<DOC>
[109 Senate Hearings]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access]
[DOCID: f:27024.wais]
S. Hrg. 109-804
HURRICANE KATRINA: THE ROLE OF THE GOVERNORS IN MANAGING THE
CATASTROPHE
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON
HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 2, 2006
__________
Printed for the use of the
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman
TED STEVENS, Alaska JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut
GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio CARL LEVIN, Michigan
NORM COLEMAN, Minnesota DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii
TOM COBURN, Oklahoma THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware
LINCOLN D. CHAFEE, Rhode Island MARK DAYTON, Minnesota
ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah FRANK LAUTENBERG, New Jersey
PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico MARK PRYOR, Arkansas
JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia
Michael D. Bopp, Staff Director and Chief Counsel
David T. Flanagan, General Counsel
Arthur W. Adelberg, Senior Counsel
John H. Cobb, Senior Counsel
James R. McKay, Counsel
Joyce A. Rechtschaffen, Minority Staff Director and Counsel
Robert F. Muse, Minority General Counsel
Eric P. Andersen, Minority Professional Staff Member
F. James McGee, Minority Professional Staff Member
Trina Driessnack Tyrer, Chief Clerk
C O N T E N T S
------
Opening statements:
Page
Senator Collins.............................................. 1
Senator Lieberman............................................ 3
Senator Akaka................................................ 16
Senator Warner............................................... 31
WITNESSES
Thursday, February 2, 2006
Hon. Haley Barbour, Governor, State of Mississippi............... 4
Hon. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, Governor, State of Louisiana..... 6
Alphabetical List of Witnesses
Barbour, Hon. Haley:
Testimony.................................................... 4
Prepared statement........................................... 41
Blanco, Hon. Kathleen Babineaux:
Testimony.................................................... 6
Prepared statement........................................... 52
APPENDIX
Affidavit of Col. (Ret.) Perry Jeff Smith........................ 56
Committee Exhibit 1 and State Exhibit 1.......................... 72
Committee Exhibit 2.............................................. 76
State Exhibit 2.................................................. 79
State Exhibit 3.................................................. 80
Committee Exhibit 13 and State Exhibit 4......................... 82
State Exhibit 5.................................................. 83
State Exhibit 6.................................................. 84
Committee Exhibit 3.............................................. 93
Committee Exhibit 5.............................................. 132
Committee Exhibit 29............................................. 136
HURRICANE KATRINA: THE ROLE OF THE
GOVERNORS IN MANAGING THE CATASTROPHE
----------
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2006
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Homeland Security
and Governmental Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in
room SD-342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, the Hon. Susan M.
Collins, Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Collins, Warner, Lieberman, and Akaka.
OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN COLLINS
Chairman Collins. The Committee will come to order.
Good morning. In the partnership among State, local, and
Federal Governments that forms the backbone of the American
system of disaster preparation and response, our Nation's
governors play the central role. They are the essential bridge
between local knowledge, and needs, Federal expertise and
resources. They are the chief executive officers of their
States and the commanders-in-chief of their National Guard
forces.
They are the indispensable decisionmakers in times of
crisis. They decide when to ask for a presidential declaration
of disaster, when to declare a state of emergency, whether to
call up the Guard, under what circumstances to stand up their
emergency operations centers and ask their sister States for
help, when to trigger an evacuation order, how much emergency
financial obligation to incur, how best to put the State's own
resources to work, and how and what to communicate to a
population suddenly thrust into misery, uncertainty, and fear.
The governor's influence cannot be overestimated in times
of catastrophe. By word and deed, by where the governor spends
time, by the priorities the governor sets, by the issues and
problems the governor becomes personally involved in, the whole
tone and tempo of the response to a disaster are established.
And the ultimate results, the successes and failures, to a very
large degree, measure the governor.
Today's hearing will examine in depth the challenges faced
by two governors in overcoming the awful consequences of
Hurricane Katrina. Their experience and insight will help this
Committee as we seek to understand what worked and what failed
across all levels of government so that we can prepare more
effectively for disasters yet to come.
I am pleased this morning to welcome Governor Kathleen
Blanco of Louisiana and Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi
to this Committee. In this, our 15th hearing as part of our in-
depth investigation of Hurricane Katrina, we will explore
further the issues that have surfaced in earlier testimony
about the responsibilities of these States' chief executives
both before and after the hurricane hit.
How did they carry out the critical function of assigning
responsibility for the emergency support functions under the
National Response Plan and seeing to it that those duties were
actually carried out? As an example of that, earlier testimony
before the Committee revealed that the responsible cabinet
officer in Louisiana completely abdicated his responsibility to
plan for the evacuation of the elderly, the sick, and the poor
who lacked their own means of transportation.
How do the governors see their fundamental role of
maintaining law and order and security of their citizens in
cases where local law enforcement crumbles under the weight of
its own deficiencies in planning and communications, as well as
the severity of the conditions?
How did the governors act to resolve disputes, conflicts,
and jurisdictional rivalries among local, State, and Federal
agencies that each wanted to do it their own way? How
successful were they in expediting government resources to
providers of critical services, even if they were in the
private sector, such as hospitals and nursing homes?
And then there is the uniquely American issue that must be
addressed by the governors--resolving State and Federal
differences regarding the status and use of National Guard and
active duty forces in a very serious crisis. Under what
circumstances, if any, should the National Guard be
federalized?
