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Election

GOP Strategist Defends Romney’s Plan To Dismantle FEMA

By Aviva Shen on Oct 29, 2012 at 11:57 am

Atlantic City, NJ

Mitt Romney’s past comments about dismantling FEMA and privatizing disaster relief have come back to haunt him as Hurricane Sandy begins to wreak havoc on the East Coast. Still, one Republican strategist, Ron Bonjean, agrees with him. On CNN Monday morning, Bonjean, a private consultant who advises GOP congressional leaders, defended Romney, suggesting that even talking about federal disaster relief is politically toxic:

Most people don’t have a positive impression of FEMA and I think Mitt Romney was right on the button. But I don’t think anybody cares about that right now. I think people care about whether or not their power’s on, whether or not their basement’s going to be flooded. And I think that if the president gets too far in front of this and something goes wrong, people are going to remember, hey, my power’s not out, and the president’s talking about FEMA. I’m not a real big fan of FEMA. That could sway their vote.

Watch it:

Sandy has already caused severe flooding in the Northeast, hours before the worst of the storm is projected to hit. President Obama has declared a state of emergency in 7 states and DC after several governors’ urgent requests for federal aid to combat the storm. Though Bonjean fails to make the connection between FEMA’s services and people worrying about their power going out, the agency has already dispatched emergency power teams to try to reinforce vulnerable power grids before the storm hits and provided hundreds of generators and other back-up power sources. Americans are unfortunately well-acquainted with the agency, despite Bonjean’s insistence that they “don’t care” about it; a recent study of FEMA data found that, since 2006, 4 out of 5 Americans have been affected by weather-related disasters.

Economy

How House Republicans Would Make It Harder To Provide Hurricane Relief

By Aviva Shen on Oct 29, 2012 at 10:25 am

Red Hook, Brooklyn flooded on Monday morning


The East Coast is bracing for the ever-strengthening Hurricane Sandy, which will affect 50 million people when it makes landfall on Monday evening. President Obama has declared a state of emergency in 7 states and DC, allowing them to receive federal funds for emergency disaster assistance.

Depending on the outcome of next week’s election, future victims of natural disasters may not be able to receive the same kind of assistance. Mitt Romney has suggested shutting down FEMA and turning disaster relief over to private companies. Meanwhile, House Republicans have repeatedly attempted to slash funds for disaster preparedness and response in 2011:

According to the House Appropriation Committee’s summary of the bill, the [GOP's 2011 continuing resolution] funds Operations, Research and Facilities for the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association with $454.3 million less than it got in FY2010; this represents a $450.3 million cut from what the president’s never-passed FY2011 budget was requesting. The National Weather Service, of course, is part of NOAA — its funding drops by $126 million. The CR also reduces funding for FEMA management by $24.3 million off of the FY2010 budget, and reduces that appropriation by $783.3 million for FEMA state and local programs.

With each major natural disaster in 2011, House Republicans dug in their heels over providing disaster relief. They repeatedly demanded the funds be offset by other spending cuts in the budget — even as a deadly tornado tore through Missouri, an earthquake shook Virginia, and when Hurricane Irene struck the east coast last year.

The politicization of disaster relief is likely to continue; the House Republican budget ignored a bipartisan agreement to make it easier to fund disaster relief, instead insisting again that spending cuts offset the emergency aid.

Politics

Hurricane Isaac Causes Levee To Overtop, Floods Section Of Louisiana

By Annie-Rose Strasser on Aug 29, 2012 at 11:09 am

Plaquemines Parish

Plaquemines Parish Evacuees

Louisiana residents woke to eighty mile-an-hour winds and heavy rain Wednesday morning, right on the 7-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the devastating storm that left nearly two thousand people dead and hundreds of thousands homeless in New Orleans.

Isaac has, thus far, been a more merciful storm. Only one sparsely-populated area, Plaquemines Parish, experienced a levee overtop and severe flooding this morning. More than 400,000 people are out of power, and severe winds continue to batter the state and the slow-moving rain could still cause more widespread flooding.

