|
||
Lessons Not Learned: Forget About Disaster Housing from FEMA
If you think of humans as the creatures most capable of learning from past mistakes, the ongoing saga of Hurricane Katrina and the flooding of New Orleans after the federal levees breached should give you some pause. Long pause.
Not only, as was reported here Monday, is the Army Corps of Engineers repeating its mistakes in choosing the technically not superior method of flood protection (pleading not enough money to do it the right way), now comes the Homeland Security inspector general to say that FEMA has learned nothing from its disastrous handling of the temporary housing problem post-Katrina in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast. The nut graf:
But FEMA's reliance on costly programs to provide trailers and mobile homes to survivors, and the government's inability to swiftly and cheaply repair damaged housing, especially rental units, mean the agency is not up to handling a Katrina-scale event...
Those "costly programs" are the same ones that resulted in thousands of people being cooped up in improperly prepared trailers that "outgassed" formaldehyde fumes, and that government "inability" has doomed at least a hundred thousand people to long-term exile from their homes.
Lessons learned? Try Bonobos.
Loading comments…
Want to reply to a comment? Hint: Click "Reply" at the bottom of the comment; after being approved your comment will appear directly underneath the comment you replied to
Long paws?
Thank you Harry for your persistent coverage of the sad issue of America's stubborn reluctance to accept that its own Corps of Engineers nearly destroyed a great American city.
We ignored the lessons learned by the French, and started a war in Viet Nam. We ignored the lessons of Viet Nam, and invaded Iraq.
The economy is still in the tank, but the happy days of huge bonuses are already returning to AIG and Wall Street.
Goldman Sachs, the company that was initially responsible for the Dot Com, Housing and Oil bubble fiascos , is now positioning itself to turn some facit of the future energy bill into, yet another, Ponzi scheme.
The health insurance and pharma industries, which have created most of the problems in our broken health care system, are sitting at the health care reform table actually being asked for their input on reform.
Does it surprise me that NO levees are being rebuilt to substandard specs? That FEMA is trying to determine a "safe" level of formaldehyde contamination, in highly expensive emergency house trailer shelters for future disasters? That single payer health care advocates were arrested, rather than listened to?
You know, the short sighted and inept policies actually did surprise me initially, because, hey, I'm guilty too! I actually thought I voted for change, when experience should have told me I was only voting for the lesser of two evils.
I don't think of humans as learning from past mistakes. This whole New Orleans disaster was a human fiasco........from the President to the engineers down to the citizens of New Orleans who were warned years in advance and even then did not evacuate.....everyone did a "heck of a job".
Your's is the only true comment in this whole blog...
Actually, zak, and BRD, the pre-Katrina New Orleans evacuation was successful, in that pretty much everyone who could leave of their own accord, left. Most of those who were trapped could not have left the city on their own.
The big failure was not the citizens, who were led to believe for decades upon decades that their government --at all levels---would ultimately do a reasonable job of protecting them in a crisis, but the leaders they trusted to carry out that most basic of government promises.
Levees were expected to overtop. They weren't expected to wash away from underneath.
Some loss of life is to be expected in a massive flood. We don't expect people to die of thirst and exposure on pavement and rooftops and in hospitals, waiting five days to be rescued by a federal government purposefully dragging its feet.
[Your's is the only true comment in this whole blog...]
Thank you for verifying your own Falsehoods.
BRD, luzianna is spot on.
Levees were predicted to overtop, and that would have caused "inconvenient" flooding. That means soggy carpets and wet ankles.
What happened August 2005 was deadly breaches due to design and construction mistakes by YOUR Corps of Engineers.
The spectacular flooding of New Orleans was not the citizens fault. The flooding was overwhelmingly andprimarily a federal responsibility and rebuilding the city is therefore a federal duty.
Luziannagirl, don't know but heard serious rumors that Arnie Fielkow is planning to run for mayor.I always liked Virginia Hamilton.Anyone who can build a responsible & honest coalition.Plus,we need a city council that is for "us" (I live in MId-City).We need a governor that will be an advocate for south LA,ie the Wetland restoration.The Feds are responsible for maintaining the levees,keeping order, and remeber,there are naval/military bases all around NOLA that maintain our national security.NOLA is a 365 24/7 port of international significance as well as a worldwide cultural center.