What of the relationship between the States? The pre-storm
evacuation by Gulf Coast residents with their own vehicles was
relatively efficient, due in large part to the exemplary
cooperation between the two governors here today. In addition,
the assistance from other States through the Emergency
Management Assistance Compacts was invaluable. How can such
cooperation be enhanced and used to even greater effect in the
future?
Finally, how do the governors see their own role within
their own States? Who has the authority to order mandatory
evacuations, and how can such orders be enforced? How can the
governors help to resolve the communication problems that
hampered preparation and plagued response across all levels of
government? What can they do to remedy the serious problems
that Katrina exposed that are clearly matters of State
jurisdiction, such as the lack of effective evacuation plans
for some hospitals and nursing homes?
Governors are chief executives and commanders-in-chief of
the National Guard. But above all, they are public servants
with enormous responsibilities. They are the leaders to which
their States' residents look to in times of crisis.
This hearing will help us better understand both their
obligations and limitations so that the partnership among
governments that forms the core of our national emergency
response system will be stronger and more effective the next
time disaster strikes.
Senator Lieberman.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LIEBERMAN
Senator Lieberman. Thanks very much, Madam Chairman. As a
matter of fact, I associate myself with just about everything
you said. And I will make my opening remarks brief.
I want to welcome Governor Blanco, Governor Barbour, and a
special welcome to your wife, Ms. Marsha Barbour, who was kind
enough to escort us when we were in Mississippi a few weeks
ago. I suppose in full disclosure, Governor, I should repeat to
you what I said to the first lady that day, which is that she
was a much more intelligent, charming, and attractive woman
than I thought you deserved as a spouse. [Laughter.]
Governor Barbour. As usual, we agree, Senator.
Senator Lieberman. And I am sure the same would be said of
me and my wife and that relationship.
I want to thank both Governor Blanco and Governor Barbour
for the cooperation that they and their staffs have given us
and our investigators and staff in our inquiry here. And I
can't resist saying that I wish we had this same full level of
cooperation from the White House, which we are working on, but
we have not, in my opinion, yet received.
This is your opportunity, Governors, to tell us, to the
best of your recollection, what happened, to answer some of the
questions about the performance of State government, your State
governments in this unprecedented natural disaster, and also to
share with us your frank assessment of the performance of the
Federal Government, particularly in the preparation for and
response to Hurricane Katrina.
What comes out of our hearings, and the story is well
known, which is that not just was there, particularly in New
Orleans, the long-time fear of the so-called ``big one,'' the
big hurricane that would overrun the levees and flood the city,
but that there were specific warnings along the way in the
Hurricane Pam exercise, etc. And I think, as we look back, I
presume that both of you would agree that no level of
government did as much as it should have done to prepare for
that eventuality.
And so, this is an opportunity to share your reactions to
all of that. This investigation is not about getting anybody.
It is about getting to the truth of what happened so together
we can work to make sure that we are much better prepared for
the disasters that will inevitably come.
I want to say, finally, briefly that, as you both know, we
were there a short while ago, the second trip Senator Collins
and I have taken there. And I think we were both stunned by the
continuing devastation that exists, and not just to the
property, which is extraordinary, and the dislocation of the
people, but the threat that the storm continues to leave on the
communities involved, large and small.
And if I may say so, on the unique cultures that are parts
of those communities that are a very important part of the
fabric of American culture. The Chairman and I were not
satisfied with what we heard that day of the Federal work on
reconstruction, and we are going to take action soon to make
some recommendations that we hope will improve it.
But most of all, this morning, I thank you for being here,
and I look forward to your testimony.
Chairman Collins. Thank you, Senator Lieberman.
I want to echo Senator Lieberman's thanks publicly to
Marsha Barbour for being our escort when we were in Mississippi
and you, Governor, for joining us in our tour of New Orleans.
Like Senator Lieberman, I was absolutely stunned at the
apparent lack of progress. When we think of the $85 billion
that we have voted for to invest in the recovery and
reconstruction of the region, it is very difficult to figure
out where the money has gone. And we look forward to working
closely with both of you to try to expedite the Federal
assistance and to make it more effective.
I am very pleased to welcome our distinguished panel today.
Both Governor Haley Barbour and Governor Kathleen Blanco took
office in January 2004. Because this is an ongoing
investigation and we are swearing in all of the witnesses, I am
going to ask you to stand so that I can administer the oath.
Do you swear that the testimony you are about to give will
be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so
help you, God?
Witnesses. I do.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
We will begin with Governor Barbour. Thank you.
TESTIMONY OF HON. HALEY BARBOUR,\1\ GOVERNOR, STATE OF
MISSISSIPPI
Governor Barbour. OK. I thought we were going to have
ladies first. My fault.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Governor Barbour appears in the
appendix on page 41.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chairman Collins. That is southern. [Laughter.]
Governor Barbour. Madam Chairman, I thought you were from
Southern Maine.
Madam Chairman, distinguished Ranking Member, thanks for
the opportunity to join you today to discuss the worst natural
disaster in our Nation's history, Hurricane Katrina. I have
given you my written testimony. So I am not going to read it
all because I look forward to the chance to answer the
questions about the things that you are interested in.
I will simply tell you, for us, this wasn't a calamity for
the coast. We had hurricane-force winds 200 miles inland. We
had a county 100 miles inland where there were 12 fatalities
from the hurricane. You have seen the obliteration of the Gulf
Coast, but there was tremendous damage in our State inland and
a number of fatalities inland as well.
In its wake, Katrina left tens of thousands of homes
uninhabited, often obliterated; thousands of small businesses
in shambles; schools, public buildings ruined, unusable; and
highways, ports, railroads, water, sewer systems, all
destroyed.