But federal government preparedness indicates that, should more quick emergency response be needed, it will be handled differently than the bureaucratic boondoggle of Katrina. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which failed so poorly seven years ago, has been fully activated to prepare for the storm:

Search-and-rescue teams — including 48 boat teams deployed to areas prone to flooding and in direct path of the storm — have been mobilized, and Louisiana officials have asked teams from Texas and six other states to be on standby. Power crews, linemen and tree-trimmers are ready to restore power as quickly as possible if there are outages. Damage assessments, including aerial surveillance, could begin as early as Friday, [Louisiana Gov. Bobby] Jindal said.

Louisiana has mobilized 40 “pods” in the southern part of the state and 20 in northern Louisiana — each designed to feed 5,000 people, Jindal said. [...]

Obama issued an emergency declaration for areas of Mississippi under threat of rain and high winds. The declaration frees up federal resources to help state and local agencies dealing with the storm and its aftermath and makes federal support available to save lives, protect public health and safety and preserve property in coastal areas.

While the storm is raging, politicians tend to push aside political differences, but it’s important to note that, if Republicans had their way, such disaster funding might not be available; their budget would slash millions of dollars from emergency preparedness funding, particularly FEMA.

Climate Progress

Gimme Bomb Shelter: FEMA Pushes For Disaster-Proof Green Buildings

By Climate Guest Blogger on Mar 7, 2012 at 3:04 pm

FEMA trailers lined up after Hurricane Katrina

by Greg Hanscom, reposted from Grist

When people say, “Call the National Guard,” they really mean Craig Fugate. As head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), he’s the guy who swoops in after a tornado or flood to clean up the mess with executive muscle and a pool of cash from the federal treasury. So perhaps it’s no great surprise that he supports efforts to create buildings that are essentially apocalypse-proof: For this guy, every day is another disaster.

Of course, there’s also the fact that he’s actually been working on credit. “I owe you a lot of money from the National Flood Insurance Program — about $18 billion,” Fugate told a group at the National Press Club last week. “Those are payouts from 2005 hurricane season.”

You may remember that season for its unruly offspring: Dennis, Emily, Katrina, Rita, and Wilma. And climate scientists tell us there are many more to come. “We cannot afford to continue to respond to disasters and suffer impacts — particularly looking at large-scale catastrophic disasters — under the current program,” Fugate said. “It will fail.”

The solution? Get smarter about how and where we build.

Read more

Climate Progress

FEMA Administrator On Climate Change: ‘We Need To Forcefully Communicate The Risk We Face’

By Guest Blogger on Feb 29, 2012 at 5:27 pm

Our guest blogger is Tina Ramos, an Energy Research Associate at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

FEMA Administrator W. Craig Fugate

Today, FEMA Administrator and former Director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management Craig Fugate reminded us that climate change and its effects are actually something that we must consider and plan for now, because the threats are not going away no matter how hard the GOP tries to convince us that they aren’t real.

“We don’t do a good job of communicating what we know [about how climate change will affect our communities],” said Administrator Fugate during the National Leadership Speaker Series on Resilience and Security in the 21st Century hosted by the U.S. Green Building Council and Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI) at the National Press Club this afternoon.

When I talk about climate resilience, I’m talking about how we need to forcefully communicate the risk we face in not building resilience to climate change at the local level, which might not have been in anyone’s experience previously.

The administrator stressed the importance of recognizing “total cost of ownership” in decision making that affects our nation’s and our communities’ futures. “People are starting to get a better sense of what total cost of ownership is. When you buy a car now, you don’t just ask how much it costs. You ask how many miles to the gallon the car gets.” You look at how present decisions have future consequences on your pocketbook and well-being.

The Administrator went on to explain that ignoring the current and future effects of climate change means not incorporating the true total cost in our decisions. “I owe you $18 billion,” he said. “The National Flood Insurance Program is underwritten by the taxpayers – did you know that? $18 billion was the money spent [on emergency services] during the hurricane season in 2005 alone,” when he was Director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management.

“We cannot afford to continue to respond to disasters and deal with the consequences under the current model,” he warned. “Risk that is not mitigated, that is not considered in return on investment calculations, oftentime steps up false economies. We will reach a point where we can no longer subsidize this.”

Tea Party conspiracy theorists have decided that ICLEI’s support for climate resilience is part of an eco-Marxist United Nations plot to build a one-world government.