These philistines carping & saying we should move,well,when a hurricane puts Manhattan under 12' of water,will they say the same?How about fires,floods,tornados,earthquakes,manmade disasters?Terrible things happen everywhere, even to those who suffer hubris regarding their safety
BTW, Harry, what do you think of that June 26 report by the "Interagency Performance Evaluation Task Force", reported on in the July 09, 2009 The Advocate by Amy Wold?
According to her, the report concludes that according to the previous report (deemed un-readable and essentially un-decipherable except by a handful of dubious experts), New Orleans will be not only be better protected after 2011, but in the interim, because levees have been raised higher and more/better pumps have been added.
Only thing is....if levees failed because they were UNDERMINED, how will raising them help?
And don't get me started on the pumps. The devil is most certainly in all those details!!!!!
Luzianna,
The levees designed and built by the federal government failed due to a variety of reasons ranging from shockingly design flaws to equally egregious construction flaws.
The Corps of Engineers messed up BIG TIME.
But protecting New Orleans is very doable. Raising the levees in the main basin of New Orleans just 3 feet will bring the area to 1,000 year protection. That is plenty good enough as Katrina was a 400 year storm.
Raising existing levees? I thought some of them that failed were so poorly constructed and designed that they needed completely replacing.
Maybe it's semantics.
Spmc,
The federal government is New Orleans' "benefactor" for the flood protection via federal mandate in the Flood Protection Act of 1965. It's the law.
Therefore the flood protection failures were a Federal Responsibility.
And rebuilding New Orleans is a Federal Duty.
It is terrible that people say that the failed levees which the federal government pledged to maintain is not the responsibility of the federal government. The posters who are saying that people should just move so they won't be near where natural diasters happened might as well just say people worldwide who are suffering from famine should just move to where the food is. I used to think this country was called the UNITIED States of America, now it should be called the every state for itself of America. What a terrible legacy for Bush to leave us.
It wasn't just Bush....we are our own worst enemy. When people make decisions and then won't take responsibility for their decisions, why is it someone elses responsibility to bail them out.
Check the Flood Control Act of 1965. The levees are a Federal problem because the Congress made it so.
"It is terrible that people say that the failed levees which the federal government pledged to maintain" ----
What the federal government failed to do was have oversite on your levy boards and local governments to use the federal levy money for the purposes intended and not squander it amongst the local players.
BRD,
Do you enjoy the pretend world you live in? Try educating yourself.
www.levees.org
The words you are attempting to use are "oversight" and "levee."
Coincidentally, the levee boards have the power of levy boards in that they have the power to levy and collect taxes. They have their own sources of funds and are required by law to match Federal money for all flood control improvements.
Brd,Your knowledge is so limited you cannot even spell it!
See Harry Shearer's Profile
Just some factual notes you may not be aware of: many of the areas that flooded in 2005 not only had not "flooded repeatedly", they had never flooded before. Also, as has been repeatedly pointed out on this blog, more than half the populated area of New Orleans is currently, even now, at or above sea level. Further, most of the involuntary evacuees were renters. While major federal assistance has (finally) been forthcoming to aid homeowners in rebuilding, the same cannot be said for rental housing. In the absence of a concerted effort to help rebuild the approximately 80,000 damaged or destroyed rental units, you can guess what's happened to rents in New Orleans since the disaster.
". . .that government "inability" has doomed at least a hundred thousand people to long-term exile from their homes." Uh, no. People had to leave their homes because of a natural disaster and the failure of the levees. These were people who chose to live in an area which floods repeatedly and in many cases is actually below sea level. They don't have their homes back because they didn't have flood insurance (and in many cases flood insurance probably wasn't available, which should have been a clue).
The government is surely culpable in regard to the levees, but the state of the levees was no secret. Anyone who chose to stay (and by that I mean didn't put their posessions in the back of a car and drive out, or even walk out) was deciding to take a risk.
Still, the government certainly doesn't have the responsibilty to rebuild these people's homes or to find them jobs or even to keep housing them. They are homeless, not disabled. Many people lose their homes every day due to various circumstances, and the government does not have any responsibility toward them. In any case, how long has it been now? If people are still unemployed, sitting in government-provided housing (no matter how poor that housing is) and whining about handouts, then what is really going on here? At what point did the government become more responsible for a citizen's circumstances than the citizen himself?
