before, and so they're just asking questions that would be a novice's question. They might be fine if you're attending a seminar sometime, but in the middle of a disaster isn't the time to say, "Send us a description of all the teams and what they do and what their authorizations are and a copy of your laws," and everything else.

You were asked these questions?

Yeah. We were asked these questions. … If we didn't have the information at our fingertips, we, the FEMA people, were expected to go to these federal agencies [whose representatives come to FEMA during disasters] and to get them to contact the people in the field, who are out there in their rubber boots in helicopters and everything else and trying to do the rescues, and call them on their satellite phones and ask them, "Now, we know you're busy, but you can just sort of stop what you're doing for a while and give us these numbers, because we need to specify -- we said yesterday there were 312 rescues in such-and-such county, but now we're seeing it was 309. We need to clarify, was it 312 rescues or was it 309?" God, the people are out there trying to save lives.

James Lee Witt- Former head of FEMA:

With a storm of this magnitude, you would think -- particularly if you had a chance of it hitting New Orleans -- you would have the Corps of Engineers start getting and gathering up the biggest pumps that they could find, on a barge, to make ready to come in. You'd think that DoD would be advised, "We're going to need this, this, this and this."

I know we did that many times. DoD actually worked very close with us. They had a colonel as a liaison at FEMA headquarters with me every single day, and any time we activated that operations center, that colonel and others were there in the operations center with us, and we were tasking them.

WashingtonMonthly.com with summeries from NYT, WP, LATimes, and Time.

"The agency dispatched only 7 of its 28 urban search and rescue teams to the area before the storm hit and sent no workers at all into New Orleans until after the hurricane passed on Monday, Aug. 29."

"Hundreds of firefighters, who responded to a nationwide call for help in the disaster, were held by the federal agency in Atlanta for days of training on community relations and sexual harassment before being sent on to the devastated area."

"FEMA would not let the trucks unload," Mr. Vines said in an interview. "The drivers were stuck for several days on the side of the road about 10 miles from Camp Beauregard. FEMA said we had to have a 'tasker number.' What in the world is a tasker number? I have no idea. It's just paperwork, and it's ridiculous."

August 28: "FEMA had already stockpiled for immediate distribution 2.7 million liters of water, 1.3 million meals ready to eat and 17 million pounds of ice, a Department of Homeland Security official said. But Louisiana received a relatively small portion of the supplies; for example, Alabama got more than five times as much water for distribution. 'It was what they would move for a normal hurricane — business as usual versus a superstorm,' concluded Mark Ghilarducci, a former FEMA official now working as a consultant for Blanco."

"Around midnight, at the last of the day's many conference calls, local officials ticked off their final requests for FEMA and the state. Maestri specifically asked for medical units, mortuary units, ice, water, power and National Guard troops. 'We laid it all out,' he recalled. 'And then we sat here for five days waiting. Nothing!'"

August 29: "'We were all watching the evacuation,' Maj. Gen. Richard Rowe, Northcom's top operations officer, recalled. 'We knew that it would be among the worst storms ever to hit the United States.' But on Monday, the only request the U.S. military received from FEMA was for a half-dozen helicopters."

September 1: "On Thursday, after FEMA took over the evacuation, aviation director Roy A. Williams complained that 'we are packed with evacuees and the planes are not being loaded and there are gaps of two or three hours when no planes are arriving.' Eventually, he started fielding 'calls from airlines saying, "Well, we are being told by FEMA that you don't need any planes." And of course we need planes. I had thousands of people on the concourses.'"

"More than 50 civilian aircraft responding to separate requests for evacuations from hospitals and other agencies swarmed to the area a day after Katrina hit, but FEMA blocked their efforts."

"National Public Radio asked Chertoff about the thousands of people camped around New Orleans' Convention Center who said no food or supplies had arrived. Chertoff said that sounded to him like nothing more than a rumor. 'I have not heard a report of thousands of people in the convention center who do not have food and water,' he said."