Ignoring the effects of climate change — until disaster has already happened and we are forced to clean up the mess on an emergency footing — is not a sustainable strategy. If lawmakers in Washington actually intend to make the fiscally responsible decisions they preach about, then they will follow the administrator’s warning and immediately develop a national strategy that at once mitigates the negative effects of climate change and begins to build resilience on the local level. Investing in climate resilience means reducing pollution and preparing for its unavoidable effects. Failure to act now will be paid for in ever-increasing amounts of America’s blood and treasure.

Download the Green Building & Climate Resilience report by the US Green Building Council and ICLEI.

Economy

While Holding Disaster Aid Hostage, Cantor Lobbied FEMA To Quickly Help His District

By Marie Diamond on Sep 28, 2011 at 10:35 am

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) made himself into a symbol of the Republican fixation on budget cutting at any cost when he insisted that additional funding to help Hurricane Irene victims be offset with cuts elsewhere. The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s budget has been drained after a string of natural disasters, and the agency thought it needed more money to help disaster victims. But Republicans, led by Cantor, threatened to shut down the government rather than approve additional funds without offsets.

But evidently Cantor realized that this aid was important to his constituents. On Monday, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that while holding the agency’s funding hostage, Cantor was simultaneously lobbying it to aid his own district in Virginia:

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-7th, is pushing for information on the status of Gov. Bob McDonnell’s request for federal disaster assistance for Louisa County residents in the wake of an earthquake there last month.

On Friday, Cantor held a conference call with Federal Emergency Management Agency and Louisa County officials. A readout of the call provided by Cantor’s office indicates that he asked FEMA officials about the timeline and process for determining whether the agency would grant federal assistance.

“FEMA said they have received the Governor’s request and sent it to the White House for a decision but could not provide any specific information on timing,” the readout said.

Democrats were quick to note the supreme hypocrisy of Cantor pressing FEMA to quickly aid the residents of his district while he was preventing the agency from receiving more funding.

Climate Progress

Update: 2011 Sets Record for Most Disasters, GOP Demands Relief Funding Be Offset by Clean Energy Cuts, Then Blinks

By Joe Romm on Sep 26, 2011 at 8:39 pm

This year just set the record for most Federal Emergency Management Agency declared disasters.  And we’ve still got 3 months to go.

It is strictly a coincidence, of course, that most of those disasters are climate related and climate scientists predicted that as we pour more heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere we would see more record-smashing extreme events (see “Two seminal Nature papers join growing body of evidence that human emissions fuel extreme weather, flooding that harm humans and the environment“).

And no doubt it is similarly coincidental that the pro-pollution, anti-science extremists who run the House of Representatives are demanding relief efforts for these disasters be offset by cuts in clean energy programs that create jobs and cut emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases that make extreme weather disasters more likely.

I believe Congressional Democrats and the White House should be willing to shut the government down rather than giving in to the GOP masters of disaster.

UPDATE:  TPM reports, “Senate Averts Government Shutdown Threat, Funds FEMA“:  “The threat of a government shutdown, and the possibility that FEMA will run out of money this week, will both be averted, thanks to some clever accounting and the GOP’s lack of will to keep holding disaster relief funds hostage to budget cuts.”  So it looks like the GOP overplayed an inanely weak hand and blinked:

Read more

Economy

Herman Cain To House GOP: Fund FEMA Now, Find Offsets ‘Later’ — ‘Stop Playing With Peoples’ Tragedies’

By Alex Seitz-Wald on Sep 26, 2011 at 9:49 am

Despite making promises not to do so, House Republicans are holding disaster relief funding hostage, demanding the money be offset by spending cuts elsewhere so as to not increase the deficit, even though this has never been done in the past. House Republicans finally passed a bill to fund FEMA and the rest of the government last week, but only days after the Senate passed their own version without offsets and after House conservatives killed an earlier version with slightly fewer spending cuts.

But speaking this morning on CNN, GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain said Congress should fund FEMA now and worry about the offsets later, drawing a sharp line against lawmakers using the funds as a “political football” while people are suffering:

CAIN: I would make sure that FEMA got the money it needed, and if I had to go find the offsets later, go find it later. Stop playing with peoples’ tragedies — these are real people we’re talking about.

HOST: So you’re saying, right now we should just fund FEMA and forget about the offsetting spending cuts, and maybe later, if we find them, then go back and get the deal done that way.