Government builds levees and thereby encourages builders to build behind them and people to move in to live and work behind them. Nobody lives a daily life constantly worried about whether they'll drown in their attics next year, month, or week. We're not supposed to.
So, Katrina was a failure of government, and, yeah, government IS responsible for making these people whole, or seeing that they get made whole, get it? You don't apply those "should have known better" standards to the families of 9-11 victims, I'll bet. Same thing---a failure in government. If government decides it can't in this way sustainably support such a city, then let them justify it compared to how they support other cities, and let them come up with a FAIR land use plan, and have the guts to stick to it.
BTW, I don't see any orgs but Brad Pitt's coming up with real, workable, on the ground solutions for building in formerly flooded areas. What's with that?
2) The true "state of levees" certainly was, and is, shrouded in government opacity and even obfuscation. Check out Amy Wold's article in The Advocate, July 09, 2009, on the recent release of a "supplemental report" necessary to just to explain the original "why it flooded" report.
Gobbledy-gook to explain gobbledy-gook, and noted academic levee/hurricane experts, most notably the one LSU fired for speaking truth to power, STILL say New Orleans is no better off now than before Katrina.
"Government builds levees and thereby encourages builders" ----- and this should make it okay for people to throw their common sense out the window and live in a "potential" flood zone.
Now you expect the federal government to pickup the tab to replace/rebuild for these folks because they made a conscious decision to live there. I think not. That makes about as much sense as people who buy/build outside an airport or military jetport and complain about the noise and want the city/county or federal government to buy their houses.
At least if you are going to make dumb decisions, take the time to have plans to protect you and yours when the odds turn against you.
Oh there we go again, talking about common sense and not depending on the federal government to bail you out for your dumb decisions!!
Check out the "St. Bernard Project" which is rebuilding/rehabing houses in the St. Bernard Parish.. Liz McCarthy won the 2008 CNN "Hero of the Year" award for the amazing work this group has done. They always need volunteers and any other support that you can give.
Or...they didn't have flood insurance perhaps because like us in 1980, they were told by their mortgage lender they didn't need flood insurance...and this on a property off Franklin Avenue, which despite standing nearly 3' off the ground, took on another 2-3' of water?
Yes, I use to have faith in the federal government when they assured us we were safe from flooding up to a cat 3 storm. I guess that was naive of me. Don't worry. I am a pure cynic now. I don't believe them anymore. I don't believe that America is an exceptional country anymore either. I will never believe in my own country again. They, Republicans and Democrats, abandoned us pure and simple. I will die a New Orleanian, not an American.
And finally, sixty, it's pretty difficult to "walk out" when the next town is 30 miles away and the few connecting highways are actually causeways, over water. Like the roads that connect the Florida Keys. Just think of New Orleans as an island. (It's technically not, but for all practical purposes, it is).
Those tens of thousands of people you saw on your TV screen, stuck at the Superdome and Morial Center, surrounded by floodwater? They were true urbanites, like dwellers of Manhattan. New Orleans was/is a PEDESTRIAN city, like New York, Paris, Brussels, London. It's one thing that was/is so special about it, and apparently, one thing that totally escaped leaders like GW "Bring It On" Bush and "Heck Of A Job Brownie". Of course, I don't think it escaped "Let'em Swim" Rove and "If You're Thirsty, Lick Sweat" Cheney, for one second.
You said:
"natural disaster" Uh, no. It was an engineering disaster. The Corps made many foolish mistakes and the levee designs were either well below Congressional mandated levels of protection or the levees themselves were well below the Corps' own design capacity. Read the ILIT Report from UC-Berkeley for more. (Google "ILIT Berkeley" for the link.)
"floods repeatedly" Uh, no. The River hasn't flooded the city since the 1840s. Most of the area flooded by Katrina had never been flooded before.
"flood insurance ... wasn't available" Uh, no. Flood insurance wasn't necessary. The same folks - the Federal government - sell the insurance and builds the levees. They said, you have levees, you don't need flood insurance; the levees are your flood insurance.
