What the Federal Response to Katrina should have looked like.

Is no one else ashamed?

Am I the only person to see the aid coming in from Asia, South America, Europe, and Africa (Africa for God’s Sake!!), and even Cuba and Venezuela, and is no one hanging their head in shame? Can we watch African International Airlines fly food and other emergency supplies into this country without hanging our heads?

For me, this is even more shameful than for most folks. I spent almost 10 years as a Regional Manager for the National Communications Systems (NCS), and served as a Federal Emergency Communication Coordinator (FECC), on numerous Stafford Act Disaster Response and recovery teams under the administrations of President Bush (senior), and President Clinton.

During the 1990s, we responded within a few hours to numerous disasters, activating the response teams from cell phones at all hours, and flying into the nearest airports, renting numerous cars and driving into unknown conditions. Working with FEMA and all the Federal Agencies that respond to disasters, we went as soon as the Disaster Declarations were signed by the President. The signature was the signal for the Federal community to move.

Our teams were on the ground with the first planes into Florida, Hawaii, Guam, Texas, the Carolinas, Oklahoma, Missouri, California, Oregon, Alaska, and every other state and territory where Hurricanes, Earthquakes, Floods, Tornadoes, and terrorists caused havoc for Americans.

At the Northridge Earthquake in California, GSA purchased millions of gallons of bottled drinking water the first day of the declaration. At Hurricane Iniki in Hawaii, GSA and the Dept. of Transportation purchased or leased aircraft, boats, cars, trucks, and shelter all through the first few days, to get people and supplies over to Kauai. At almost every disaster field office, our teams worked 18 to 24 hour shifts the first few days, and then 12 hour shifts with no days off, sometimes for weeks.

My personal responsibility was to ensure that communications were available to the local, state, and Federal Response Community, and to give absolute priority to the needs of the victims and the on-scene responders. Sometimes, this meant rebuilding the entire regional Infrastructure on an emergency basis. It was stressful, demanding work, but every member of FEMA and the Federal Agencies deployed with FEMA were ready and willing to do it.

After almost 10 years, I took a more relaxing position with the Department of Defense, and last year I retired.

And now, for the last week, I have watched in shame and horror as the disaster in New Orleans has gone from bad to worse to intolerable.

The Declaration for this Disaster was not signed by the President until 3 days after the State of Louisiana Declaration and request, and that was the first surprise of many. In the first days, many of the normal FEMA response teams were simply not there. The Principal Federal Official (PFO) is the Director of FEMA, who cannot possibly devote full time to this disaster, and does not have the training for it. The Federal Coordinating Officers (FCO), for the States of Alabama (Mr. Ron Sherman), Mississippi (Mr. William L. Carwile, III), and Louisiana (Mr. William Lokey) have never been available for the press or the public to explain their actions. These people are the appointed directors of the entire Federal Response Effort for those three states.

The Director of FEMA and the head of the Dept. of Homeland Security are not normally the on-scene coordinators of the Response Effort, the PFO and FCO are the on-scene Response leaders. It is they who activate the Emergency Support Function Teams, who authorize the requests for Defense Support of Civil Authorities, who take all the requests from State Officials and return people, food, shelter, material, money, and expertise to mitigate the consequences and put the region back on its feet.

And my question is: Where were they? In fact, I’d like to know where they are now. We are still having the President and the Directors of DHS and FEMA give out wrong and bad information. Even former President Clinton has commented on it.

For pity’s sake, John Travolta was delivering water and food faster than FEMA.

OK, The President and the other staff at the White House have said they want to fix things first and talk blame later. And I have spent most of my working life saying “fix it, don’t blame it.” Perhaps we don’t need blame, but we really need to know what happened here. I am just sick when I think of all the available resources and systems that could have been available, that somehow got left out of the response here.

So I think that the people of the USA, and the Media, and the elected representatives in the House and Senate, need to familiarize themselves with some of the past actions taken regarding Hurricanes in Louisiana, and with the National Response Plan (NRP) structure and requirements, which is the plan that DHS and FEMA use to decide how to respond to disasters. And I think we need to start asking hard questions now, so these points aren’t forgotten in the days ahead.

A copy of the NRP is on the FEMA Web site in PDF format.

FEMA and the Federal Response Community (a group of 15 Federal Agencies called the Emergency Support Functions - ESF), evacuated New Orleans in September 1998, in preparation for Hurricane Georges, and possible flooding of New Orleans. The scenarios reviewed then were almost identical to what has just happened. But, at that time, there was a PLAN to deal with these situations in a timely manner.

It was known then, because it was tried then, that the Superdome was a poor idea for shelter for longer than one or two days.

These plans didn’t just disappear. FEMA Region 6, all the state Emergency Managers, and all the ESF Agencies (DOT, NCS, DOJ, DOA, DOE, COE, GSA, Red Cross, White House, DOD, etc.), maintain these plans, review them regularly, and update them as necessary. In 2002 the New Orleans Community was treated to a review of the scenarios and plans in a newspaper series. In 2004, a FEMA exercise familiarized ALL responding ESF agencies with the scenarios and the response and recovery plans.

The Disaster Declarations under the Stafford are required before FEMA or other Agencies can move or obligate funds for a Disaster.