You mentioned the EMAC system, the Emergency Management
Assistance Compact. Our sister States were tremendous to us,
starting with Florida whose elite search and rescue teams were
on the ground in Mississippi the night of the storm. And we had
600 Florida State law enforcement officers in Mississippi for
more than 2 months.
But it wasn't just Florida. North Carolina sent their Med-
One portable hospital, Georgia's investigators, and Ohio's
search and rescue teams. We had 12,000 National Guard from
units from more than 20 States, boots on the ground. Alabama
sent two MP units while Mobile was still flooded.
So, as Governor, I am terrifically grateful to all of the
States. The generosity of the American people has just been
unbelievable--Corporate America, philanthropists, everyday
citizens.
The President came to Mississippi about the second or third
time, we went to a feeding station, where I bumped into a man
who told me he was from Vermont and said that he and 16 other
truck drivers had driven 17 tractor-trailer loads of food from
Vermont to Mississippi. And I was marveling, thanking him, and
he told me it was his third trip. The generosity and outpouring
of the goodness of the American people has been spectacular.
And I will tell you, I appreciate the efforts of the
Federal Government. People complain about the failures, and
there are plenty of problems. But let me tell you about some
Federal efforts that didn't go wrong.
The night Katrina struck, Coast Guard helicopter crews from
Mobile conducted search and rescue missions on the Mississippi
Gulf Coast. These fearless young men, who hung from helicopters
on ropes--dangling through the air in the pitch-black darkness
of the first night because there was no electricity--pulled
people off of roofs and out of trees. And by the first Friday,
these Coast Guard daredevils had lifted 1,700 Mississippians to
safety by hoisting them up into helicopters.
Later that week, the U.S. Department of Transportation
began providing fuel for all our emergency responders and all
our critical operations, which was essential to our recovery
efforts.
During the relief and recovery stage, the Federal
Government has pumped resources in to help us. These efforts
have been enormous, but those efforts have been far from
perfect. From the outset, there were problems and shortages.
Some were the inevitable result of our State's bearing the
brunt of the largest and worst natural disaster in American
history, which obliterated all systems. Electricity, water,
sewer, roads, bridges, communications were all devastated.
FEMA's logistical operations simply didn't provide what was
needed.
We found ourselves having to scramble, adjust, innovate,
make do. Our efforts weren't perfect either, not by any means.
But the spirit of our people pulled us through. Our people are
strong, resilient, and self-reliant. They are not whiners. They
are not into victimhood.
From day one, they hitched up their britches and did what
had to be done, helping themselves and helping their neighbors.
Their spirit has been an inspiration to me, and it was and is
the key to relief, recovery, rebuilding, and renewal.
I am going to stop in a second. I do want to thank
Congress. Just before Christmas, Congress passed a major
Katrina supplemental disaster assistance package, totaling $29
billion. Added to the assistance that will result from the
Stafford Act, the Federal Government is providing and will
provide some $25 billion to $27 billion of support for
Mississippians and rebuilding our infrastructure. We are very
grateful. And I pledge to you and to your constituents that we
will be good stewards of the money that you are giving us.
I especially want to thank Senator Thad Cochran, who led
the passage of the package of supplemental appropriations, and
Senator Trent Lott, who led the passage of the Gulf Opportunity
Zone bill, and our entire congressional delegation.
With that, Senator, I think what I will do is stop and let
Governor Blanco make her remarks and then answer questions, as
I would particularly like to speak to some of the questions
that you raised, particularly about progress, debris removal,
temporary housing. And so, I look forward to that.
But if it suits the Committee, I would stop my formal
statement at that point.
Chairman Collins. Thank you. Governor Blanco.
TESTIMONY OF HON. KATHLEEN BABINEAUX BLANCO,\1\ GOVERNOR, STATE
OF LOUISIANA
Governor Blanco. Madam Chairman, Senator Lieberman, I want
to tell you that it is a great honor to be here today. I deeply
appreciate your bipartisan review and your efforts to identify
the lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Governor Blanco appears in the
appendix on page 52.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
I take full responsibility for improving Louisiana's
emergency response, just as Congress is responsible for
improving the Federal response. We stand united in our
determination to do better.
I thank the American people for uplifting us with prayers
and generosity. And I must thank the governors and officials
from every State and territory for sending tens of thousands of
National Guard troops and first responders. Men and women from
across the country from every State stood shoulder to shoulder
with Louisiana's first responders and the Coast Guard to save
lives.
I count Louisiana's neighbors among our blessings. Governor
Barbour, thank you. Thank you so much for being a good neighbor
and helping me when I called you. You helped me to move 1.3
million people to safety before the storm. Many traveled
through your State, and it was because of your willingness to
enact a contraflow plan in your State, as well as the
contraflow plan in our State, that actually worked.
And thank you for extending welcome mats to so many of our
displaced families. We have some of your families, too,
ironically. But my heart goes out to your families. We know
that our people lost everything. Our people experienced not
just a Louisiana tragedy, not just a Mississippi tragedy, but
an American tragedy of biblical proportions.
In Louisiana, the catastrophic failure of our Federal levee
system eclipsed Katrina, sending flood waters across New
Orleans and the surrounding parishes. Still reeling from round
one, Louisiana braced for round two. Rita leveled Southwest
Louisiana the way Katrina leveled Mississippi.
