[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 117 (Monday, September 19, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10165-S10168]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           HURRICANE KATRINA

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I thank the majority leader for taking 
the parliamentary steps that are going to permit us to consider some 
emergency help and assistance for New Orleans and the gulf area, in the 
area of education in particular. We are going to have more to say about 
that in a very short period of time. We want our friends there to know 
help really is on the way, particularly in the areas of education and 
health.
  On Friday, 13 of my colleagues and I visited the stricken city of New 
Orleans and the gulf coast to see Katrina's devastation firsthand and 
hear from the affected residents. Like so many millions of Americans, I 
have been moved by the news coverage of Katrina and her brutal 
aftermath for the past 3 weeks. But nothing I have seen on television, 
nothing I have read in the newspapers, and nothing I have heard from 
the survivors we have embraced in Massachusetts could prepare me for 
the staggering scope of the devastation when witnessed firsthand.
  The destruction is massive in its scope. In many areas, the 
destruction is total. Much of New Orleans is a ghost town. Troops and 
police patrol eerily quiet streets. The desolation is frighteningly 
real.
  At least 40 percent of New Orleans was devastated by the calamity. We 
could see the high water marks on buildings, far above our heads. 
Debris is strewn everywhere. Massive amounts of muck, black as ink and 
ringed with the rainbow swirls of oil and chemicals, cover everything.
  For so many of our fellow citizens--from New Orleans and throughout 
the gulf region--there is nothing to return to. In Mississippi, entire 
communities are completely gone. All that is left of entire blocks is 
the concrete slabs where families once lived. Even the old oaks that 
graced Mississippi's historic shoreline for generations could not 
withstand Katrina's wrath.

[[Page S10166]]

