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Politics : Sioux Nation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skywatcher who wrote (38508)	9/13/2005 12:28:34 PM
From: Karen Lawrence	Respond to of 362350

Good one. "FEMA ... was functional under Bill Clinton and corrupted under George W. Bush' -To rebuild New Orleans and the Gulf Coast will require a vast and coordinated effort. Before the storm, scientists and planners called for $14 billion to rehabilitate the barrier islands and wetlands and to re-engineer the levees. Rebuilding the city itself will cost tens of billions more. And it should be done fairly soon in the interest of those just displaced. The new New Orleans should be a beacon of mixed neighborhoods, affordable housing, and decent transit for the poor and middle class. It should be free of slumlords and protected from excessive gentrification. Because the risks will not go away, the country needs a new disaster-management paradigm. This must include transparent plans, properly resourced, with provision for all Americans living in areas of risk. The Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA -- which was functional under Bill Clinton and corrupted under George W. Bush -- must be taken out of the Department of Homeland Security and given back over to competent leadership. But that should be only the beginning; it is very clear we are totally unprepared to cope with calamity on the scale just seen. For the Gulf Coast we may need a new authority altogether -- a Gulf Coast Authority, modeled on the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and based in the region -- to manage the ecological risks and coordinate disaster planning. Katrina's damage extends nationwide. Oil production, refining, and trade routes are disrupted; prices are soaring; confidence is damaged. The Port of New Orleans cannot be dispensed with, and so long as it is disrupted the national economy is in peril. The best support will come not from quick fixes but from immediate steps that meet long-term needs, strengthening our infrastructure in many parts of the country after decades of neglect and decay. But some quick fixes are needed. On the physical side, opening and staffing the port will have to be done quickly at any cost. On the human side, the new bankruptcy bill should be suspended at once, before it takes effect on October 17. Gulf Coast evacuees who have lost everything should get immediate relief from their existing debts. prospect.org