Agreed. This is beyond stupid also....
Offers of Aid Immediate, but U.S. Approval Delayed for Days
By Elizabeth Williamson, Washington Post Staff WriterWed
Sep 7, 1:00 AM ET
Offers of foreign aid worth tens of millions of dollars --
including a Swedish water purification system, a German
cellular telephone network and two Canadian rescue ships --
have been delayed for days awaiting review by backlogged
federal agencies, according to European diplomats and
information collected by the State Department.
Since Hurricane Katrina, more than 90 countries and
international organizations offered to assist in recovery
efforts for the flood-stricken region, but nearly all
endeavors remained mired yesterday in bureaucratic
entanglements, in most cases, at the Federal Emergency
Management Agency.
In Germany, a massive telecommunication system and two
technicians await the green light to fly to Louisiana,
after its donors spent four days searching for someone
willing to accept the gift.
"FEMA? That was a lost case," said Mirit Hemy, an executive
with the Netherlands-based New Skies Satellite who made the
phone calls. "We got zero help, and we lost one week trying
to get hold of them."
In Sweden, a transport plane loaded with a water
purification system and a cellular network has been ready
to take off for four days, while Swedish officials wait for
flight clearance. Nearly a week after they were offered,
four Canadian rescue vessels and two helicopters have been
accepted but probably won't arrive from Halifax, Nova
Scotia, until Saturday. The Canadians' offer of
search-and-rescue divers has so far gone begging.
Matching offers of aid -- from Panamanian bananas to
British engineers -- with needs in the devastated region is
a laborious process in a disaster whose scope is unheard of
in recent U.S. history, especially for a country more
accustomed to giving than receiving aid.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said yesterday
that to his knowledge, all offers of foreign aid have been
accepted and some have arrived, such as Air Canada's
flights to relocate displaced people. But many others must
be vetted by emergency relief specialists. "I think the
experts will take a look at exactly what is needed now," he
said.
FEMA spokeswoman Natalie Rule said the foreign complaints
echo those from governors and officials "across the
nation."
"There has been that common thought that because [offers of
aid] are not tapped immediately, they're not prudently
used," Rule said. "We are pulling everything into a
centralized database. We are trying not to suck everything
in all at once, whether we need it or not."
European diplomats said publicly that they understand the
difficulty of coordinating such a massive recovery effort.
In an open letter released yesterday, though, Ambassador
John Bruton, head of the Delegation of the European
Commission to the United States, wrote:
"Perhaps one of those lessons will be that rugged
individualism is not always enough in such a crisis,
particularly if an individual does not have the material
and psychological means to escape the fury of a hurricane
in time."
Soon after the flooding, the government of Sweden offered a
C-130 Hercules transport plane, loaded with water
purification equipment, and a cellular network donated by
Ericsson.
"As far as I know, it's still on the ground," said Claes
Thorson, press counselor at the Swedish Embassy in
Washington. He said that along with 20 other European Union
nations that have pledged aid, "We are ready to send our
things. We know they are needed, but what seems to be a
problem is getting all these offers into the country."
So far, Thorson said, the State Department has denied
Sweden's request for flight clearance. "We don't know
exactly why, but we have a suspicion that the system is
clogged on the receiving end," he said. "But we keep a
request alive all the time, so we are not forgotten."
German telecommunications company KB Impuls contacted
another company, Unisat, based in Rhode Island, with the
idea of contributing an integrated satellite and cellular
telephone system.
In a region with its communications systems in tatters, the
$3 million system could handle 5,000 calls at once, routing
them, if necessary, through Germany.
KB Impuls would contribute the equipment and two engineers,
supplied with their own food, water and generator fuel, to
set it up. Unisat contacted another firm, New Skies
Satellite, with offices in Washington, which agreed to
contribute satellite capacity.
New Skies even arranged transport, securing a C-130 cargo
plane from the Israeli air force, to pick up the equipment
and technicians from Germany and bring them to Louisiana.
"With one call, I got an airplane," Hemy said. And then,
over four days, she and the owner of Unisat, Uri Bar-Zemer,
called contacts at FEMA, the American Red Cross, the State
Department, even members of Congress, trying to find
someone to accept the gift.
Finally the State Department told them that to receive
flight clearance, the gift must have a specific recipient.
"I was ringing, ringing, ringing -- and nothing," Hemy
said. Finally, yesterday, she got a call from the U.S. Air
Force's Joint Task Force Katrina Communication Operations
division, thanking the companies for the gift and inquiring
about the system's technical specifications.
As of late yesterday, the companies were waiting for a
written order from the Northern Command to begin the
mission. "I don't have a problem confirming that,"
Bar-Zemer said of the story. But he expressed concerns that
disclosing the difficulties in donating could jeopardize
the company's chances of actually delivering the aid.
Staff writers Robin Wright and Nelson Hernandez contributed
to this report.
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