  Survivors' stories are heartwrenching. Three babies died at the New 
Orleans convention center from heat exhaustion. A first responder at 
the convention center found he was the only doctor for 10,000 people. 
Dozens of elderly residents died of heat stroke or kidney failure. One 
woman waded through the floodwaters to Charity Hospital, floating her 
husband's body alongside her on a door.
  In Pass Christian, MS, the police heroically stayed behind and braved 
the storm to rescue as many people as they could. Finally, as the flood 
waters were rising, they saved themselves by climbing onto the roof of 
the police station and watched their cruiser below tossed by the 
surging tide.
  Rescue workers we spoke with there found some 80 bodies--many in the 
attics of their homes, dead after desperately trying to claw their way 
through the roof to survival. Scratch marks were visible on the 
rooftops.
  The city's mayor is still missing. But the city attorney has been 
named acting mayor and has stepped up as a leader with determination 
and compassion, helping people recover and rebuild their lives.
  So much has been destroyed. But the spirit of the people we met 
remains strong. Like Job of the Old Testament, these people have had 
everything they own and cherish torn from their grasp. But they are 
determined to recover and rebuild their lives. They still have hope--
and we must do all we can to help them.
  I was inspired by the heroism of the relief workers, the military, 
the churches, neighbors, friends, strangers--all coming together to 
support those in need--truly America at its best. Those we met on 
Friday were physically and emotionally exhausted. There still does not 
seem to be enough time each day to help all those who need our aid--not 
enough energy to heal the many broken hearts. Relief workers have 
suffered broken bones, sprained ankles, sunburns, dehydration, and 
infections from the contaminated floodwaters.
  But they press on, for they know there is so much remaining to be 
done. Those we met have an unyielding determination to rebuild that 
treasured region and rejuvenate its unique spirit. The work they do 
every minute, every hour, every day since Katrina struck, helps us 
all--our whole American family. They need to know that we are 
listening, and that we hear their concerns. We will not ignore them or 
put them aside. They deserve our leadership and our support, and we 
must prove to them that we are equal to the task.
  My wife Vicki and her family hail from the New Orleans area, and 
Vicki lived several years in the city. Her family's deep roots there 
lend a special perspective to our concerns about the many affected by 
this terrible storm. Such a treasured and vibrant part of our Nation 
deserves nothing less than our best efforts as Senators to help it 
rebuild better than ever.
  States across the country are responding, and I am proud of 
Massachusetts's efforts. Almost 500 Army and Air National Guard 
soldiers and airmen from our State have been sent to provide direct 
support to the hurricane victims as part of Operation Helping Hand. 
They are performing functions as diverse as security, command and 
control, law enforcement, communications, medical care, including 
mental health care, and spiritual guidance. The Massachusetts Guard has 
also activated an additional 150 persons for indirect support, staffing 
the joint operations center and helping with logistics and airlifts. We 
have shipped more than 200 tons of cargo using 17 aircraft, including 
humvees, trucks, trailers, generators, a field ambulance, meals ready 
to eat, water, cots, tents, and medical supplies.
  There are almost 200 evacuees now living at Camp Edwards on Otis Air 
Force Base on Cape Cod. We have enrolled them in health care plans, 
helped children find their parents, offered mental health counseling, 
and enabled those who qualify for veterans benefits and Social Security 
benefits to continue to receive them without interruption or delay--
anything to make them feel welcome and at home.
  For the evacuees who express interest in staying in Massachusetts, we 
are working with local housing authorities to have them placed in our 
towns, and the Black Ministerial Alliance has welcomed them into our 
congregations. FEMA will pay for plane tickets anywhere in the United 
States to reunite the evacuees with their family and friends.
  Finding employment for evacuees and schooling for their children are 
top priorities, and Massachusetts businesses and schools are eagerly 
lending a hand. Some have already found employment, and a job fair at 
the base has helped others.
  Massachusetts colleges have been eager to pitch in as well. Sixty 
public, private, and community colleges have enrolled over 1,000 
displaced students and offered to assist them with financial aid. 
Displaced undergraduates will be able to attend public colleges and 
universities tuition-free. And many campuses have offered to expedite 
admission, waive fees, and help secure housing. UMass Amherst has 
already enrolled more than a dozen undergraduate students and is 
housing them in local hotels until more permanent housing is secured. 
Boston University has accepted 321 displaced students. Boston College 
has accepted 150 students from Loyola and Tulane. Amherst is taking in 
students from Xavier and Tulane. Amherst and Williams College have 
invited faculty from Xavier to join their campuses for the semester.
  Katherine Barnett, a graduate student from Tulane, is now attending 
Boston University. ``I didn't think attending BU was going to be an 
option, but everyone there has been totally great,'' she said.
  When the tsunami struck Indonesia in December, and when earthquakes 
devastated Armenia, EI Salvador, and Iran, the courageous team of 
health professionals from Massachusetts General Hospital was always 
among the first to respond. The team's response to Katrina is no 
different. Dr. Susan Briggs from Massachusetts General is leading the 
effort. She told me progress is being made with the team's two mobile 
clinics, and they are reaching those in more remote areas. But in New 
Orleans, they are discovering many new storm-related medical needs as 
people begin to return to the city.
  Three medical teams from Boston and one team from Worcester have been 
on the scene since the earliest hours of the disaster, and they have 
kept up a steady pace. Additional truckloads of medical supplies left 
Massachusetts at 5 o'clock this morning for the gulf.
  I talked with a wonderful doctor at Mass General, Dr. Larry Bronner. 
He talked about calling up Broderick Chevrolet and saying they needed 
three big trucks for transport. The founder of that automobile 
distributorship said:

       You tell us where you want the trucks and when you want the 
     trucks; you've got the trucks.

