Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected

[Judi Lynn]

Money Earmarked for Evacuation Redirected

By RITA BEAMISH
Associated Press Writer

September 17, 2005, 1:18 PM EDT

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.
(snip/...)

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-katrina-evacuation,0,6121844.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines

[xxqqqzme]

1. I KNEW it was the fault of the clenis!

n/t

[serryjw]

2. There is no accountability on any level

for any of the money. When you pay your taxes you are flushing it down the toilet.This will NOT be the last tragedy due to incompetence.

[salvorhardin]

3. I wouldn't put it as harshly as you do

but I tend to agree. There are good bureaucrats, in fact I'd say that most career bureaucrats are really trying to do their jobs in the best way possible. Still, we're learning that all it takes to throw a giant monkey wrench into the system is to dismantle accountability mechanisms and hire key positions based on politics. The Republicans aren't alone in this, they've just taken political hackery to a whole new level. The sad fact is that this kind of thing has been going at least since the Civil War.

[serryjw]

6. Please tell me something that has gone right?

I agree we do have a few good ones but they are so undermined by Bushit. When you think of the kinda money that is in the Federal budget and how it is wasted. When Governor Kean (thug!) says he is disappointed on how nothing has happened to protect us in 4 years......yadie yadie.....Where are all the checks and balances to ensure money goes to what it has been appropriated for ( what is the sense of having a Congress?)?
We are not just talking about cronyism. This is putting many lives in danger.This was a natural disaster(with 4 days notice)....God help us if the next isn't.

[salvorhardin]

8. Whoa dude. We agree.

What happened with FEMA and disaster preparedness in New Orleans was criminal and goes several steps beyond almost anything we've seen before although I can think of several instances that are on a similar scale such as the distributing of known defective M-16s to soldiers in the Vietnam war.

All I was pointing out is that many of the nameless, faceless bureaucrats that actually are responsible for the day to day functioning of the government are by and large good people. Throw in cronyism and remove accountability though and get stuff like this article talks about. It's nothing new, but the Bush administration has crafted this kind of criminal negligence into an artform.

[serryjw]

9. Aren't we STILL using the

M-16's in Iraq?

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

10. The M-16's in Iraq

are a newer version that supposedly has the kinks worked out of them. Among other thing they have a three round limit per trigger pull built in when it's on automatic fire.

The M-16's in Viet Nam were a piece of shit that jammed up easliy. They must have had a few of them still around when I went in the Army in 1975. Several of us had problems with ours during basic training.

[serryjw]

12. Better yes....BUT not great!

http://www.grunt.com/forum/topic.asp?ARCHIVE=true&TOPIC_ID=5809

[kestrel91316]

13. Well that is definitely what THIS administration wants the sheeple

to think. So we will demand even LESS government services, and be forced to rely even more on religious charities and corporations for services we have a right to receive from government.

[WhiteTara]

4. Tauzin acts as though repukes weren't

running Congress for those full 8 years. Where was their oversight? Hey you Tauzin, where was your oversight? You're from Louisiana you SOB. If thoroughly checked, I am sure he profited off the redirection of the evacuation plan funds.

It is so amazing to me that these "people" actually say these things as though they were someone else's actions instead of their own.

[anotherdrew]

11. the key word is: "Earmarked" there is zero accountability on earmarks

If anyone can exercise accountability for earmarked funds it's the congress critter that put the earmark in some omnibus spending bill. Thing is, who put what in, is not documented anywhere! There is a big article all about this in Harpers from a month or two ago. I'm surprised Tauzin is claiming it, since if anyone was going to check that the money was being spent correctly, it would have had to have been him! Surely he knows this...

[finecraft]

5. This is a hoot---Billy Tauzin commenting about misuse of funds!

Here's how Billy's district worked: Everyone would go to Billy asking for money for "special" projects. Someone needed a new sewer plant, someone needed a new road, someone needed a new bridge...and the list goes on and on. Billy would get some money for the project, but it wouldn't be enough for the project...just a "study" of the proposed project. Billy had a large stable of people that loved to "study" projects....and also by coincidence, loved to contribute heavily to Billy's campaigns. Our parish has bookcases filled with "studies" that Billy got money for. Did one project ever get started? Sadly no...if the study said that the project was worthwhile, there was never any money available for the actual project. But there sure was a readily available pile of cash for more studies. I hate this man.

[serryjw]

7. I'm sorry.......BUT

my cat's BUTT doesn't stink! Photoshop it to skunks!..That's what they are.