CAIN: Yes. … We’re going to have a gentleman’s agreement that we will find the offsets, rather than finding the offsets right in the middle of it and making it a political football.

Watch it:

Asked about Sen. Mark Warner’s (D-VA) comments yesterday that the Tea Party faction in the House is to blame for the hold up, Cain said the conservative lawmakers need to pick their battles better. “I would not make this a battleground, Cain said. “This is one that I would basically try to, you know, fall on my sword for — go ahead and do what’s right for the people.”

Cain added that Congress “should put politics aside” and fund FEMA because “people should not have to suffer because of the political bickering.” Congress returns to work today to try again, with FEMA money running out soon and funding for the rest of the government ending Friday.

Economy

Cantor Claims Victims ‘Need To Know’ Disaster Relief Funds Are ‘There For Them’ After Repeatedly Holding Funds Hostage

By Travis Waldron on Sep 23, 2011 at 1:00 pm

House Republicans finally pushed through their continuing resolution early this morning after finding yet another $100 million in spending cuts that satiated the conservatives who wouldn’t approve disaster relief funds without matching offsets. Immediately after it passed, spokespersons for Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) took to Twitter to warn Senate Democrats against blocking funds for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), despite the fact that a bipartisan Senate majority passed a $7 billion FEMA relief package a week ago.

At a news conference today, Boehner and Cantor themselves joined in those warnings, attempting to blame Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and his Democratic colleagues for blocking disaster relief funds. Cantor, who has repeatedly insisted that the House would not approve disaster relief funds without offsets, blasted Reid for “blocking” funds that victims of multiple natural disasters needed:

CANTOR: As the Speaker indicated, there are people who are suffering in a big way, and they need to know that FEMA and the disaster relief monies will be there for them.

Watch it:

That’s an interesting change of position for Cantor, who was the first Republican to mention exchanging disaster relief funds for spending offsets in the wake of the tornadoes that hit Joplin, Missouri in May. Cantor again insisted on offsets after the East Coast earthquake that was centered in Mineral, Virginia — the heart of his own district. And for good measure, Cantor again noted that offsets were necessary for disaster funds after Hurricane Irene battered states along the East Coast from North Carolina to Vermont.

Democrats in both the Senate and House have been attempting to approve disaster relief without massive spending offsets to popular programs, including those that once had broad Republican support. And they haven’t been alone in their opposition. Cantor’s actions on disaster relief earned him rebuke from multiple Republican governors and put him out of step with former Republican Majority Leader Tom DeLay (TX), who pushed through deficit-financed disaster relief after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Economy

House GOP Leadership Warns Senate Dems Not To Delay Disaster Relief Funding The Senate Already Passed

By Travis Waldron on Sep 23, 2011 at 11:55 am

Shortly after midnight Friday morning, House Republicans pushed through a six-week continuing resolution that would extend the government’s spending authority into mid-November. The House failed to pass a similar resolution Wednesday when 48 Republicans voted against it because funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was not, in their view, sufficiently offset.

To fix that problem, House leaders persuaded 23 Republicans to change their votes by buying them off with an additional $100 million in spending cuts, proving yet again that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s (R-VA) assertion that no one was holding disaster relief hostage for spending cuts was false. And despite holding up FEMA funding for more than a week, Cantor and Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) offices immediately took to Twitter after the vote to announce that it was Senate Democrats who were holding FEMA funding hostage. Read tweets from Cantor spokesperson Brad Dayspring and Boehner spokesperson Kevin Smith:

But as Brian Fallon, spokesman for Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) noted in his response to Dayspring and Smith, a bipartisan Senate majority already approved $7 billion to fund FEMA last Thursday, a full week before House Republicans approved a much smaller package last night.

The Senate package also passed on its second try after Senate Republicans successfully blocked Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) first attempt to bring the bill to the floor. The House GOP is now planning to recess today without coming to an agreement with the Senate.

Republicans brought the government to the brink of shutdown in March, and Republican leadership has held disaster relief funding hostage since tornadoes hit Joplin, Missouri in May. Now, with the American people turning against their lack of leadership in Congress and Republican governors rebuking them on disaster relief, it appears the GOP’s only answer is to attempt to blame Senate Democrats for blocking funding they already passed.

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