Katrina took 1,100 lives in Louisiana, and we mourn every
one of them. Katrina and Rita wreaked a path of destruction
through our State that displaced more than 780,000 people,
ruined 217,000 homes, closed 18,000 businesses, and left
240,000 people unemployed.
All 64 parishes in our State were affected, and I hope you
will join me in recognizing presidents and leaders of many of
the hardest-hit parishes in Louisiana who are with us today. I
would like to ask them to stand.
Benny Rousselle, Plaquemines Parish president. Kevin Davis,
St. Tammany Parish president. Toye Taylor, Washington Parish
president. Junior Rodriguez, St. Bernard Parish president. I
have Mayor Randy Roach of Lake Charles in Southwest Louisiana.
Jefferson Council president John Young. Craig Taffaro, who is a
councilman in St. Bernard. And Roland Dartez, who is director
of the Police Jury Association.
These are the people who are in the trenches today, helping
us to rebuild Louisiana and working through recovery.
[Applause.]
Governor Blanco. Senators, most of you on this Committee
toured, and certainly, Senator Collins and Senator Lieberman,
we appreciate the fact that you toured our devastated areas. I
believe you definitely understand the gravity of what has
happened.
We appreciate your call for additional Federal funding, and
it has to be sustained. Help us as we ask the rest of Congress
to understand. One way you can do that is by urging your
colleagues to visit our State, please.
In a hurricane region, we learn from every storm. Our
evacuation for Hurricane Ivan that did not hit our State
resembled Houston's gridlock during Hurricane Rita. So, at that
point in time, I revised our plan. The phased evacuation used
during Katrina used contraflow, using both sides of the
interstate for outbound traffic.
We efficiently moved 1.3 million people to safety within 36
hours. In other words, we evacuated a population comparable to
the entire State of Alaska or the entire State of Delaware or
Hawaii, Rhode Island, or even Maine. In spite of successfully
evacuating over 92 percent of the population, it is tragically
clear that too many were left behind.
Some people played hurricane roulette, remaining by choice,
and had to be rescued. Others simply could not leave. We did
the best we could under the circumstances, but we have to do
better. We must do more to make sure that local governments
succeed. When they succeed, we all succeed.
Hurricane season begins again on June 1, and we are
enacting lessons we learned. Here are some of the steps we are
taking.
We are rethinking our evacuation plans to account for the
new reality of weakened levees and of people now living in
trailers. We are requiring additional oversight of evacuation
plans for nursing homes and hospitals. We are revamping primary
and secondary emergency support functions under the State
emergency operations plan. We are streamlining credentialing
for out-of-state first responders, and the list goes on.
We saw in Katrina what the Nation learned with the collapse
of the communications systems after September 11. If you can't
communicate, you can't coordinate. In Louisiana, we are working
to acquire mobile command units and develop a state-wide
interoperable solution that incorporates the entire emergency
community. I ask Congress to design uniform interoperable
standards with dedicated funding.
Please reform the Stafford Act to account for catastrophic
events and to allow the flexibility to adopt common-sense cost-
saving measures that meet our needs. For example, the Stafford
Act forces FEMA to purchase costly temporary housing when the
wiser investment just might be in some permanent housing.
It is not uncommon to hear about evacuation planning, but
it is unusual to hear about the inability to repopulate an area
after an evacuation. This is the dilemma we currently face. For
our people to return home, we must guarantee their security,
their housing, their jobs, access to health care, a restored
infrastructure, and improved schools. We are rebuilding an
entire urban center from scratch.
Today, I ask Washington to focus on security and housing.
Our people deserve a stronger levee system, coupled with a
long-term plan for hurricane protection and coastal
restoration. Louisiana could finance its own long-term solution
if Congress would simply give us what we believe is our fair
share of oil and gas revenues from the outer continental shelf.
We would not be here today if the levees had not failed.
People could have walked or driven home from the Superdome if
the levees had not failed. Our people entrusted their lives and
properties to levees designed more than 40 years ago. It was
like we expected a worn-out 1965 Chevy to pass 2006 safety and
inspection standards. It is long past time to upgrade.
We must replace false security with reliable 21st Century
hurricane protection systems based on the most innovative,
scientific, and technological advances. In the last special
session of the legislature, I pushed creation of the Coastal
Protection and Restoration Authority. The CPRA is charged with
overseeing levee boards statewide and developing a master plan
for coastal and flood protection.
Next week, I am convening the legislature one more time to
consolidate levee boards, to reorganize New Orleans government
in order to eliminate waste and duplication, and to elevate the
director of the Office of Emergency Preparedness to directly
report to the Governor in order to improve internal
communications.
These new actions are only the latest in a series of tough
post-hurricane reforms that Louisiana has enacted to help
rebuild ourselves stronger and better than before. For the
first time ever, our State has adopted a state-wide building
code to better protect against future storms. Our new reality
forced my decision to cut $650 million from our budget. We had
a $1 billion shortfall.
We are cracking down on corruption and have adopted new
standards of accountability, mandating full disclosure of
disaster-related contracts by public officials and/or their
relatives.
In order for our people to return home, we must address at
the root many of the inequities that dominated New Orleans and
the surrounding communities. Parents need to know that we are
committed to building a brighter future for their children.
This is why the State is taking over failing New Orleans
schools and insisting on standards of excellence. We will
preserve our unique culture, while building an improved future
for all our citizens.
Our people need housing. I want to thank you for the
housing relief Congress so graciously sent us through the
Community Development Block Grants. But I must tell you that
this funding will only take us to the first junction along a
road of urgent needs. Louisiana suffered more than 70 percent
of the housing loss from Katrina and Rita. Fifty-four percent
of the housing funding does not come close to an equitable
solution.
