[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 58 (Friday, May 12, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4515-S4518]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     AFTERMATH OF HURRICANE KATRINA

  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, last Friday, May 5, at the invitation of 
Senator Landrieu, I went down to New Orleans, LA, for a second trip to 
the State since the hurricane. I wanted to have a chance to be able to 
get around the city, meet with people, and measure the recovery effort 
up close and personally now that we are 8\1/2\ months since Hurricane 
Katrina.
  Let me, first of all, express my gratitude to Senator Landrieu who 
has been tireless, as I know Senator Vitter has. They both have been 
pushing hard for their State, as they ought to. But I particularly want 
to thank Senator Landrieu who spent the day with me and who, together 
with me, sat through a small business roundtable with a great many 
small businesspeople in New Orleans who were struggling to make things 
work in the aftermath of the hurricane.
  She took me around New Orleans East, and we drove through on the 
interstate, able to see on both sides of the interstate the still-
current state of abandonment of so much of the city. The statistics 
somehow don't really convey what is happening there and what is not 
happening there.
  I know Washington is a tough place to make anything mean anything 
right now. We are caught up in an awful lot

[[Page S4516]]

of partisanship, and there is a lot of back and forth and not a whole 
lot that is going on legislatively as a consequence of that, though we 
all hope there is going to be a breakthrough on the immigration bill in 
the next days. But I have to tell my colleagues that somehow we have to 
find a way to break through on the reality of what is happening to a 
whole bunch of folks down in New Orleans and on the gulf coast, whose 
lives have been disrupted, who have all the hope in the world of being 
able to return to their homes but increasingly are finding a lagging 
effort and a bureaucracy and other kinds of problems standing in their 
way. That has a huge cost--a huge cost. Before Hurricanes Katrina and 
Rita, Louisiana had 86,000 small businesses, employing more than 
850,000 people and contributing $22 billion to the local economy. Of 
those 86,000 small businesses, 71,000 were in the disaster zones, and 
nearly 20,000 were catastrophically destroyed. More than 365,000 
residents were left homeless. But those statistics 8\1/2\ months later 
do not tell the story of New Orleans.

  I thought I was going to go down there and I was going to see this 
incredible burst of energy of the cleanup, unbelievable numbers of 
folks out in the streets loading trucks and moving debris and doing 
things. But instead what I saw in New Orleans East and, most 
importantly, what I heard from people who are there struggling to make 
ends meet, to make this work, stunned me as to how little organized, 
fundamental activity is still taking place 8\1/2\ months after New 
Orleans was devastated.
  When I went to New Orleans the first time in the immediate days after 
the hurricane, I saw a region that was damaged by a storm but at that 
point in time still very strong in spirit. I saw people determined to 
turn things around and to make it work. I talked to people who proved 
their resilience and their love of their State when they committed 
themselves to not just not giving up, but to not leaving, to rebuilding 
their homes and their businesses. On that trip I met people who felt 
that if the words of the Federal Government and the State and the city 
were, in fact, followed through on, they had hope for the future.
  On this trip that I just made a week ago, I met with small business 
CEOs. I met with people who have spent a lifetime there who are 
beginning to feel a kind of despair about the lack of presence of real 
leadership that is changing their lives for the better. As I went down 
streets, I saw street after street after street filled with debris, 
garbage bags just out in the streets, cars with the word ``tow'' on 
them waiting to be towed. Eight and a half months later, we can't tow 
cars.
  Where were the trucks lined up with people loading them up with the 
debris being taken out? I expected to see a backed-up line of trucks 
with an enormous burst of energy. No such thing.
  I met people in New Orleans who are increasingly afraid, angry, and 
disillusioned. I was reminded by small business owners and homeowners 
last week that New Orleans doesn't only have a hurricane problem, New 
Orleans has a levee problem. And the levee problem is more than just a 
problem of the levees that broke, it is an overall levee problem. And 
if that levee problem were addressed with the speed--I know there are 
some who say, well, we just allocated additional money and this and 
that. I tell you, we are building bases in Iraq a lot faster than we 
are rebuilding New Orleans, and we are putting more energy into saying 
we will stay the course there than we are staying the course in New 
Orleans.
  Too little has been done in any kind of rapid fashion to help deal 
with those levees with respect to the hurricane season that starts in 
just a few weeks. I left New Orleans convinced that the gulf coast 
doesn't have a morale problem, but I will tell you what: Washington and 
the community there have a leadership problem, and it is up to us to 
change it before it is too late. I want to explain that.
  We all understand the response immediately after Hurricane Katrina, 
and there is a lot on the record about who did what, and so forth. I 
don't want to go back to that. That is not what this is about. But what 
is most distressing to me is that after that lesson was supposed to 
have been learned, the people I met in New Orleans told me they were 
fed up with empty promises that have followed the initial shock of what 
happened at the Superdome. They believe the promises have been broken 
and more mistakes have been made after they had been promised that 
mistakes weren't going to be repeated.
  What I heard from people on a very personal level is that schools are 
overcrowded, that parents are struggling to hold on because they want 
to stay there, but they don't know if they can. There is an enormous 
personal anxiety that takes a toll day after day after day as people 
are living like that.
  One of the businesses I visited is a linen and laundry business that 
used to take care of all of the hospitals in the region. Well, now 
there is only one trauma center open. They are paying more employees 
than there is work because they want to try to keep the employees 
there, but the CEO just left last week. He took his family and left New 
Orleans. Gone because they don't see the revitalization taking place 
that they need.
  Across the way from that particular business was another business: 
Tommy's Seafood. He has been there a long time. He bought a new 
building. The new building was mortgaged. The new building was hurt, 
damaged in the winds. So he gets the insurance check, but guess what. 
The insurance check is made out to the bank. So the bank gets the money 
and the building still has to be fixed.
  That is not what we intended in the U.S. Congress. That is not what 
disaster assistance is supposed to do in a smart way. There are all 
kinds of examples like this where people are waiting for SBA loans, 
trying to get the loans. They can't get the loans. More loans have been 
denied than have been granted. Out of $9 billion--the administration 
says: Well, we have given $9 billion in loans. Guess what. Only $1 
billion of that $9 billion has actually gone out to people.
  On September 15, the President spoke to the Nation from Jackson 
Square, and he made a series of promises. Here is what he said:

