[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 116 (Thursday, September 15, 2005)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1878]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     TIME TO ESTABLISH AN INDEPENDENT HURRICANE KATRINA COMMISSION

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                           HON. WM. LACY CLAY

                              of missouri

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, September 15, 2005

  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, this is to register my support for the 
legislation, H.R. 3764, to establish an independent commission to study 
the Federal Government's response to Hurricane Katrina.
  The disaster brought by Hurricane Katrina is indisputable. The 
failure of government agencies and elected officials to effectively 
minimize the suffering and death of the victims in the Gulf Coast is 
indefensible.
  History will record the Katrina disaster as a turning point in this 
nation's history. When the waters rose and the levees burst, the world 
watched as thousands of sick and elderly Americans, thousands of poor 
families with young children cried out for food and water. American 
citizens who trusted the advice of the government were abandoned in an 
evacuated city without food or water, without plumbing, without law 
enforcement, without transportation and without hope. The pictures we 
saw were nothing short of unbelievable. Mr. Speaker, in September 2005 
the image of America was forever changed in the eyes of the entire 
world.
  As a nation we can no longer pretend that all Americans have the 
opportunity to share in the wealth of this great nation. The winds of 
Katrina exposed the truth to all Americans and to all the world.
  The very least this body must now do is to abandon the partisanship 
that has stifled public policy making for too many years. We are 
elected officials and our first responsibility is to represent the 
people--not to represent political parties. There should be no 
disagreement that whatever government did or did not do in response to 
Hurricane Katrina, we did not do our best. The mission failed. And it 
was not the failure of one person or the failure of one government 
agency or the failure of any political party--it was a collective 
failure. Now we must come together to do everything humanly possible to 
make certain that this never, ever happens again.
  Mr. Speaker, we must establish an Independent Katrina Commission to 
assess the federal government's response to this hurricane and to 
determine what we must do to effectively respond to future large-scale 
catastrophes. The people of this nation expect nothing less. It would 
be stupid and it would be senseless for this body to even consider 
doing otherwise.
  I implore my colleagues to remember the thousands of American 
citizens whose trust in our government was destroyed when their 
livelihoods were lost, their homes were washed away and the poor and 
the sick were left all alone to die. It will take a generation or more 
for most of the victims and their families to mend; this Congress must 
do everything possible to support them. The recovery of our nation is 
at stake. We must work to ensure that Katrina remains the single 
greatest natural disaster in our history. We need an Independent 
Katrina Commission to restore faith in this government and to ensure 
that we never again experience a preventable disaster.

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