Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected

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Sat, 17 Sep 2005 15:31:47 -0700 (PDT)

Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected

 

 

 

 

 

Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected

By RITA BEAMISH, Associated Press Writer

 

 

As far back as eight years ago, Congress ordered the

Federal Emergency Management Agency to develop a plan

for evacuating New Orleans during a massive hurricane,

but the money instead went to studying the causeway

bridge that spans the city's Lake Ponchartrain,

officials say.

 

The outcome provides one more example of the

government's failure to prepare for a massive but

foreseeable catastrophe, said the lawmaker who helped

secure the money for FEMA to develop the evacuation

plan.

 

" They never used it for the intended purpose, " said

former Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La. " The whole intent was

to give them resources so they could plan an

evacuation of New Orleans that anticipated that a very

large number of people would never leave. "

 

In Hurricane Katrina's aftermath, attention has

focused on the inability of local and federal

officials to evacuate or prepare for the large number

of poor people, many of them minorities, who had no

access to transportation and remained behind.

 

That possibility was one of the concerns that led

Congress in 1997 to set aside $500,000 for FEMA to

create " a comprehensive analysis and plan of all

evacuation alternatives for the New Orleans

metropolitan area. "

 

Frustrated two years later that nothing materialized,

Congress strengthened its directive. This time it

ordered " an evacuation plan for a Category 3 or

greater storm, a levee break, flood or other natural

disaster for the New Orleans area. "

 

The $500,000 that Congress appropriated for the

evacuation plan went to a commission that studied

future options for the 24-mile bridge over Lake

Ponchartrain, FEMA spokesman Butch Kinerney said.

 

The hefty report produced by the Greater New Orleans

Expressway Commission " primarily was not about

evacuation, " said Robert Lambert, the general manager

for the bridge expressway. " In general it was an

overview of all the things we need to do " for the

causeway through 2016.

 

Lambert said he could not trace how or if FEMA money

came to the commission. Nor could Shelby LaSalle, a

causeway consulting engineer who worked on the plan.

 

LaSalle said it would be " ludicrous " to consider his

report an evacuation plan, although it had a

transportation evacuation section, dated Dec. 19,

1997. That part was tacked on mainly to promote the

causeway for future designation as an official

evacuation route, LaSalle said.

 

" We didn't do anything for FEMA, " he added.

 

Asked why the congressional mandate was never

fulfilled, Barry Scanlon, senior vice president in the

consulting firm of former FEMA Director James Lee

Witt, said he believes the agency did what it needed

when it gave the money to the state.

 

" FEMA received an earmark which it processed through

to the state as instructed by Congress, " Scanlon said,

Witt is now a private consultant to Gov. Kathleen

Blanco, D-La., on the Katrina aftermath.

 

Tauzin said he, too, could never find out where the

money went. " They gave it to the causeway commission?

That's wacky, " he said.

 

At the time eight years ago, the Louisiana delegation

had plenty of political muscle to get the money.

Then-Rep. Bob Livingston, R-La., was chairman of the

House Appropriations Committee, which controls the

government's purse strings.

 

Livingston, now a lobbyist, said he could not explain

what happened either, although he knew of other

predictive hurricane studies over the years.

 

" Do I wish the study had been made? Sure, but now

that's by the boards. We're doing the best we can

right now to repair and rebuild, " he said.

 

FEMA typically contracts its studies to private or

government entities. Kinerney, the agency spokesman,

said it appeared the money went through the Louisiana

government. State emergency and transportation

officials said they did not recall it.

 

After nothing came of its first directive, FEMA

addressed the need for an evacuation plan " off and on "

over the years, Kinerney said. Last year, the agency

undertook the massive " Hurricane Pam " project that was

supposed to create a comprehensive emergency plan for

New Orleans.

 

That work was unfinished when Katrina struck, though

its first phase involved an elaborate hurricane

simulation that was eerily predictive of Katrina's

disaster.

 

Asked about any earlier FEMA-funded plan, Mark Smith,

spokesman for the state Office of Homeland Security

and Emergency Preparedness, said, " To the best of our

knowledge we can find no information on this. "

 

Congress' 1999 language directed that FEMA consult

with that state agency as well as the Louisiana

Department of Transportation and Development.

 

FEMA's parent agency, the Homeland Security

Department, did provide $75,000 to print 1 million

evacuation maps that were distributed this year for

the state's updated transportation evacuation

blueprint, state transportation spokesman Mark Lambert

said.

 

That plan used phased evacuation orders and

reverse-flow traffic patterns to avoid the highway

snarls New Orleans saw during Hurricane Ivan in 2004.

 

But that plan was designed for traffic management, not

to provide transportation or contingencies for the

infirm, elderly and poor who could not get out on

their own, officials said.

 

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