Appropriations Bills

WASHINGTON –David R. Obey (D-WI), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, made the following statement on the second Emergency Supplemental to fund Hurricane Katrina Disaster Relief.

Obey had planned to offer an amendment to the bill to restructure the Federal Emergency Management Agency in light of the agency’s recent gross failures. However, Republicans refused to allow consideration of his amendment.

“FEMA, which had become a professional, qualified agency under James Witt during the Clinton Administration, has once again become a dumping ground for political cronies.”

“Three years ago, this Congress, in the wake of 9/11, merged FEMA into a gargantuan new agency, the Department of Homeland Security. Since that time, the White House, the Congress and the Department of Homeland Security, altogether, have squeezed the resources available for FEMA, they have hollowed out that agency, and they have cut more than 500 people out of that agency.”

“To top it off the president appointed to run that agency a gentleman who before he joined FEMA had no previous disaster experience and whose only apparent connection to the disaster world was that he was the college roommate of the former director of FEMA.

We have seen the disastrous results of that appointment.”

“I want to provide the $50 billion that the legislation is going to provide today and I will vote for it, and so will every other sane member of this House, I assume. But I deeply regret the fact that the manner in which this legislation is being brought to the floor today will prevent me, or any other member, from taking an action which I think is essential to restore the professionalism of FEMA and to depoliticize that agency.”

“I wanted to offer an amendment to that bill which would have allowed the money to flow immediately, but which would have done 5 additional things.”

“It would have restored FEMA’s status as an independent agency with no intervening bureaucracy between the White House and that agency. It would have reestablished the position of the FEMA director to one who reports directly to the president. It would have required the FEMA director to have extensive experience in emergency or disaster related management.”

“It would make that directorship confirmable for a specific five year term, to reduce the likelihood of political patronage by the president of any party, and it would have established a deputy director with primary responsibility to assure that a direct connection is retained with the Department of Homeland Security, so that in the process of dealing with domestic disasters we do not neglect our responsibilities to also protect the country against terrorism.”

“Our friends on the majority side of the aisle declined to allow us to have that vote. I don’t object to the majority saying ‘we don’t believe that that’s the right solution’ or ‘we don’t believe that’s the right time to discuss this,’ that’s a legitimate position. But what we are asking for is to at least have the ability to at least have the ability to discuss that issue.”

“Because every day we delay professionalizing and depoliticizing FEMA is another day that taxpayer money is being spent on an agency that has been demonstrated under these circumstances to be incompetent.”

“The President has a responsibility; each and every member of this Congress has a personal responsibility, to see to it that if we are going to provide $50 billion today and another $50 billion down the road to know that that money is going to be spent in the most efficient, most effective way to save lives and to rebuild communities. We cannot have that kind of confidence under the existing management of the agency. I think we’ve got an obligation to move as quickly as possible to fix the problem.”

“The amendment I would have offered would have given us 120 days to make those changes. I regret deeply the fact that we will not be able to at least discuss that matter on the floor today.”

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