Here we go. With an uncaring, idiot president and an inept FEMA, people living along south-eastern coastal areas of the US will be on their own again this hurricane season.

Bertha becomes 1st hurricane of Atlantic season

MIAMI (AP) — Hurricane Bertha continues to strengthen as it moves over the central Atlantic Ocean.

As of 11 a.m. EDT Monday, the Atlantic season’s first hurricane was centered about 775 miles east of the northern Leeward Islands. National Hurricane Center forecasters say Bertha is expected to turn in the general direction of Bermuda.

It’s still to early to tell whether Bertha will hit the island, but forecasters urged residents to monitor the storm’s progress.

But it ain’t done yet. And Chertoff went to Califorinia today. I hate thinking like I do, but I can’t help it. Those bastards wouldn’t have changed the law if they didn’t intend to put it to use. If those fires had been in….. say….ohhhhh…… I don’t know……let’s say New Orleans……martial law would be in place. That’s the first thing I thought of today when I heard Skeletor was on his way, and that people were being housed in the stadium. My heart goes out to the people in the fire ravaged areas.

Bowing to robust lobbying by U.S. governors, members of Congress appear poised to repeal a law enacted just a year ago that expanded the president’s power to invoke martial law.

Both the House and Senate have passed defense authorization bills (HR 1585) that would undo the provision in a law (PL 109-364) that augmented the circumstances in which the president may use the military, even without governors- consent, to enforce the law at home during crises. A House-Senate conference is writing the bill’s final version, and the provision is unlikely to change.

The National Governors Association also is concerned about a proposal in the House-passed version of the bill that would require new procedures for the control of National Guard and active-duty troops during domestic emergencies.

But the more significant issue for governors is restoration of the traditional limits on presidential power in times of crisis.

More at CQ

60,000 families. What’s wrong with this picture? 2 years later, and 60,000 (probably more) are still living in FEMA trailers. Trailers with cancer-causing formaldehyde. What a country!!! What a government!! I wonder how much these cancer-causing trailers cost us. And I wonder why Chertoff still has a job. Way to take care of our own!!!

The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced yesterday that it will allow 60,000 families displaced by Hurricane Katrina and now living in FEMA-provided trailers on the Gulf Coast to move into hotel or motel rooms if they are concerned about formaldehyde gas in their trailers.

The policy shift, made two weeks ago but not widely publicized until now, follows a House committee finding in July that FEMA leaders had suppressed warnings about the presence of high levels of potentially cancer-causing formaldehyde, apparently to avoid legal liability.

The announcement brings full circle FEMA’s costly and troubled housing response to the Katrina disaster. The agency hastily ordered $2.7 billion in manufactured housing, mostly through no-bid contracts, only to discover later that FEMA rules prevented the use of a third of the purchases in flood zones, where most victims lived, and that local communities would refuse to host large trailer encampments.

More at the Washington Post

This great graphic is from Louisiana blogger Suspect Device. (Thanks to Blue Gal for the tip.)

The Washington Post has an interactive multimedia section that shows past and current photos of the areas hit by Hurricane Katrina. They also report:
(more…)

Katrina started the initial devastation. The Bush administration seems hell-bent on continuing it. Payback for not voting republican all those years is such a bitch!

Report: Little progress on Katrina contracts

In some cases, Bush administration backtracked on pledge to rectify errors

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has shown little progress - and in some cases backtracked - on its pledge to do a better job in awarding contracts to small, Gulf Coast businesses for Hurricane Katrina work, a congressional analysis shows.

The review of federal contracts from five government agencies, conducted by the House Small Business Committee, is the latest to document missteps in the award of billions of dollars of lucrative government work since the 2005 storm.
[...]

The committee’s review found that small businesses in Louisiana had an overall net loss of $8.9 million in contracting dollars since April, when the agencies reaffirmed their commitment to give smaller companies a share of the work. The loss was due in part to a decision at the Homeland Security Department to modify several existing agreements instead of awarding significant new contracts.

In addition, the review found the five agencies - Homeland Security, General Services Administration, Defense, Veterans Affairs and Small Business Administration - had claimed falsely that 259 contracts were awarded to small businesses when in fact they went to large companies or ineligible recipients. That created the false impression that more than $95 million in contracts was awarded to small companies, when they actually went elsewhere.

MSNBC.com

I don’t understand why the Democratic led congress hasn’t done something about the Gulf Coast. Why has it been forgotten???????? 2 years…..and it’s still a mess.

