Gov't fulfills few Katrina promises

[ProSense]

Gov't fulfills few Katrina promises

By MATT CRENSON, AP National Writer 1 hour, 24 minutes ago

Nearly half of New Orleans was still under water when
President Bush stood in the Crescent City's historic Jackson Square and swore he would "do what it takes" to rebuild the communities and lives that had been laid to waste two weeks before by Hurricane Katrina.

"Our goal is to get the work done quickly," the president said.

Snip...

Government auditors found that debit cards distributed to Katrina victims were used to pay for things like Dom Perignon champagne, New Orleans Saints season tickets and adult-oriented entertainment. The audit also found that people used fictional addresses, fake
Social Security numbers and the identities of dead people to fraudulently register for assistance. FEMA also double-deposited funds in the accounts of 5,000 out of the nearly 11,000 debit card holders.

CLEANUP: The job still isn't done. More than 100 million cubic yards of debris have been cleared from the region affected by Katrina. So far the government has spent $3.6 billion, a figure that might have been considerably smaller had the contracts for debris removal been subject to competitive bidding.

Working through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, FEMA gave each of four companies contracts worth up to $500 million to clear hurricane debris. This spring government inspectors reported that the companies — AshBritt Inc. of Pompano Beach, Fla., Phillips and Jordan Inc. of Knoxville, Tenn., Ceres Environmental Services Inc. of Brooklyn Park, Minn. and ECC Operating Services Inc. of Burlingame, Calif. — charged the government as much as four to six times what they paid their subcontractors who actually did the work.

more...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060819/ap_on_go_pr_wh/katrina_promises

[gademocrat7]

1. another shameful example of incompetence from shrub and co.

Disgraceful and disgusting.

[WCGreen]

2. It would be interesting to see if these companies

owners had given money to the GOP...

[rubberducky]

3. What really,really aggravates me...........

is all the hype about the wasteful spending with the debitcards given to the people. Did anybody put restrictions on how that money was to be spent?? NO!!! I said at the time, the gov. needed to follow the billions! Forget already how people spent thier debit money for God`s sake. The ONE thing the gov. should have been able to control was the billions spent on crony contracts as far away as Alaska! Did anybody bring the hammer down on them?????? NO!! Leave it to the robber barons in the white house to whine about the damn debit cards. If they truely want to prosecute somebody start with the damn contractors THEY hired, who sat on thier lazy asses, while hiring illegals to do the work.

[skids]

4. Is there text copy of this NPR story...

...my friend was telling me about -- some old lady that * had a photo-op with, promising her everything was going to get fixed up lickety split, and of course it didn't.

She plays it very coy, saying she believes * will honor his word, that he just must be realy, really busy to have not followed up on all those things he promised her.

[Gman]

5. My son in law went to work clearing debris in LA a couple weeks

after Katrina. He was paid $1500 a week for a couple of weeks. Then there was no work because the government brought in these big companies with the big equipment. Took the work away from the small contractors and small businesses. And they paid less than half what my son in law was making.

[serryjw]

6. Did we doubt it?

Total for this search: $5,000

Contributor
Occupation
Date
Amount
Recipient

ASHBRITT INC
POMPANO BEACH,FL 33069
INFORMATION REQUESTED - 6/19/2
6/19/2002
$5,000
RNC/Repub National State Elections Cmte


-------------
Only one of 3 I could find

[texpatriot2004]

7. Kick it for Katrina Victims nm