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September 8th, 2005 - - Washington, D.C. – Chairman Lewis introduced a $51.8 billion disaster supplemental package late last night. The bill closely tracks with the Administration request and provides $50 billion for Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Disaster Relief Fund, $1.4 billion for the Department of Defense, and $400 million for the Army Corps of Engineers to repair damaged infrastructure. The bill will be considered later this afternoon and the Senate is expected to pass it soon afterward. FEMA has been allocating almost $2 billion a day and at that rate the Administration expects to be out of money by the end of the week.
“Congress is committed in a bipartisan way to providing whatever is needed to aid the recovery of areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina. This will be an expensive and difficult task but we are committed to seeing it through,” said Chairman Jerry Lewis.
The Chairman’s bill adds some reporting and accountability provisions to allow Congress to conduct oversight over the expenditure of taxpayer dollars. These provisions are similar to what was included in the September 11th recovery packages and require regular and timely reports on how disaster funds are being expended. In addition, $15 million is provided within existing funds for the Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security to monitor disaster expenditures by FEMA and other relevant agencies.
“We fully expect to be approving still more assistance once we have an assessment of the full scope and cost of this disaster. We will insist on proper oversight of all of these appropriated dollars to ensure that the funds are being spent wisely,” said Lewis.
The $50 billion for the FEMA Disaster Relief Fund (DRF) is expected to be spent for the following:
- $23.2 billion for Individual and Housing Assistance
- $11.0 billion for Mission Assignments (tasks issued by FEMA to agencies, but are reimbursable from the DRF)
- $3.0 billion for Army Corps of Engineers
- $2.5 billion for DOD
- $5.5 billion for other (HHS, DOT, GSA, etc…)
- $7.65 billion for Public Assistance
- $1.6 billion for an additional 100,000 (200,000 already purchased) trailers for temporary housing
- $4.6 billion for FEMA Operations (Logistics, Supplies and Materials, and Urban Search and Rescue)
- $1.3 billion for other needs (Disaster Unemployment Insurance, Damage Inspections, Counseling, Legal and other expenses)
- $650 million for mitigation activities
Examples of individual and housing Assistance include: temporary housing, home repairs, Medical, dental, and funeral costs, replacement of clothing and household items, repair or replacing vehicles or other transportation, moving and storage, including evacuation costs. This assistance is capped at $26,200 per household.
Public assistance includes: debris removal on public property, debris removal on private property if it constitutes a public health hazard, emergency protective measures (search and rescue; emergency medical care, and shelter; food, water and medicine), road systems and bridges and water control facilities.
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