President Bush signed the Stafford Act Declaration for the Hurricane Katrina situation on July 29^th, 2005. This is the day Katrina made Initial Landfall, and this Declaration enabled the ESF agencies to obligate funds for evacuation, transportation, purchasing water, food, radios, clothes, and shelter away from the area, leasing trucks, helicopters, etc. All this is SOP, and has been done many times before.

Within 12 hours, the FEMA FIRST teams (Federal Incident Response Support Team), The ERT-A (Emergency Response Team A, out of Washington DC), and the ESF Agency Coordinators SHOULD have been set up in a Joint Field Office (JFO), with the State and Local Emergency Planners and responders. ESF-2, Communications, should have been available to establish many levels of communication among responders and Local, State, and Federal Officials.

The JFO SHOULD have been jointly operated by the Federal Coordinating Officer (FCO), and the State Coordinating Officer (SCO), both reporting to the Primary Federal Official (Appointed for the disaster by the President, or by the Director of Homeland Security, or by the Director of FEMA.

Our first questions then need to be:

1. Why is the Director of FEMA the Principal Federal Official? He can’t devote his time to this disaster alone.

2. Were the FIRST and the ERT-A teams activated and moved? If so, why no action for days?

3. Where were the ESF Agencies? Not with the Governor, Not on the news. Were these agencies activated for support? According to many news reports, the answer is no, but no one has actually asked FEMA or DHS this question. These include the Communications, Transportation, Medical Care, Food, Shelter, Mass Casualty and Mortuary, and Law Enforcement teams, and many others.

4. Why weren’t the actions normally taken for this kind of hurricane taken immediately? Buying water, food, clothing, shelter; leasing vehicles and aircraft, bringing in the Nat. Guard, activating the DOD units, etc. At most hurricanes, this is done in 12 to 24 hours, maximum.

5. Where was the Information Management team (ESF-5, a FEMA function)? On Thursday, September 1^st, FEMA claimed they had only just been made aware of the Situation in the Astrodome. The Local and State Coordinating personnel didn’t tell FEMA? And FEMA never asked, and didn’t even watch the News? Thursday was 5 days after the Declaration, and 4 days after Katrina made Landfall, and 3 days after the dikes broke. What were they doing?

6. In a large scale incident, DHS has the responsibility to activate another part of the response, notifying the president that this is a CATASTROPHIC INCIDENT, and activating the Catastrophic Incident Response. I don’t think this has been done yet, but if it has, why hasn’t it been announced? The available resources to support the local and state efforts are greater than those under the Stafford Act.

I don’t know why the plans fell apart, but I have a suspicion.

In a joint or Disaster Field Office, the ability for the ESF teams to respond rests very much on the presidential appointees who are charged with managing the disaster. If the Appointee doesn’t have the sense of urgency or leadership necessary, only a few Federal Managers may risk their careers to take a greater role in the response activity.

The key is leadership. The NRP requires the FEMA Leaders to take a proactive stance, and to lead the response and recovery effort, not simply to wait for the States to determine what they may need. FEMA has the experience and the resources to manage these recovery efforts. If the DCO doesn’t want to be seen spending too much, or wants to allow the State to solve most of its own problems, then the response will be low key, and most ESF personnel will not be activated.

At a disaster in 1996, I activated a very expensive FEMA resource and authorized its delivery by USAF C-5A, which is fast but expensive. The FEMA coordinator 400 miles away thought this was extravagant, and ordered the system transported by ground. So an 8 hour response time turned into a 48 hour response time (the ground was flooded and many roads were washed out). In the after-action sessions, we set up a new line of communication to prevent that situation from happening again.

Rather than take a leadership role and determine the necessity of an action, this individual took a safe role in terms of response and budgets.

I don’t want to think that this lack of risk-taking is to blame for all this horror in Louisiana, but in an atmosphere where nothing is being done, and where no one is leading, it could have happened easily.

There is one last question to be asked. In the aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, FEMA looked very hard at itself, and worked hard to change into the world-class Emergency Management organization that it was throughout the 90s. So the last question here is: What happened to that expertise and ability?

We need to find that ability, because this is surely not the last hurricane or catastrophic incident this country will face. And I never again want to see the poorest continent in the world bringing relief to Americans.

So, the MSM (FOX News, who else?) doesn't bother with sources

Read this article.

Apparently FOX News doesn't bother substantiating ANYTHING when they want to stir up the old Anti-Terrorist Mob Mania.

Without checking on the accuracy of a report, or the current whereabouts of a person, they put a name and a 3 year old home address out over the air, and accused the person of being a terrorist. It turns out they were wrong about the address, and most probably wrong about the name.

The innocent family that had bought this house 3 years before has now spent a few weeks being terrorized by right wing fools. They require police protection, and the father is afraid to go to work because he is so worried about his children.

I want to take the revolution to FOX. These irresponsible chickenhawks are inciting people to riot. They have never seen a mob, and when they finally convince some idiot to use fire or guns then they will feel very sorry, and say we didn't mean this to happen.

Yes they did. They are trying to create a polarized electorate, a police state, and an inflamed mob of viewers. They are no different than the Nazi Propagandists of the 30's, and it is time to stop them/