About the Office of the Federal Coordinator for Gulf Coast Rebuilding

Office of the Federal Coordinator for Gulf Coast Rebuilding >> About

Leadership

Major General Doug O'Dell serves as the Federal Coordinator for the Office of Gulf Coast Rebuilding managing the long-term Federal rebuilding efforts by working with state and local officials to reach consensus on their vision for the region.  The overarching mission of the Federal Coordinator is to identify the priority of needs for long-term rebuilding by working with the people on the ground; communicate those realities to the decision makers in Washington; and advise the President and his senior leadership on the most effective, integrated, and fiscally responsible Federal strategies for supporting a full and vibrant recovery

Mission

The strategy is focused on a set of prioritized, integrated and long-term initiatives to build the region back better than it was before, per President Bush’s September 15, 2005 speech in Jackson Square, New Orleans. The initiatives are:

Restoring long-term safety and security

• Rebuild the region’s water management system to world-class standards, including the creation of a new governance structure (controlling quantity, such as levees and canals, as well as quality);
• Improve the planning of emergency services, such as emergency first response (i.e., 911), and new evacuation plans;
• Restore and protect the environment, including balanced development of new towns and wetlands restoration;
• Reconstitute of the justice system, restoring police departments, courts, district attorney systems and prisons;
• Rebuild the health care delivery system, through a network of private/public hospitals and clinics.

Renewing the region’s economic engine, and creating growth opportunities

• Support business investment through tax relief and simplification, regulatory flexibility and other incentives;
• Provide support for small business throughout the region through disaster loans and other relief;
• Repair critical public infrastructure such as roads, bridges, water and sewer systems and public buildings;
• Create new jobs and restore pre-disaster opportunities by providing incentives and job training programs.

Revitalizing communities

• Rebuild and repair permanent homes by addressing long-term financing gaps, and safer, more responsible building codes;
• Support the states in developing urban plans and building urban communities for the current and future population of the region;
• Improve and rebuild the education system, from K-12 through postsecondary institutions; and
• Renew community and faith-based institutions to restpre community networks and social service delivery to the people of the region.

Organization

The Office, created on November 1, 2005 by Executive Order 13390 officially opened on November 16, 2005, in Washington, D.C. In addition, the Federal Coordinator has an office in Baton Rouge with a team that regularly travels throughout the region. Other satellite offices are being set up on the coasts of both Mississippi and Louisiana to provide hands-on support in the region. Together, we will make good on the President’s commitment to rebuild and renew this important American community.