We do have a plan, a plan that will help homeowners whose
homes were destroyed help clear their mortgages without losing
their pre-storm equity through the Baker bill. Congressman
Richard Baker is proposing a bill that would complete our
package and make it work for Louisiana citizens.
Last week, however, the White House attempted to kill this
bill. Our delegation is urging Congress to consider our
proposal favorably.
An investment in the Gulf Coast region is a wise investment
in the economy and the economic security of our country. Our
port system is one of the Nation's largest epicenters of trade
and commerce. We produce 25 percent of the domestic oil needs
that drive our economy and are so important to the move toward
energy independence. Our cultural contributions are studied and
celebrated the world over.
Congress has been generous, but we have a long road ahead
of us. We are insisting on accountability and adopting bold
reforms at the State level that I hope will echo through the
halls of Congress. We are writing the book on lessons learned
from this catastrophe.
Please, be our lasting partner. That is what we need from
you. Stand by us as we rebuild. Our people, hard-working and
patriotic American citizens, deserve no less. Thank you.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Governor Barbour, the Committee has heard repeatedly from
officials at all levels of government that Mississippi's
biggest problem immediately following Katrina was a severe
shortage of commodities like food, water, and ice.
In fact, your director of the emergency management agency
has estimated that during the first 9 days after Katrina hit,
FEMA delivered only 10 to 15 percent of the food, water, and
ice that was requested by your State. And that point was
actually echoed by FEMA's own representative in Mississippi,
who has since retired.
I want to ask you what you believe was the major cause of
that shortfall in commodities. I understand that whole systems
were down and communications were bad. But did it reflect, in
your judgment, fundamental failures in FEMA's logistics?
Governor Barbour. I don't think you can come to any other
conclusion. It is correct, I know at least through the first
week, that we were getting about 10 to 15 percent of what we
were supposed to have received.
As I said earlier, we just took matters into our own hands.
We scrambled and started making things work. And the other
Federal agencies, I have to say, really helped us.
On the fuel side, the Coast Guard gave us 2 days worth of
fuel when we were about to run out. And then before that was
all consumed, U.S. DOT came in and provided fuel for us for
several weeks. All of our emergency operations, including
generators at hospitals and at public jails, not just motor
fuel for our police cars.
But that is what we had to do because FEMA couldn't provide
it. Ultimately, the U.S. military provided us 1.5 million MREs
that I remember them flying in, in C-17s if I remember right,
there at Gulfport/Biloxi and started unloading tens of
thousands of cases of MREs.
Again, I don't know whether to attribute that to FEMA being
agile or the military just filling in for them. But for us, it
was a godsend.
But this is the nature of the beast. And that is why when
you ask ``what is the role of the governor,'' somebody has got
to be in charge. And there can't be but one person in charge,
and the Federal Government can't be in charge in Mississippi.
And they never were.
And you mentioned Bill Carwile, who was the Federal
coordinating officer. One of the good things about the unified
command structure was he knew he reported to me because it is
like it says in the Good Book, ``Man can't serve two masters.''
And he and they tried hard, but their logistical system
just couldn't provide it. So we made other arrangements in
various and different ways, and this wasn't the only thing
where we had to make other arrangements. And sometimes it was a
Federal agency that came in to help us fill the gap. Sometimes
it was the private sector. Sometimes people just figured out
how to make do.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Governor Blanco, during the 15 hearings that we have held,
we have heard a lot of very troubling testimony. And during
this past week, in particular, we have heard testimony that is
very troubling to me and that seems to contradict the statement
that you made this morning in which you said ``we did the best
we could.''
And I want to give you an example of that. Your Secretary
of Transportation, Secretary Bradberry, has conceded to the
Committee in his testimony that his department did absolutely
nothing prior to Katrina to meet its emergency support
obligation to plan for the transportation needs of those
hurricane victims who could not evacuate themselves, the so-
called special needs populations, nursing home residents, those
who may have medical needs but are at home.
His exact words I want to read to you. ``We have done
nothing to fulfill this responsibility.'' How can you say this
morning that ``we did the best we could'' when one of your
cabinet members has testified that he did absolutely nothing to
plan for the transportation needs of the most vulnerable people
in your State?
Governor Blanco. Senator Collins, I have a very honest
cabinet secretary who explained to you, I believe, that plan
was in transition. We certainly agree with you that the
Department of Transportation should have planned for the
evacuation of the most needy citizens. Let me say that will
never happen again. We all have learned powerful lessons.
But in the pre-evacuation stages, the parish presidents
here would tell you that the first-line responsibility lies at
the local level. They know what is going on. And as we walk
through the process of evacuation, they express their needs up
the chain. Just as we do with the Federal Government, they do
at the local level.
The nursing homes, in particular, all had evacuation plans
that they were expected to follow. And if they didn't follow
them, they were expected to ask for assistance, first, from
their local governments and then to the State. And then if,
indeed, that could not be handled, we would handle it just like
we did in Hurricane Rita. We actually had military assets at
our disposal for Hurricane Rita, and we pre-evacuated the
nursing homes and the hospitals.
This is a very delicate population, and it has to be
handled carefully because, as all medical personnel will tell
you, an evacuation under the best circumstances can cause a
delicate population to cause us to lose lives in the evacuation
process. We even, with having the most assets at our disposal,
when we did Hurricane Rita, because everybody was in Louisiana
at that time, we even found glitches in the system then.