"While people were dying in New Orleans, the U.S.S. Bataan steamed offshore, its six operating rooms, beds for 600 patients and most of its 1,200 sailors idle.

Foreign nations — responding to urgent calls from Washington — readied rescue supplies, then were told to stand by for days until FEMA could figure out what to do with them."

Last Thursday, as the Red Cross began distributing its own debit cards, thousands stood for hours in the 93 (degree) heat outside the Astrodome in Houston for FEMA cards that never came."

AP

Poor planning and communication plagued FEMA's response to Hurricane Katrina, a top agency official said Monday, acknowledging that other federal departments' offers to help rescue storm victims went unheard or were ignored.

William Lokey, chief of response operations at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told senators he was unaware that the Interior Department offered to send boats, planes, trucks and personnel to rescue Katrina's victims immediate after the Aug. 29 storm hit.

St. Bernard Parish home page

The parish president said that while FEMA has been slow in delivering travel
trailers to residents, parish government found several thousand trailers
that were available for sale at a cost of several thousand dollars each less
than FEMA has been paying for trailers. But Rodriguez said FEMA refused to
pay for the ones the parish found or reimburse the parish if it bought them.

NOLA about my home parish

Parish President Kevin Davis said he recently had to justify requests for removal of "hangers" and "leaners" -- FEMA parlance for large dangling branches and partially uprooted trees -- that turned up with the same GPS location. The protocol for removing the hefty tree-remains requires the parish to document their locations before contractors haul them away.

But standard GPS devices can pinpoint only a spot within 15 feet. In some densely forested sections of the parish, that means a leaner or two might be mingling in a hanger's GPS location.

"They don't seem to understand, in St. Tammany, we can get a lot of trees in 15 feet," Davis said to a Rotary Club of Slidell meeting this week, explaining the delay in cleaning parish roads of some of the largest tree debris.

Because of the maze of regulations, none of the estimated 5,000 stumps in unincorporated St. Tammany have been picked up, almost five months after Katrina.

CNN- This one is great. After the president of St. Tammnay criticized FEMA publicly, FEMA released an email that he had the delayed the process by recommending his own construction company and that he wanted to lease land to fema for $7000 per month. Except that:

"I do not own a construction company. I did not attempt to lease land to FEMA," Davis said Monday. "The only land I own is the lot my flooded home sits on. This is absurd.

Fortune/CNN on Washington Parish

The problem was water--not enough to drink. The third day after the storm, Taylor and Nevers drove to Louisiana's most powerful radio station, WWL in Baton Rouge, and used the airwaves to send out a plea for the parish. "We need bare necessities," said Nevers. "We need food, water, medical supplies." FEMA made no response, but by the time Taylor and Nevers returned home, private relief was on its way. An ice company from lower Louisiana sent in truckloads. A doctor from Lafayette, La., commandeered a private plane to airlift bottles of water to Bogalusa's tiny airstrip. Three trucks sent by Nature's Way Purewater in Pennsylvania pulled in with 75,000 more bottles. Temple-Inland, whose containerboard plant is the area's largest employer, provided generators, truckloads of tarps and lumber, engineers who got the water system back up--and $500 cash to each of its workers.

A Southern Baptist Convention disaster team from Illinois rolled in with a convoy of food and volunteers, who would serve more than 14,000 meals a day.

The Birmingham, Ala., police department heard the radio plea, and 20 officers showed up to reinforce the Bogalusa police. "We were on the border of chaos," says Bogalusa police chief Jerry Agnew, who started breathing easier only after 15 more officers showed up from Oregon, Texas, and California.

A FEMA team finally arrived, though it was still just setting up assistance offices as FORTUNE went to press--18 days after the storm.

From a Harry Reid speech- I know this to be true from local stories.

“Today I heard on the radio the story of St. Bernard President Henry “Junior” Rodriguez who told of how it took five or six days before he saw any federal officials in his town. The first outside help he got was from Canadian Mounties from Vancouver.

Do I need to go on?

[Fireball]

Oops, redundant.