Text of a Letter from the President to the Speaker of the House of Representatives

On September 8th, I signed into law Public Law 108-303, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for Disaster Relief Act, 2004, which provided $2 billion in supplemental funds for hurricane-related disaster relief. On September 14th and 27th, I submitted additional supplemental requests totaling $10.2 billion to continue immediate assistance to address the impact of Hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan, and Jeanne.

Due to the availability of better estimates regarding the damage resulting from Hurricane Jeanne, I am requesting additional emergency funds from the Congress to address this natural disaster. I now ask the Congress to consider the enclosed requests, totaling $691.2 million, for additional emergency resources for the Departments of Agriculture, Defense, the Interior, Transportation, and Veterans Affairs; as well as the Corps of Engineers, the Environmental Protection Agency, and International Assistance Programs.

I hereby designate these specific proposals in the amounts requested herein as emergency requirements. These additional requests will support response and recovery efforts to address the critical needs associated with the effects of Hurricane Jeanne. In addition to this enacted and requested emergency funding, Federal agencies will continue to use existing resources and programs for response and recovery efforts from all recent hurricanes and storms.

I urge the Congress to limit this emergency funding to those items directly related to the recovery efforts from the impact of these recent major disasters and to act expeditiously on this and my pending emergency supplemental requests.

The details of this request are set forth in the enclosed letter from the Director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Sincerely,

GEORGE W. BUSH

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