My own Lieutenant Governor, Mitch Landrieu, was paying a
last-minute coordinating call to the Lake Charles area just
before the hurricane struck and ended up staying overnight with
them in order to expedite the evacuation. Some of the military
assets and the FEMA assets were being redirected to Houston,
when they had been ordered by our DOD commander, General
Honore, to come to Lake Charles.
So even under the best of circumstances, a lot of things
get confused. We have learned, though, a lot of lessons, and we
are demanding that the nursing homes submit their plans to the
State for very close scrutiny and review, and we will make sure
that they all get evacuated.
Chairman Collins. Well, let us talk about the nursing
homes. You made the point that lives could be lost during the
evacuation process. And I certainly agree with you that it is
difficult, and it requires planning to move frail patients. But
in this case, what happened is the majority of nursing homes
did not evacuate, and people died because of it.
You talked about that the nursing homes have an obligation
to come up with their own plans, and that is certainly true.
But certainly, when pleas for help were coming in to your
emergency operations center, they should have been responded
to.
The most troubling testimony that we have received in this
past week was from Joseph Donchess, who is the executive
director of the Louisiana Nursing Home Association. He
testified that although he is a named participant to sit at the
EOC in Baton Rouge and was there throughout Hurricane Katrina,
that when he communicated, passed on the messages from nursing
homes pleading for buses to help evacuate them, pleading for
fuel to keep their generators going, he was told, in effect,
that because he represented a private organization that he
could not order or send out missions for help.
As a result, the evacuation of nursing homes was much
delayed. He told us of a specific case where the delay
contributed to the deaths of six patients.
Were you aware that requests were coming in from nursing
homes--I know you were present at the EOC--and that they were
not being given priority, as Mr. Donchess has testified?
Governor Blanco. I know that Mr. Donchess was extremely
agitated in the aftermath of the hurricane when I saw him and
spoke to him in the EOC. At that point in time, evacuations
were far more difficult, and nursing homes and hospitals were
competing for the limited amount of assets available to us.
I would not characterize it, as he has, that nursing homes
did not have a priority. Indeed, there were tremendous cries
for help from many sectors--hospitals that needed evacuation,
nursing homes needed evacuation. I cannot say that it was a
pretty sight.
But I will tell you, Senator, you are absolutely right in
your concerns, and we will do a better job coordinating. I
would like to point something out, though. It does take some
time to evacuate this delicate population. And on the day, on
the Friday before the storm, if every State that was threatened
by this hurricane began evacuations on the Friday before the
storm, Florida's nursing homes and hospitals would have all
been evacuated in the panhandle.
Alabama's coastal nursing homes and hospitals would have
all been evacuated. Mississippi's would have all been
evacuated, and Louisiana's. And that means they would have all
moved north, perhaps into other States, into other facilities,
or into the northerly reaches of our respective States. This
would call for an enormous amount of equipment to accomplish
this.
Chairman Collins. I have just got to say that I can
certainly understand his being extremely agitated if he is
getting reports in that the most vulnerable elderly, ill,
infirm patients in nursing homes are dying and can't get
evacuated. I would be agitated, too, if I was getting those
reports.
Governor Blanco. We also have investigations going on, and
arrests have been made. There is a personal responsibility from
the owners of nursing homes.
And I do want to correct the record. I don't think that
anyone stopped to ask about public or private facilities.
Indeed, we had privately owned hospitals that were evacuated by
whatever assets we could command. I would take issue with that
particular characterization because, in the end, we evacuated
60,000 people. We had limited assets with unlimited needs.
Remember that we are going to do this better the next time,
and I think Mr. Donchess is very willing to work with us now to
make sure that each nursing home follows its evacuation plan
early and properly as well.
Chairman Collins. Senator Lieberman.
Senator Lieberman. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Governor Blanco, I want to go back to Secretary Bradberry
for a moment because I had two reactions to his testimony
yesterday.
The first was to be quite impressed and appreciative of the
work that he did on behalf of your administration with people
from New Orleans city government in the mass evacuation, which
was really quite remarkable and obviously is a major reason,
perhaps the most significant reason, why more people were not
killed by Katrina, in addition to the heroic efforts by a lot
of search and rescue people.
And that is the people who pretty much could get out on
their own. But to facilitate that was a very important and
impressive exercise in governmental partnerships.
But on this question of the responsibility that his
department was given under the State emergency response plan, I
must say that his answer that it was transitional didn't fly
with me. And just to briefly say that, as I understood it, the
State, under your leadership, did something very responsive and
constructive, which was that you--and maybe in response to the
Hurricane Pam exercise--also created a new State response plan
in some sense mirrored after the Federal response plan.
In that regard, you gave the State Transportation
Department the specific responsibility to get ready for
transportation facilities for those who could not get out on
their own prior to a natural disaster.
And what was really stunning to me, first, in the reading
of the staff interview with Secretary Bradberry was that he
essentially said he didn't think that was an appropriate--I am
paraphrasing, but I think I am catching the essence of it. He
didn't think that was an appropriate responsibility for the
State Department of Transportation. So he just plain didn't do
it. And the consequences of that were terrible.
Incidentally, we had the man from the Federal Department of
Transportation here yesterday, and they didn't get going until
after the storm either in terms of the enormous transportation
assets they could have brought.
But I want to ask you, were you aware that Secretary
Bradberry had made this personal judgment that he essentially
was not going to carry forward his responsibility for pre-storm
evacuation transportation?
