The Disaster called Katrina Continues

(Homeland Security Secretary Chertoff, would you buy a used car from this man)
The title of this post maybe a misnomer. Hurricane Katrina wasn't a disaster. It was a meteorological event. It is part and parcel of living on an ever changing planet. It was not the first time the earth has demonstrated it's fury and will not be the last. The disaster was that despite the fact, that because of corruption and graft, we new long before hand that were a hurricane to hit that area it would be devastating, we did nothing about it. An even worse disaster was the poor response of the American government to come to the aid of it's own citizens. And the magnitude of that disaster, we learn 3 years after Katrina crossed the coast of Mississippi and Louisana, is even greater than we imagined.

Consider the following excerpts from a story recently reported on CNN: 11 June 2008 - 2:00pm

FEMA Sat On $85 Million in Katrina Relief

Housing groups in Katrina-affected regions are expressing their outrage after a CNN investigation uncovered that tons of supplies intended for hurricane victims sat in storage for two years before being given away to cities and other organizations.

"FEMA gave away about $85 million in household goods meant for Hurricane Katrina victims, a CNN investigation has found. The material -- from basic kitchen goods to sleeping necessities -- sat in warehouses for two years before the Federal Emergency Management Agency's giveaway to federal and state agencies this year.

Martha Kegel, the head of a New Orleans nonprofit agency that helps find homes for those still displaced by the storm, said she was shocked to learn about the existence of the goods and the government giveaway.

'These are exactly the items that we are desperately seeking donations of right now -- basic kitchen household supplies,' said Kegel, executive director of Unity of Greater New Orleans. 'These are the very things that we are seeking right now. FEMA, in fact, refers homeless clients to us to house them. How can we house them if we don't have basic supplies?'

FEMA confirmed it had kept the merchandise in storage for the past two years -- then gave it away to cities, schools, fire departments and nonprofit agencies such as food banks. In all, General Services Administration records show FEMA gave away 121 truckloads of material."

Or from the Times-Picayune

Wednesday June 11, 2008, 10:03 PM

In March, the Federal Emergency Management Agency gave away $85 million of donated items and household supplies originally intended for Katrina victims.

The Louisiana agency that deals with government surplus was offered the goods but turned them down.

"Somewhere in this big bureaucracy, links weren't made," said Adam Sharp, spokesman for Sen. Mary Landrieu, whose office is scrambling to track FEMA's discards and possibly reroute them to UNITY of Greater New Orleans, which desperately needs goods for formerly homeless people it has placed in subsidized apartments. "If the supplies just have been moved from one warehouse to another, we hope to get some of them moved back to FEMA so that they can be re-offered to Louisiana and given to UNITY," he said.

For about two years, the goods were stored in one of FEMA's main emergency-supply warehouses, a 280,000-square-foot building in Fort Worth, Texas, according to FEMA's acting press secretary, James McIntyre. When the owner decided to demolish that warehouse earlier this year, FEMA staff went through and tagged unnecessary items.

The agency kept only items routinely used for disaster response: pallets of water, diapers, and cots. It jettisoned boxes of miscellaneous donated goods that came in droves after Katrina but never found owners: things such as shoes, clothing and coffee makers. Everything deemed unnecessary was transferred by FEMA to the U.S. General Services Administration, which distributes all surplus federal property.

O.K. Thats bad. But it gets worse o.k.:

James McIntyre, FEMA's acting press secretary, said that FEMA was spending more than $1 million a year to store the material and that another agency wanted the warehouses torn down, so "we needed to vacate them."

"Upon review of our assets and our need to continue to store them, we determined that they were excess to FEMA's needs; therefore, they are being excessed from FEMA's inventory," McIntyre wrote in an e-mail.

He declined a request for an on-camera interview, telling CNN the giveaway was "not news."

WHAT??? HELLOOOOO??? NOT NEWS???? WE SPEND $1,000,000 TO STORE GOODS THAT WERE DESPERATELY NEEDED OVER TWO YEARS AGO AND EVEN THOUGH IT IS AID STILL DESPERATELY NEEDED AND WE STILL HAVE IT TO GIVE IT TO THOSE WHO WERE SUPPOSED TO GET IT BUT GIVE IT TO THOSE WHO DON'T NEED IT INSTEAD?????

CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW???????????????

Well we sure helped those such as Debra Reed didn't we? Who said:
"An honest person like me didn't get nothing," said Reed, 54, who recently moved from a tent beneath a New Orleans bridge to a home with the help of Kegel's group. "I'm gonna turn, 'cause I'm gonna cry. I didn't get nothing. I fought to get my money, but they wouldn't give it to me. So I ended up going under the bridge."

Ever sleep under a bridge before? I have. And maybe thats the freaking problem, not enough Americans have slept under a bridge to care about the Debra Reeds of the world who lost everything through no fault of their own. Hurricanes can't be stopped. They are a force of nature. Governments who F*&k over there own citizens can be stopped. For they are a force of man allowed to function by, "WE THE PEOPLE". If we do not call to account those who perpetrate such injustice on it's citizens such as Debra Reed, who will stand for you when in your old age you are left to seek bridges for shelter?Add to Technorati Favorites