       Throughout the area hit by the hurricane, we will do what 
     it takes. We will stay as long as it takes to help citizens 
     rebuild their communities and their lives. When the streets 
     are rebuilt, there should be many new businesses, including 
     minority-owned businesses, along those streets. When the 
     houses are rebuilt, more families should own, not rent, those 
     houses. When the regional economy revives, local people 
     should be prepared for the jobs being created.

  Over 8 months later--over 8 months later--history is repeating 
itself. Too little has been provided in real response, and a lot of 
time has been wasted without real solutions for getting the gulf coast 
back to business. Eight months after the President stood in Jackson 
Square, there aren't trucks massively lined up, hauling this debris out 
of the city and garbage out of the city. In fact, there seems to be 
very little activity from the Federal Government.
  I know the President has been down there 12 times. That is what they 
will tell you very quickly. They will tell you about the amount of aid 
that has flowed into the region. We will talk about that in a minute. 
The fact is, the piles of debris that remain standing before every 
building are an unbelievable reminder of the devastation to people, but 
they also stand as a blockade, as a barrier to the ability of 
businesses to get going, to the ability of people to be able to come 
back and figure out what they are doing with their homes. The more they 
see that, the more a homeowner sees that kind of debris just stuck 
there, the more they begin to say: This ``ain't'' happening. I am out 
of here. I am out of here.

  Local officials told me they have fears that mosquitoes and rodents 
are carrying diseases as a result of the piles of garbage on the 
streets. In the richest country on the face of the Earth, we shouldn't 
have Americans abandoned to the worry that their children are going to 
be at risk for Third World health problems because Washington didn't 
meet its most basic obligations to those citizens. More than $10 
billion in contracts have been awarded for debris removal, emergency 
response, and reconstruction efforts, but where is it? Tens of 
thousands of abandoned cars are still littering different streets. 
There is garbage, hurricane debris, trash in front of virtually every 
home or business that I saw. Most of those homes are abandoned still, 
obviously.