As a New Orleanian/Katrina survivor, public school teacher,I am highly offended by most of these posts.We have been rebuilding on our own.The insurance companies said NO to claims because they wouldn't cover wind damage(like roofs blown off)or subsequent water damage.Wind or Water?Nagin was elected by a slight majority bussed in by Bill Cosby & Jesse Jackson that claimed only a "black" mayor should be allowed in New Orleans;screw being the most qualified.Lt.Gov.Landrieu was opponent,so thank Bill and Jesse.Nagin is rarely here,will be gone next year anyway.Harry, please run for mayor!The people of New Orleans have helped each other, and thanks to the 1,000s of volunteers from all over the world,especially young people.Oh,slumlords took their FEMA money,didn't rebuild,those who did quadruple rents.FEMA money still not being released to our area,thank Bush and Jindal for that.Got that out there?
Alice, seriously, who do you think really has a chance for running for mayor & winning?
That is SO important for New Orleans, to have a good mayor, who will put together a good team who looks for opportunities to find common ground, even with political foes, who has a basic love for people, boundless enthusiasm and a positive outlook, and who works for the good of the entire city. It's the team concept that works, you know.
And no, y'all can't have Kip Holden!!!!
I love ya' Harry, but we need you to rabblerouse & be caustic. Maybe be part of a mayor's kitchen cabinet.
What about Garland Robinette? Think he's up to it, and would be interested?
In reference to the statement "the government's inability to swiftly and cheaply repair damaged housing, especially rental units, mean the agency is not up to handling a Katrina-scale event"
I have a question. Why is it the responsibility of a government agency to fix this? If a single home or rental property were to be damaged with water, fire or what ever, the property insurance would handle the repairs and the temporary housing of the effected residents. Why did this not happen in New Orleans? Have the private insurers been held accountable for this? In addition, have those families still living in FEMA trailers and FEMA sponsored hotel rooms been held accountable for their inaction? Held accountable to move forward on their own, or are they incapable of helping themselves or are they just willingly living off the government and waiting for another handout? Did they even have insurance?
Don't get me wrong, I agree that there are some that do need assistance, but there are many in this and many US cities that willingly allow the government to be the sole benefactor of their life, not taking personal responsibility in their own life, and believing that they are owed something or are just to ignorant or lazy to better for themselves.
This "did not happen" in just New Orleans, but across the coast of Katrina and Rita devastation "insurance" failed as a viable recovery option. Particularly in Mississippi, the realm of Governor Haley Babar, the Insurance Industry proved itself quite the Reaper. Please check out this Insurance-workers' blog from down there: http://slabbed.wordpress.com/ and they will help bring you up to speed on the efficacy and veracity of our "American" (Re)Insurance Industry and how it aggregates and aggravates Disaster Capitalism.
In the case of FEMA however, Harry is absolutely correct. They used to be about Disaster Management --not Disaster Creation such as Renaissance Village: the city of 1000s of formaldehyde boxes they situated in the middle of nowhere and just left it. Indeed, don't you wonder who made all of that poison plywood? If you want that kind of cold disaster management then move to China. We don't need no re-education here. We just need to get the smell of Bush Stupid out of our Federal Emergency Management.
LOL! Insurance companies honoring contracts. What a laugh! Wake up McIntyre. It doesn't work that way when insurance companies panic about their bottom line. There is no one to make them payout. (at least without a long, costly legal battle.) Congress is owned by their lobbyists.
You tell us, spmcintyre. Why didn't property insurance come thru like the people who paid those premiums all those years were led to believe they would? Hmm? That's just one of the 64 Gazillion dollar questions abt Katrina! What would be greater than great, is if more than just New Orleanians (or ex-New Orleanians) were asking it!
Tell me spmcintyre, Oh Wise One, if you don't own a car and do not have large amounts of cash on hand, just how do you evacuate ahead of a storm? If you are lucky enough to find a way to get out of town, where do you go? If you are lucky enough to have a place to go, how do you get food?
If you have a place to stay and food, how do you go about getting a job (as your former job was in a place that got washed off the face of the earth? How do you , with no money, no home, no car , maybe limited skills,restart your life?? All of this while competing with hundreds of thousands of others in the same dire circumstances.