Governor Blanco. I was not aware. But then, again, let me
say that we didn't have any specific requests in the pre-storm
exercise. We had much need after the storm.
Senator Lieberman. I am sorry, and excuse me. Do you mean
that the city did not make a request for pre-storm
transportation for evacuation?
Governor Blanco. That is correct. The city did not.
Senator Lieberman. Even though, am I right, the State
Department of Transportation was given that responsibility
under the State response plan?
Governor Blanco. That is correct.
Senator Lieberman. But for some reason, the city did not
ask, and the State did not, on its own, initiate any action to
do that.
I want to go back. So I don't want to dwell too long on
this. But you did not know that Secretary Bradberry had decided
not to carry out that part of his responsibility?
Governor Blanco. No, sir.
Senator Lieberman. Just for future reference, was there
anybody in your administration who had responsibility for
essentially making sure that the various State officials who
had been given individual responsibility were carrying it out
in preparation for a disaster?
Governor Blanco. Yes. The officer in charge of the
Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and Emergency----
Senator Lieberman. OK. And hopefully, going forward, that
person under your direction will make sure that everybody in
the State government is doing what they are supposed to be
doing to get ready for a disaster.
Governor, yesterday, the Comptroller General, David Walker,
issued a preliminary report on the conduct of the Department of
Homeland Security and FEMA in regard to Katrina, and it was
quite critical. The press secretary at the Department of
Homeland Security put out a statement in response, which was
quite critical of the comptroller general's report.
In it, there is this sentence, and we will want to ask
Secretary Chertoff and Mr. Brown about this. But since you are
here today, I want to ask you about it. This is, again, the
response of DHS to the criticism yesterday.
``The preliminary report falsely implies inaction by DHS
and FEMA before landfall. In fact, the clear record shows that
State officials expressed satisfaction with the Federal
Government's asset pre-positioning and other pre-hurricane
assistance during a video conference the Sunday prior to
landfall.''
There is a transcript of that conference that we have
pulled up, which is Exhibit 3 in the exhibit book.\1\ But I am
going to quote from it. If you want to look at it later, you
can. President Bush was on that video call on Sunday, August
28. Other officials from around the country.
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\1\ Committee Exhibit 3 appears in the Appendix on page 93.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The record shows that during the call, Colonel Jeff Smith,
Deputy Director of Louisiana Office of Homeland Security and
Emergency Preparedness, provides a briefing for all on the
call. And at the end, Mike Brown, Director of FEMA, says,
``Colonel''--and I presume this is the basis for the DHS
response--``Colonel, do you have any unmet needs, anything that
we are not getting that you need?''
And Colonel Smith says, ``Mike, no.'' Then there is a word
that is inaudible to the transcriber--``resources that are en
route, and it looks like these resources that are en route are
going to be a good first shot.''
``Naturally, once we get into this thing, neck deep here,
unfortunately, or deeper, I am sure that things are going to
come up that maybe some of even our best planners hadn't even
thought about. So I think flexibility is going to be the key
and just as quickly as we can cut through any potential red
tape when these things do arise.''
I want to ask you what your understanding of what Colonel
Smith was saying there. Because, obviously, the DHS is saying
and going to say that they have got the word that they felt
that everything was fine as far as the Federal pre-positioning
for the hurricane coming on.
Governor Blanco. Senator Lieberman----
Senator Lieberman. Excuse me a second. Am I right that you
were not on the call?
Governor Blanco. That is correct.
Senator Lieberman. So what I am asking you to do is to
really try to, as a chief executive, help us interpret what
Colonel Smith was saying.
Governor Blanco. I think what Colonel Smith would be
referring to, and I was not on the call, was the fact that for
what we might call a ``normal hurricane,'' and if the levees
had not failed, we would have had what we call a ``normal
hurricane.'' And that would have been a lot of wind damage, a
lot of rain damage.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. I think that what FEMA seemed to be lining
up and what they were lining up would have been considered
adequate, and it would probably have worked fairly well for us.
Senator Lieberman. Had there not been flooding?
Governor Blanco. Had there not been the awesome flooding
that we had to deal with.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. And so, I am sure that in the early
stages, the best you can do is know what is being lined up and
know that you can count on that coming in. As it turned out,
the level of preparation at the Federal level was inadequate.
The State was overwhelmed. The Federal resources were
overwhelmed. The local resources were overwhelmed. We were all
overwhelmed by the magnitude of the fury of the storm, which
then destroyed the Federal levees and then inundated our entire
region with waters that were very destructive. And in that
case, it became inadequate.
Senator Lieberman. So do you think there is basis for what
I take it to be the DHS statement that Colonel Smith's words
led them to believe that at that point, on Sunday afternoon,
the State was satisfied with what FEMA had done?
Governor Blanco. Well, I think if they tell you that they
have got a multitude of resources lined up, I can tell you, not
being on that conference, that was the way I felt from the
personal interactions that I had with Mike Brown and other FEMA
representatives.
They were working hard, we thought, to pre-position a lot
of various assets, and indeed, they did that. And in the end,
it simply was not enough.
Senator Lieberman. Even though, by testimony we have heard
and the extraordinary narrative that you provided the
Committee, that Dr. Mayfield of the National Hurricane Service
spoke to you on Saturday night, apparently got so anxious about
what his scientific ability told him was coming that he was
calling anybody he could call.
Did he call you, Governor Barbour?
Governor Barbour. Yes, sir.
Senator Lieberman. Right. To say, ``This is the big one.