[[Page S4517]]

  Katrina pulled back the curtain, and it revealed poverty and squalor 
that many didn't believe could exist in our country. But 8 months 
later, after people said no more and never again, and the cameras went 
away to a large degree, those images are still there on the streets of 
New Orleans.
  I don't know any Americans who remember what they saw in the 
Superdome who feel that their dues have been totally paid by making a 
one-time contribution to the Red Cross. And in the same way, when you 
look at what the Federal Government response is, people in New Orleans 
are left wondering whether we have come to a different conclusion.
  Eight months after the President promised the revitalization of new, 
small, minority-owned businesses, the businesspeople who have shown 
great courage staying in New Orleans are literally fighting to keep 
their doors open in the face of such a slow and woefully inadequate 
Federal response. Orleans Parish, which is the center of Louisiana's 
economy, had 12,695 small businesses employing 245,000 people before 
August 29 of last year. Today, it is estimated that only a little more 
than 2,000 of the 12,600 have opened. Where is our response? Those 
businesses need people to sell things to and people need a place to 
live.
  The President seems to mean something when he speaks about staying 
the course in Iraq, but it doesn't appear as if we are staying the 
course down in New Orleans, notwithstanding the money that has been 
allocated. It takes more than money. It takes a strong leader who is 
rolling up his sleeves and bringing people together and organizing all 
of these contractors and different efforts in a way that maximizes both 
the volunteer and paid effort of the United States of America.
  One person I spoke with confirmed what I could see with my own eyes. 
One person said to me--this is a professional who has spent years down 
there, whose home is there, who helped rescue people, who stayed 
through the whole thing, and he was rescuing people in boats blocks 
away from his house. He said: Basic services in 70 percent of the city 
don't exist. In those areas, there is no fire protection, police 
presence is minimal, there is garbage, hurricane debris, trash in front 
of all of the homes. Billions have been spent. Yet the city is piled 
high with debris of every kind.
  Those are his words. Those are his words.
  The residents of New Orleans are beginning to put their hopes 
elsewhere. That is what is happening. Maybe some people want that to 
happen. That is a question that ought to be asked. They are starting to 
put their future in a new place. Over 3,400 private homes are for sale 
in New Orleans, more than at any other time since we started tracking 
this indicator 6 weeks after Katrina made landfall. This is up from 
approximately 2,800 homes that were for sale in February, and it is the 
highest number since October of 2005.
  Jim Funk, who is CEO of the Louisiana Restaurant Association, said 
the pre-Katrina restaurant workforce of New Orleans has been reduced 
from 133,000 to 22,000. Only 1,500 of the almost 3,500 pre-Katrina 
restaurants are back open. Of course, restaurants need people and need 
workers. The unemployment rate of those who remain displaced jumped to 
nearly 35 percent in March, a 54-percent increase from the month 
before. Unemployment is up 54 percent from the month before, even 
though we are supposed to be putting people back to work.