  That is typical of the kind of reaction across the board in my State, 
and I know in many others.
  Now they are involved in a 35-hour trip down to New Orleans, even as 
we talk this afternoon.
  As we traveled in New Orleans and Mississippi, I was heartened by the 
spirit of determination to overcome this disaster and improve the lives 
of those most affected. I saw it on the faces of those who stayed 
behind to help with rescue and relief efforts, just as I have seen it 
in the faces of those who have had to leave all they know and go to 
safe havens across the country. It is the same spirit of determination 
that will carry them down the long road to rebuilding.
  The residents of the gulf region and New Orleans take pride in their 
cities and towns. They want to lead the way in reviving their own 
communities. That should not be ignored.
  First and foremost, this means we cannot have big businesses and 
outside contractors taking over the process of rebuilding. Local 
businesses, big and small, should get the lion's share of the work. And 
local people should get the lion's share of the jobs.
  The businesses and residents of New Orleans should rebuild New 
Orleans. Bay St. Louis should rebuild Bay St. Louis. Their communities 
should rebuild their communities. Pass Christian should rebuild Pass 
Christian, and we should be there to help.
  Community leaders I spoke with in New Orleans mentioned the 9/11 
families and their ability to band together as a voice for change, 
successfully pressuring the White House and Congress

[[Page S10167]]

to form the independent 9/11 commission. Katrina survivors, they told 
me, don't need veto power over every proposal to rebuild their region, 
they just need a voice in the rebuilding of their own communities.
  There has been much discussion of the economic despair of those who 
were stranded in New Orleans and other areas, because they did not have 
the resources to escape the storm and flood. An enormous tragedy has 
afflicted a forgotten segment of our society, and it shames us all that 
in a country as rich as ours, we were not able to provide for the 
safety and security of all our citizens, but allowed race and class to 
devastate them.
  Our collective effort for rebuilding and reconstruction is an 
opportunity to make amends for decades of neglect, and genuinely 
address the needs of those most direly affected by this disaster.
  Estimates of the Federal Government's investment in this rebuilding 
effort are now as high as $200 billion. We must be certain that these 
funds go to the rebuilding of the new Gulf Coast and not to the 
accounts of the biggest contractors with the best political 
connections. The enormous job of rebuilding New Orleans and the gulf 
coast must be done right.
  The national government can help most by seeking to develop a common 
plan for the redevelopment of the region. We should have a commission 
on which everyone has a say--mayors, governors, community leaders, 
business leaders, citizens, the Federal Government--everyone. There 
should be hearings throughout the area to listen to the people's views 
of the kind of future they want. We should listen to the people of New 
Orleans on how they wish to revive the vitality of that special city. 
We should involve the best flood control engineers, the best community 
and urban development specialists, the best city planners, the best of 
everything. Redevelopment should not be determined by the biggest most 
powerful contractors. We need to work from a shared vision for the 
future in which we all do our part to build the new gulf coast.
  I commend President Bush for making the rebuilding of this damaged 
region a high priority for the Federal Government, and I believe a 
commission would give all of us the plan we need to get the job done 
right.
  We must cultivate and promote public-private partnerships that are so 
important to successful community redevelopment. Already, many 
organizations are setting about the business of rebuilding in the gulf 
coast region. Private companies such as Starwood Hotels and Resorts in 
New Orleans have already set a re-opening date of November 1, and local 
small business owners are beginning to set up shop again. National and 
local philanthropic organizations such as the Baton Rouge Area 
Foundation are beginning to examine the long-term housing needs of the 
area. National efforts such as those of ACORN are underway to organize 
residents who have been displaced and given them a fair voice and fair 
representation in the process.
  All of these groups and many others are key partners in the Federal, 
State, and local efforts to rebuild the gulf coast communities 
devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
  It is essential, too, for contracts for rebuilding to include 
training for local people to do the jobs. That means training local 
residents for debris removal, environmental clean-up, construction 
trades and other skills necessary to get the region back on its feet.
  Billions of Federal dollars will be devoted to the effort. We must 
make sure that it is the residents of the region that benefit through 
jobs and training.
  We must give urgent attention to the few hospitals and clinics that 
are still operating, but they are working with reduced staff and few 
resources. Many, like East Jefferson General Hospital in the New 
Orleans area, do not have the resources to remain open much longer 
without government help.