Oh Wise One, what solutions do you have to offer?
It is the truly "ignorant" and "lazy" who blame all poor people for their circumstances without thought to causation. That might require some effort and some heart.
Besides it is far easier to lump all disadvantaged people together as one parasitic mass of humanity that you might have to help than to allow for complex analysis.
Would your own income pay for restarting your life ie: food, car, clothes, furniture, insurance, health care,mortgage/rent payments AND continued mortgage payments of the house that was destroyed that insurance REFUSED to pay for and on the lot that you CAN'T SELL?
Do you think a catastrophe can't happen to you?
Thanks Harry.
As usual you are ahead of the curve, and here as well: http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/07/no_homerebuilding_program_runn.html
My goodness some people never learn, but we will be soooo glad to get ourselves rid of Ray "Raygunz" "Baby'head" "Murder'brand" "Chocolate'Don" "Whiney'mouf"... stop me please, NAGIN.
Of course we all figure that you and Ms Judith are way too busy to, ahem... yes, well errrah Run for Mayor?
Sorry, jus'sayin... folks are starting to talk. Enquirering Mind wants to noze.
Really though, if y'all can just keep bringing us Christmas on Camp Street
we'll be alright fo'sho.
The government is responsible, and should be held responsible. Starting with the recently reelected Mayor of New Orleans, who is first and foremost, and including his predecessors, responsible for the condition of the condition of the levee system? It is on this office that primary blame should be placed, for not making certain that the cities safety systems were being maintained and upgraded properly. In addition to that issue, there was a major lack of local organization before, during and after Katrina. Immediately it was hollered from many media outlets, why is the Federal Government not getting it done. The other states and cities effected by Katrina, although not damage as badly as New Orleans, were able recover much faster, and were able to handle issues because they had stronger local support, and relied upon themselves in order to organize repairs.
Spmc,
The mayor of New Orleans has no control nor responsibility whatsoever for the levee system. Design and constructiom of the system, by federal mandate, belongs to the federal government since 1965. And no inspections could have detected design and construction flaws in the levees deep underground.
And only the federal government is authorized to make repairs afterward. It´s the law.
WRONG AGAIN! Have you been to Chalmette, Slidell, Waveland, Bay St. Louis, Biloxi, Gulfport, D'Iberville, Pass Christian, and the rest of the Gulf Coast? Where do you get your "facts"??
"Relied on themselves to organize repairs"!!! How about over 1 million volunteers (obviously not including yourself) and counting.
Please stop spouting what you "learned" from Fox news. There is enough ignorance to go around. Don't add to it.
See Harry Shearer's Profile
It appears hard for some commenters to distinguish between a "benefactor", and remedying the destruction one has caused through mis- or mal-feasance. As the article I linked to points out, FEMA is fully capable of dealing with most natural disasters. The scale of what happened to New Orleans is directly related to the cause, the design and construction flaws of the federal levees. A private actor who wreaked such damage would certainly be hauled into court and held accountable. One expects no less of the feds. Or at least one should.
And then there's the Levy Boards who took the Federal maintenance money and divided it up amongst themselves as a matter of normal business. Where should they be held accountable for the collapse of the levy system.
I spent 10 months in Louisiana with the last six months in the delta and areas in and around New Orleans. My suggestion at the time and still is, we should have left New Orleans flooded and used it as a military/police/fire training ground.
Absolutely nothing good will come out of the billions and billions of dollars being spent to rebuild a city which was and is a boil on the butt of the United States.
It would be nice if they would at least TRY. 10 months in LA and you know it all. You know nothing except how to turn your back on your fellow Americans.
Wow! How does one begin to comment on such an asinine statement?
The city and port that was the actual reason for The Louisianna Purchase.
The birthplace of American culture, and still the most unique city in the US.
A city beloved by those who live there, and people from all over the world who've visited and enjoyed it's special atmosphere.
This is the place you'd have left flooded and turned into a "military/police/fire training ground?"
Huffpost won't let me say what I'd like to say about a person who would make such a statement.
I gather that you've left New Orleans. Good riddance.
I wish the best to whatever benightedly unsuspecting burg or hamlet you'll next "benefit."
You must be logged in to comment. Log in or connect with