  I met Pat Murphy, who owns United Cab. United Cab is a 66-year-old 
business. He spoke at our roundtable. After wading through redtape and 
months of administrative delay in a process that he described as, 
quoting Pat Murphy, ``turning into harassment,'' he finally received 
his SBA loan.
  Why does a small business that has existed for 66 years have to go 
through 8\1/2\ months of a painful process, which they term 
``harassment,'' in order to get a loan after a disaster and come back 
into business, from the very agency whose sole purpose is to be able to 
provide that kind of assistance? The worst part is that Pat Murphy will 
tell you he is one of the lucky ones. He actually received a loan, and 
he knows a whole bunch of folks who are still waiting around for that 
money.
  Some may have heard that the administration brags about that $9 
billion of disaster loans they have approved. But as I said, only one-
ninth of that, only $1 billion, has found its way into the hands of 
people. Why can't you deliver the checks? If you approve it, why can't 
you make sure people get it right away? Mr. President, 11 percent of 
the funding has actually reached the people who are asking for it. In 
addition, what is more, about half of those who applied for disaster 
loans were denied. What are they going to do? All these folks who have 
been denied loans have nowhere to turn.
  If you are serious about revitalizing New Orleans, you have to be 
willing to put that money into their hands. One of the biggest problems 
they have is capital, being able to pay some people for a period of 
time so they can stay. For people who need to put food on the table and 
take care of their kids, if there is no certainty as to that 
availability of money, they are going to go somewhere. They have to go 
somewhere. What happens is the fabric of New Orleans gets destroyed 
because people put down their roots somewhere else.
  For those who have been fortunate enough to receive housing 
assistance, they are living in front of their damaged homes, many of 
them in trailers that are sitting on concrete blocks. What is the 
problem with that? Let me tell you what the problem is. No. 1, the 
trailers FEMA is providing cost $70,000 a piece. They are not 
permanent.
  Hurricane season starts in a few weeks. The National Weather Service 
is predicting 14 named storms to hit the gulf during this next 
hurricane season. I might add that they were accurate last year in the 
number of named storms they predicted. Do you know what is going to 
happen when the wind hits, 90 miles an hour, 100 miles an hour or more? 
Those trailers are going to blow around, and they are going to create 
more damage.
  I am told by people in New Orleans you could have built modular 
housing for less money with greater permanency. If you had been smart 
about this, you could have set up a village of modular housing for 
people who are working on their permanent housing, you could create 
lumber distribution centers, you could bring carpenters from around the 
country, plumbers, electricians. Labor unions from all around the 
country would be willing to donate, come down and live in a special 
village and then to rebuild. None of that kind of basic organization 
effort that America is supposed to be so good at--that we are so good 
at, when led--is taking place.
  I want to know what kind of leadership spends $900 million to buy 
25,000 manufactured homes and 1,300 modular homes and they can't be 
used because FEMA rules say they are too big or unsafe in a flood zone. 
Bureaucracy, lack of imagination, lack of willingness to do what it 
takes--which is what the President said we would do in Jackson Square.
  What type of leadership spends $249 million to secure 8,136 cruise 
ship cabins for 6 months at a cost that Inspector General Richard 
Skinner estimated at $5,100 a month per passenger, six times the cost 
of renting a two- bedroom apartment?
  Eight months after the promises were made, New Orleans has only one 
level 1 trauma center. The largest medical complex, Charity Hospital, 
needs to be rebuilt, but FEMA will only fund repairs, so they are not 
going to rebuild, or can't yet.
  So what do the residents of New Orleans do during the coming 
hurricane season if one of those named storms is severe? Eight months 
after promises were made to expand local business participation in the 
recovery, guess what, FEMA is continuing its business model of hiring 
megacontractors to oversee the recovery efforts. Why is it that debris 
removal contract dollars aren't making it to the local businesses? We 
had one particular guy who has been in business for I think it was 27 
years. He does tree removal and tree work. He has not been used. In 
fact, he was called and told by FEMA that they are using an outside 
contractor. He is one of the people trying to stay, and they are going 
to take his business away for somebody out of State.
  Why are so many local contractors waiting for FEMA to pay them 
millions of dollars for work they have already completed?

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  Last Thursday, the Senate passed an emergency spending bill that 
includes $2.2 billion for levee reconstruction in southeast Louisiana, 
$1.5 billion for Orleans Parish levee projects, and $1.3 billion for 
the disaster loan program. Senator Landrieu and I offered--I 
cosponsored an amendment that she proposed--two amendments. One was to 
ensure the SBA sends up its disaster response plan to Congress before 
June 1, which is the start of the 2006 hurricane season; and second, to 
require the SBA to report to Congress monthly on the status of the 
disaster loan program now and after future disasters.
  Senator Landrieu, Senator Snowe, and I also cosponsored an amendment 
by Senator Vitter that declares areas hit by Hurricanes Katrina and 
Rita as historically underutilized business zones--HUBZones, as we call 
them. It makes sure, though, that small, local businesses will get 
first consideration for Federal contracts. This is something we have 
been trying to get done since last September. We put that on the floor 
of the Senate right after the hurricane, and still it has taken the 
Congress to this day to get this done.
  But that is only part of the story. We passed bipartisan legislation 
which offers a more comprehensive approach to help get small businesses 
back on their feet. Let me tell you what we wanted to do. We wanted to 
give some small businesses grants--not loans, grants--because clearly 
those small businesses are going to need a tide-over period of time 
until you can get a population back that is going to begin to use them. 
If you are serious about keeping the integrity of this city and you are 
serious about rebuilding it and allowing those citizens who have been 
told they will have the opportunity to stay there, to stay there, you 
have to give them some money. They can't repay the loans if they can't 
do the business right now.

