"FEMA gives away Katrina donations"

[orleans]

Thursday, June 12, 2008By Katy Reckdahl
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.

more at link
http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-10/1213248650134190.xml&coll=1

[BlooInBloo]

1. Fuckers. Let's all hope that Iowa people receive better treatment.

[orleans]

2. no shit. n/t

[China_cat]

7. Of course they will.

The people in Iowa won't be so overwhelmingly people of color.

[kath]

3. Ohmygod, this is so, SO wrong.

Man, does FEMA suck moose c#*k or what?!!

85 million dollars worth of stuff that people dug deep and donated because they wanted to HELP. I'm speechless...

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :grr: :grr: :grr:

[Shoelace]

6. yes they surely do

and I only reserve that term for the really bad guys. I thought I was the only one who knew that term but glad to know it's still around. Going to be interesting to see how they handle the historic flooding in Iowa now. So far, I've not heard what they are doing there except that they are bringing in enough water for a couple of days in Cedar Rapids.

[Raksha]

4. This is unreal. They not only didn't help,

they sabotaged the relief efforts in every way they could. I'm sure it was on purpose too.

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. I bet it's another attempt to make them look so bad Americans will scream to have it dismantled and

replaced.. by a privately owned company of sort, of course.

[rudy23]

8. That's exactly what the plan is. We're all pawns in a game meant to encourage

privatization of everything. They can't let the government succeed on any level without destroying the thesis statement of the Bush presidency.

[galledgoblin]

9. gave supplies away to who?

did FEMA higher-ups stock up on Christmas presents?

[REACTIVATED IN CT]

10. My son & I spent an afternoon at the armory in Hartford CT

working with other volunteers to process donations. For hours, people drove up in their cars and pickups loaded with donated items - food, water, clothing, medical supplies, toiletries, pet food. We helped unload the items and sort them in preparation for them being packed on pallets, wrapped in plastic and loaded into trailers that were to be driven to NOLA. I'm sure the same scene was being played all over the country that Labor Day weekend. How rewarding to know what happened to the donations.

[orleans]

12. people in my neighborhood got items together, went shopping

and spent hours helping load a semi filled with donations

we raised money for the red cross

god damn this gop administration

[Swamp Rat]

11. k&r

:grr: