Hurricane Katrina “villain” voices his side

Former FEMA director blames Louisiana’s local government

By Danae DeShazer

Thursday, April 5, 2007

The poor response to Hurricane Katrina was caused by the dysfunctional behavior of Louisiana’s local government and the lack of public communication about the situation, Michael Brown, former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said.

Brown was questioned by Scott Morris, director of FEMA’s Florida Long-Term Recovery, and members of the audience at the Dole Institute of Politics on Wednesday night.

Bill Lacy, director of the Dole Institute, introduced Brown as the “villain” of Hurricane Katrina, but asked the audience to decide for themselves what the truth was in the situation.

Brown said he started his position prior to Katrina by creating five disaster scenarios that FEMA should plan for, including hurricanes and tsunamis. However, the budget didn’t allow for FEMA to prepare for a potential catastrophic disaster.

“The administration was so focused on terrorism and other problems that homeland security was a problem child,” Brown said.

After posing to administrators that FEMA’s budget was important if a disaster were to happen, Brown said each person he asked turned a deaf ear to him.

“FEMA was crippled after budget cuts and programs being split apart,” Brown said.

Brown said Hurricane Katrina could have been helped if the government would have federalized the response, which would invoke national security to take over the state governments.

The dysfunction of Louisiana local government, including the mayor of New Orleans and the governor of Louisiana, was part of the cause for a delayed response by FEMA, Brown said.

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FEMA was crippled after budget cuts and programs being split apart.

- Michael Brown, former director FEMA

The second problem Brown addressed was miscommunication after the storm hit. He said that he announced the truth about sending food, medicine, cots, etc.

Brown said, “Factually we were doing that, but it still wasn’t enough.”

He said he regretted that he didn’t tell the whole story to the public. At the time, he thought he could handle it internally within the federal government, but wished he would have turned to the public so the whole nation could have gotten involved. He knew he would have gotten fired if he had said something, but it could have inspired people to fix the problem.

Lisa Martinez, masters student in social welfare, and Al Araiza, Overland Park resident, evacuated from New Orleans together after Hurricane Katrina hit. Martinez said she didn’t blame Brown for what happened in response to Katrina.

“It’s more than one man. He didn’t come in with the ax and break the levee,” Martinez said.

She also agreed with Brown that the government should have federalized a response and took over the city from the beginning. Araiza said most of the low-economy population didn’t have what it took to prepare an individual response, or to survive on their own.

Kansan staff writer Danae DeShazer can be contacted at ddeshazer@kansan.com.

—Edited by Lisa Tilson

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