  How much money have we spent in Iraq that is going to turn out to be 
a grant versus what is happening down in New Orleans, to our own 
citizens.
  The Senate passed that legislation. I will tell you what, it has been 
blocked. It has been blocked since we passed it after Hurricane 
Katrina. There has not even been a serious effort, despite our efforts, 
Senator Snowe and mine, to try to get some sort of negotiation on it--
not even serious. It was dropped from the 2006 CJS conference, and now 
it is waiting for action as a freestanding bill. This legislation 
includes essential bridge loans and the grants that would help those 
suffering the most to be able to keep their doors open so you do 
maintain the integrity of New Orleans.
  The Senate has yet to take action on a bill introduced by Senator 
Landrieu which I cosponsored to follow on this other bill which has 
additional provisions, recognizing the situation and the needs on the 
ground. There is no excuse for us not making every good-faith effort 
possible, in a bipartisan way, to do what makes sense if we are going 
to keep faith with those folks and with all of our citizens, to whom 
this sends a message.
  I don't want to just talk about the slow response. I think we have to 
find a way to get some urgency here. The businesses in the gulf coast 
cannot and should not have to face bureaucratic redtape and delays. 
They will not be able to last much longer. Many of the businesses that 
didn't have business interruption insurance are already gone. Many 
others are on the verge of closing unless they are able to secure 
financial assistance in an expedited manner. These companies cannot 
survive on empty promises. What Louisiana and Mississippi need, 
obviously, is a level of leadership that is prepared to break through 
the bureaucracy and come together and create the ingenuity and 
creativity to rebuild the region.
  There are a lot of Americans who would be prepared to volunteer time 
if you want to organize them. That could be done. You could have a 
civilian assistance corps of experts who are willing to undergo some 
hardship for a period of time, live in tough circumstances--a tent city 
or whatever it is--to lend their expertise to helping to rebuild and do 
certain things. There are all kinds of ways you could do more cleanup 
and more rebuilding in an expedited fashion.
  The fact is, we saw after Katrina, when the National Guard was 
there--I give them great credit. Under General Honore, a career soldier 
in the Army, he showed what strong leadership, what a hierarchal 
organization with clear lines of command, what a real structure could 
bring. In those areas where the National Guard did cleanup and did 
immediate work, a great deal happened. That is what should have 
continued. But guess what. They have gone. I thought we were going to 
stay as long as it takes. I thought we were going to do whatever it 
takes. Those are the words of the President. But they are gone. They 
could be there today still doing things if we had the will.
  New Orleans is one of the great cities of our country. It has an 
amazing history, a diverse and ethnically rich population, and great 
culture. I think every American has a stake in its resurrection.
  I thank Senator Landrieu again for inviting me there for a firsthand 
look. I really thought I was going to see something very different. I 
know there have been about 40 Senators or more who have gone down there 
at one point or another. They have seen a lot of this with their own 
eyes. It just defies my sense of what the possibilities are in our 
country. With all of the unbelievable equipment we have, with all of 
the skilled labor we have, with the volunteer spirit of our Nation, it 
is stunning to me that we are not proceeding more rapidly to do for New 
Orleans what New Orleans needs.
  My hope is that we will pass those bills I talked about and that over 
these next 8 months, over the next months, we can ramp up.
  Everybody said never again. I will tell you what is happening in New 
Orleans today. The images people saw at the Superdome, of people who 
felt abandoned, who didn't have adequate shelter, while misjudgments 
were being made around them by those who were supposed to be 
responsible, is actually being repeated at this very moment.
  There is a Superdome II taking place in New Orleans today, for those 
citizens who can't get back on their feet, who don't know what to do 
with their property, for the 70 percent of the city that has no basic 
services, for the people who cannot move because of the debris or the 
garbage, the people who don't have a prayer of getting their home going 
again or their business going again because of the lack of adequacy of 
the housing and a clear plan that says to them with certainty that 
there is a future. Right now, that future for a lot of folks is very 
difficult.
  One of the problems I heard about from a number of responsible 
people--there were chamber folks there and other folks there--is the 
mental health issue. There are a lot of citizens who have been living 
under an extraordinary level of stress since Hurricane Katrina. Some of 
them have lost family members. Almost all are struggling to pay bills. 
It is hard to think about the future. That stress takes its toll.
  I was told how crime is rising, about how the sense of despair is 
taking a greater toll, and how there is going to be a larger mental 
health problem within that region, as a consequence of the lack of 
adequacy of response and the plight in which people find themselves.
  We can do better. I think everybody here knows we can do better.
  We have strong leaders in this country. We have excellent generals 
and military personnel. They know how to manage. We have business 
leaders who run extraordinary companies, who understand the hierarchy 
and understand how to get things done. Clearly, FEMA doesn't, and 
clearly whatever the structure is that is there, it is inadequate to 
get the job done.
  My hope and prayer is that we can deliver on the promises to New 
Orleans and turn this around.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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