  We should also give urgent attention to schools, to help that few 
that can reopen to do so, and to build new ones that can become the 
anchors for new communities.
  We must also make sure that we rebuild in a thoughtful way, drawing 
on the many lessons that we have learned from this disaster and other 
efforts at community building.
  We need to build water control systems that will be able to withstand 
giant hurricanes and floods in the future. We need to rebuild roads and 
sewers and power lines and whole public transportation systems. We need 
to restore the ecological resources of the region.
  The rebuilding process should not merely involve reproducing 
structures and systems in the way that they existed before the 
hurricane and flood. The people of the region have an opportunity to 
create better water control systems to ensure that this does not happen 
again. They have a chance to improve schools and rely on technologies 
necessary in the new economy. They have a chance to build the gulf 
economy of the future--and in doing so to improve the entire Nation's 
economic destiny. They have a chance to build a new economy that works 
for everyone--with diverse housing and more job opportunities.
  This new economy will of course still include a vibrant tourism 
industry, and there will continue to be jobs for the many service 
workers who call New Orleans home. A local union representative 
stressed to me that New Orleans can't just be a city in which only 
millionaires can afford to live.
  I am deeply concerned that the Department of Labor in Washington has 
taken harmful steps that will hurt the effort to revive the region. 
They have said that the big outside contractors moving into the area 
can pay construction workers sub-standard wages. These workers have 
lost everything, and they are desperate to rebuild their homes and 
their lives and their communities. Yet now these giant contractors can 
come in from outside and deny fair wages.
  We are talking about $8-, $9- and $10-an-hour wages. That is what the 
prevailing wage is for basic construction trades in Mississippi, 
Alabama, and Louisiana. That doesn't sound like exorbitant wages for 
workers who are putting in a hard day's work. It sounds like fair wages 
to me--rather than bringing in outside workers who are going to work 
for depressed wages--not even the minimum wage.
  This is important.
  The Department of Labor also says these big contractors don't have to 
reach out to minority workers. The greatest devastation is for the 
poor, poor white and poor black, and we want to make sure that those 
workers--white and black--are going to have opportunities. But the idea 
that they are waiving all requirements to try to include local 
participation does not make sense.
  Yet more than 40 percent of the people of New Orleans are African-
Americans. They represent a vast share of the people in the shelters 
who are left with nothing. How can the Labor Department say that these 
outside contractors can come into Louisiana and Mississippi and thumb 
their nose at African-American workers there?
  That, too, is gravely wrong. In his speech to the Nation last 
Thursday, President Bush acknowledged that we must address the legacy 
of poverty as we rebuild. But authorizing substandard wages and turning 
our back on minority workers is not the way to meet that goal.
  We have the ability in Congress to help New Orleans and the gulf 
coast area to rebuild themselves better than ever. All we need is the 
will to do it. I have talked with my colleagues from the region in 
their offices and I listened to them on Friday as we saw the storm-
ravaged areas. Senators Landrieu, Vitter, Lott, Cochran, Sessions, and 
Shelby are determined to get the gulf coast back up on its feet, and I 
have appreciated the opportunity to discuss this with them.
  I appreciate, also, the leadership that Senator Enzi has provided on 
this issue as chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions 
Committee. Under his leadership, we introduced a strong bipartisan 
relief measure on education that should be before the Senate very soon. 
And we hope to have measures to meet the health and employment needs 
very soon.
  Senator Landrieu in particular has been an inspiration to us all. She 
was tireless in her efforts to expedite the Federal response to the 
hurricane and is extraordinary in her resolve to help New Orleans 
recover. Her strength is a comfort to her constituents--and to the 
Nation.

[[Page S10168]]

  Senator Frist, our leader, deserves praise as he returned briefly to 
his earlier career as Dr. Frist. I truly admire his courageous efforts 
to provide medical care in the early days at the makeshift hospital at 
the New Orleans airport.
  Friday was not a one-time visit; it was just one day, but it will be 
a day I will not forget. We will not simply move on to a new issue 
tomorrow. This wound in our Nation runs deep, and our response must be 
equal to the task. The hurricane destroyed communities, but it did not 
and could not destroy their spirit. They will rebuild, and we will help 
them to the very best of our ability, because in the end, we are one 
Naion, one people, one family. It is in this way that we can best tap 
the true wealth of Nation. We must get it right.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be able to 
proceed for 4 more minutes.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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