NEW ORLEANS — More than 20 months after Hurricane Katrina, many communities in Mississippi and Louisiana are still haggling with the Federal Emergency Management Agency over how much money the government will reimburse them for debris removal and infrastructure repairs.

FEMA says it audits all Katrina projects to root out waste and fraud. Local officials, however, say the agency has needlessly dragged out the process and has not clearly defined what prices it considers reasonable.

Millions of dollars are at stake for cash’strapped communities still struggling to rebuild. Some communities say that if FEMA does not reimburse their expenses, they may have to borrow money or raises taxes to cover debris-removal contracts.

In Mississippi, two dozen counties and cities could lose a combined $18.4 million because FEMA questions whether they paid too much for the work, said Mike Womack, director of the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.

Read more at the Washington Post

So they’re rushing to help. Aren’t many of the folk in NO still waiting for help? What a shitty shoddy administration.

From CNN.com:

Bush to Americans: ‘Help the folks down here’

AMERICUS, Georgia (CNN) – President Bush assured tornado victims Saturday that help is on the way as he toured towns in Alabama and Georgia that were among the hardest hit by Thursday’s storms.
[...]

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One en route to Alabama, Federal Emergency Management Agency Director David Paulison said Bush’s visit was indicative of “the new FEMA.”

Before Paulison’s tenure, the agency drew fierce criticism for its handling of the Hurricane Katrina aftermath. Paulison told reporters that in the past FEMA didn’t intervene in disaster recovery until the state and local community became overwhelmed.

That system doesn’t work, Paulison said. After Thursday’s storms, FEMA immediately sent 14 teams armed with food, water, ice, tarps, plastic sheeting and communications equipment.

“We have to go in as partners, so that’s what we’re going to be doing,” Paulison told reporters.

One managed a bowling alley. Another was a cook. Another, a convicted felon who spent time in prison.

They are among the people the state of Florida relied on as supervisors in a FEMA-funded, $23 million counseling program for hurricane victims.

Team leaders in Project H.O.P.E. (Helping Our People in Emergencies) are “mental health professionals,” Florida assured the Federal Emergency Management Agency in its applications for the counseling grants. Yet, only one in four of those hired met federal educational and licensing guidelines, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel found.

Project H.O.P.E. hired Leon Gillis in November 2005 as a team leader in the Daytona Beach area even though he wrote on his application that he had been convicted of robbery twice, aggravated assault and cocaine possession. He has been arrested 14 times in Florida from 1966 to 2002 and spent more than five years in prison, records show.

Read more at the Sun Sentinel

Waste waste and more waste……..

By Sally Kestin
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Posted October 8 2006

At the Pinitos Learning Center in Boca Raton, disaster workers dressed as “Windy Biggie” and “Sunny” teach 30 preschoolers a song about how the wind is good, even during a hurricane.

“Windy Biggie is our friend.

“Windy Biggie is strong wind.

“She turns, turns, turns, turns around.

“She’s knocking things to the ground.”

This is FEMA tax money at work. It’s also paying for Hurricane Bingo, puppet shows, “salsa for seniors,” and yoga on the beach.
Read more at the Sun Sentinel

Last year, the Federal Emergency Management Agency awarded Florida $22.6 million for “crisis counseling” for victims of hurricanes Wilma and Katrina.

Sooooooo, is Bush going to be indicted on charges of negligent homicide and cruelty to the victims left on roofs and in attics for days while waiting for rescue???? Not that the owner of this nursing home shouldn’t be charged, but let’s be fair here……. how many senior citizens died in attics and in homes with no way of escape? No food. No water. No hope. No rescue.

CHALMETTE, La. - The owners of a nursing home where 35 patients died in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina were indicted Wednesday on charges of negligent homicide and cruelty to the infirm.

A St. Bernard Parish grand jury took about four hours to return the indictment on 35 counts of negligent homicide and 64 counts of cruelty to the infirm against Salvador and Mabel Mangano, who were arrested about two weeks after the Aug. 29, 2005, storm. Their nursing home, St. Rita’s, is in the rural St. Bernard Parish community of Poydras.

The Manganos’ arrest represented the first major criminal prosecution arising from Katrina, which flooded 80 percent of New Orleans and virtually wiped out neighboring St. Bernard Parish. The Louisiana death toll was nearly 1,600.

Read full article at MSNBC