by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright February 13, 2006
All Rights Reserved.

ive-months after Hurricane Katina decimated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, federal officials still haven't accepted responsibility for the government's failure. Passing the buck, former Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Michael D. Brown testified last week before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs committee that bureaucratic red tape in the Department of Homeland Security hampered the government's response. “I expected them to cut every piece of red tape, do everything, that I didn't want to hear anybody say we couldn't do everything humanly possible to respond to this,” Brown said about his video conference to the White House one day before the disaster hit, costing 1,300 lives, displacing thousands from New Orleans' poorest neighborhoods. Days before a House select committee releases its final report, the government looks for scapegoats.

      Brown resigned in disgrace Sept. 12, 2005, with questions swirling about his fitness to serve the nation's leading emergency management job. In the wake of Katrina, few people agreed with President Bush's assessment that “Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job,” believing the FEMA director was in over his head. Whatever happened after Katrina, the government doesn't want an encore, with the Congress scrambling to figure out what went wrong. Fingers now point toward Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who was faulted in the committee report for going to Atlanta for a bird flu conference while New Orleans' residents clung to rooftops to escape drowning. Two days before Katrina hit, Chertoff failed to appoint a disaster point person and convene an interagency group to manage the expected crisis, according to the committee's report, bypassing FEMA's responsibility.

      When the Department of Homeland Security was formed March 1, 2003, there were warnings about creating an unwieldy bureaucracy, adding layers of red tape to otherwise cumbersome departments. Creating Homeland Security was the largest government overhaul since the end of World War II, establishing the Department of Defense. Following Sept. 11, the public demanded, and Congress agreed to, more accountability, preventing the nation's elite security agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation, from preventing the worst attack in U.S. history. Putting numerous federal agencies under one roof raised concerns, especially about overlapping oversight and responsibilities. “Late, ineffectively, or not at all,” concluded the report, referring to Homeland Security's inadequate response to hurricane Katrina.

      Disaster relief after Katrina was a national and global black eye on the U.S. government. More attention was paid to the Asian Tsunami than dealing flooding in New Orleans. Faulting Chertoff for not designating Katrina as “an incident of national significance,” the report blamed Homeland Security for not taking the disaster seriously, including coordinating with the U.S. military. “Our judgment, based on a careful review of the record, is that the Department of Homeland Security needs new and more experienced leadership,” said Democratic Reps. Charlie Melancon and William J. Jefferson, in a 57-page response to the committee's draft report, calling for an independent investigation like the Sept. 11 commission. Chertoff, who testifies Tuesday, plans to tell the Senate Government Affairs and Reform Committee that “all authority” was vested in FEMA director Michael Brown.

      Calling Brown's response to Katrina “willful insubordination,” Chertoff's press secretary Russ Knocke passed the buck, insisting that Homeland Security assumed FEMA was in charge. Brown testified that Homeland Security “wasted my time,” giving little reassurance that the new behemoth federal agency didn't hamper the government's efforts at emergency management. Brown claimed he had 30 conversations with the White House during the Katrina disaster that he could not establish command and control. So far, the administration has refused to release Brown's transcripts, with the Republicans responsible for the select committee's report rejecting Democrats' calls for subpoenas. Without getting the facts, it's going to be difficult to fix a broken system, costing 1,300 lives, leaving thousands homeless, eroding U.S. credibility and embarrassing the nation.

      Hindsight is always 20/20, especially by government officials seeking to save their collective rear ends. While there's nothing wrong with assigning blame, there's something very wrong with finding scapegoats for natural disasters. When the 17th Street levee broke, there was little Brown or Chertoff could do to prevent devastating flooding from years of neglect. Rebuilding dilapidated levees was the government's responsibility together with the Army Corps of Engineers, local and state officials. “Had this been a terrorist group blowing up the levee in New Orleans, it would have been a totally different response,” said Rep. Charlie Melancon, blaming Homeland Security but engaging in wishful thinking. Passing the buck doesn't excuse bureaucrats like Brown or Chertoff from doing their jobs and coordinating a more satisfactory response to natural or man-made catastrophes.

About the Author

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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