[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 60 (Tuesday, May 16, 2006)]
[House]
[Page H2625]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  EQUITABLE FUNDING FOR HURRICANE RITA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BRADY of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague, 
Congressman Meek from Florida, for allowing me to reclaim my time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today to join my good friend, Congressman 
Boustany from Louisiana, in urging our colleagues not to forget the 
victims of Hurricane Rita as they determine priority funding in the 
Hurricane supplemental bill that is before the House and the Senate 
today.
  You may know, but, of course, last August Hurricane Katrina, the 
sixth largest Hurricane in gulf coast history hit the gulf coast. It 
sent a human tide of over half a million evacuees to Texas. And while 
our State was struggling with the unprecedented effects of that storm, 
its own coast took a direct hit from Hurricane Rita, the fourth largest 
storm in gulf coast history, just 3 weeks later.
  As Hurricane Rita grew into one of the most intense storms in 
recorded history, steering a path through Texas and along the Louisiana 
border, our State, and especially southeast and east Texas were in the 
midst of its unprecedented response to Hurricane Katrina.
  So our region not only took in evacuees, tens of thousands from 
Louisiana, and are thrilled that we did, we also took in 2.7 million 
evacuees from Hurricane Rita, the largest in history.
  Then the hurricane shifted; Hurricane Rita went right up those same 
communities that had already done so much. Rita delivered a devastating 
blow to the region. As this photo illustrates, the resulting physical 
damage was massive.
  The town of Sabine Pass was leveled. Further inland, entire 
communities, including houses, businesses, bridges, roads and 
utilities, were severely damaged or destroyed by Hurricane-force winds 
and torrential rains.
  Over 75,000 Texas homes were damaged or destroyed in Rita, $1 billion 
of our timber crop, the largest economic driver in east Texas; and 
today, 10 percent of our Rita evacuees have yet to return. Without 
homes or without places to work, we are again in a real fight for our 
lives.
  Today we have a number of our Texas leaders, southeast Texas Recovery 
Team in Washington meeting with the White House, meeting with House 
leaders, meeting with FEMA and HUD to talk about how Texas can recover.
  We had, as I said, 75,000 homes damaged or destroyed. Many of those 
have temporary blue tarps on today that are starting to deteriorate or 
blow off. When the hurricane season hits, we will put more and more 
people out of their homes.
  We are asking for about $1 billion in community development block 
grant funds in housing to help repair those homes, to help get people 
back in their homes, to help southeast Texas recover.
  We are also asking for equal treatment. These are all photos from the 
Beaumont Enterprise and their special edition on Rita, showing the 
damage from this region. But as we rebuild, we find that, 
unfortunately, the Federal Government split Hurricane Rita along State 
lines, literally provided one assistance to our Louisiana neighbors, 
and a different level to our Texas neighbors, which is terribly unfair 
and creates a terrible burden on our Texas communities, many of whom 
are poor, many with very high minority and poverty rates, all of them 
eager to help our Louisiana neighbors, but also eager to try to recover 
ourselves.
  So we are up here asking for the same 90/10 reimbursement rate of 
FEMA that our Louisiana folks have received for the exact same 
hurricane, same storm, same damage. Different treatment, same storm. It 
ought to be the same storm, same damage, same treatment.
  Mr. Speaker, let me close with this. This Congress, our government, 
are charged with a duty to wisely allocate precious taxpayer dollars. 
This hurricane supplement has become a magnet for some less-than-
justified projects.
  Mr. Speaker, I can tell you this: that the Hurricane Rita assistance 
in schools of 90/10 and in housing are not only fair and justified, but 
will go a long way toward helping these communities who did so much for 
our Louisiana neighbors and are doing so much today to help them 
recover at a time of terrible need.

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