This is going to probably cause enormous flooding.''
So, on Sunday, wasn't the State on notice--and the Federal
Government, I gather--from Dr. Mayfield's warnings, on notice
that flooding was probably going to occur?
Governor Blanco. We expected flooding. We get flooding
after every hurricane. It is the amount of flooding that became
untenable. There are certain low-lying regions that flood every
time. And that is why we had wildlife and fisheries boats pre-
positioned, some 400.
But I do want to say that we had first responders from all
over Louisiana rushing in to the scene immediately following,
as soon as it became evident of the level of devastation. We
had volunteers who drove in with their boats and began rescue
missions late Monday afternoon.
Rescues, when life is in danger, a rescue situation is
never really pretty. It is filled with tension and danger.
Senator Lieberman. My time is up. Thank you.
Chairman Collins. Senator Akaka.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AKAKA
Senator Akaka. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman.
I am sorry I was detained and missed all of your testimony.
Just to let you know, I was at the National Prayer Breakfast
this morning and also had a hearing as ranking member on the
Veterans Committee. So I thank you so much. But I have got to
tell you the timing has been perfect.
Thank you, Madam Chairman, Governor Blanco, and Governor
Barbour. I would like to add my welcome to you, too.
In October, I toured parts of the Gulf Coast with my
colleagues on the Energy Committee, and I was deeply moved by
the heroic and humanitarian actions taken by the people of the
Gulf region. It was great to hear and see them.
Throughout our investigation, I keep thinking about those
Gulf Coast residents who couldn't take care of themselves,
especially the sick and the elderly. Like most Americans, I was
stunned by the news footage of those left behind in nursing
homes and hospitals. We saw firsthand nurses and doctors moving
stranded patients to higher ground and higher floors as the
hospital flooded, knowing that their own families needed help,
too.
I know Senator Collins has questioned you extensively on
this subject, but I would like to follow up with a few
additional questions.
I would like to follow up with you on an issue I raised
earlier this week with Dr. Guidry, the medical director of the
Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals. As you know,
Emergency Support Function, ESF-8, of the Louisiana emergency
operations plan gives the Louisiana State University Health
Sciences Center primary responsibility for providing and
coordinating hospital care and shelter for nursing homes and
home health patients with acute care requirements, as well as
casualties of emergencies and disasters.
However, our Committee interviews have revealed that health
care officials, specifically those in the Department of Health
and at LSU, knew that LSU did not have the capability to
perform this emergency function when the plan was agreed upon.
As Senator Collins mentioned, a representative from the
Louisiana Nursing Home Association testified that LNHA was
barred from submitting requests for assistance for stranded
nursing home residents through the E-Team process at the State
emergency operations center. It looks to me as though there was
no one organization willing and able to take responsibility for
the Louisiana nursing homes during Hurricane Katrina.
My question to you is did you know that the emergency
operations plan contained a health care section that was not
operational when you approved it?
Governor Blanco. Senator Akaka, there are many parts of the
early emergency plans that are very difficult to achieve, and
we understand that. I do want to--for your own information
because I have responded to Senator Collins' inquiry, the
nursing home question, I believe, came into play in the
aftermath of the storm, when we had unlimited needs, but
limited resources.
The nursing homes were competing with the hospitals at that
point in time for removal of the neediest patients, fragile
patients. We understand that we need to pre-evacuate nursing
homes and have the nursing home owners follow the plans that
they submit to the local governments. And the State has already
put processes in place now to assure ourselves that every
nursing home owner is following a prescribed plan and is safely
evacuating their nursing home patients before an event occurs
and not to be found in these difficult situations when
everybody is crying and clamoring for resources.
And I respectfully disagree with Mr. Donchess's assertion
that because it was private sector they didn't have standing.
We were evacuating private sector hospitals at the same time
that we were evacuating public hospitals. In fact, some of the
private hospitals got pre-evacuated, got evacuated before the
public hospital.
Senator Akaka. What person or agency do you hold
accountable for responding to nursing home needs in the event
of a disaster?
Governor Blanco. We will now have the Department of Health
and Hospitals responsible for that, and that will be Secretary
Fred Cerise.
Senator Akaka. Thank you.
Governor Barbour, your testimony raises concerns over the
labor shortage in Mississippi that is hindering your State's
reconstruction. I share your concern over labor issues.
However, in order to attract workers, their rights must be
protected.
I understand that Latino and immigrant workers are playing
a critical role in rebuilding Mississippi communities. Yet
numerous reports indicate that they are being exploited by
contractors. The Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, one of
the key organizations assisting foreign workers on the ground,
has filed approximately 200 complaints of nonpayment with the
U.S. Department of Labor. Complaints have also included
injuries resulting from unsafe working conditions.
What is being done to enhance enforcement of State labor
laws and to penalize unscrupulous contractors who refuse to pay
or refuse to protect their workers?
Governor Barbour. Senator, as you noted, those complaints
were filed with the U.S. Department of Labor. They haven't been
filed with the State, to my knowledge.
Now the attorney general is not my appointee. He is an
independently elected government official like I am, and
perhaps his office has received those complaints. He is the
person who would receive complaints about consumer fraud or
business practices, that sort of stuff. But perhaps this
organization has chosen to file those exclusively with the U.S.
Department of Labor, which would be, of course, up to them, not
up to me.
We have, as I noted in my testimony, a lot of nonlocal
people who are there working. Some of them are Latinos,
Hispanics. Others are from other parts of the United States. We
have got plenty of work for them.
They need to be treated just like anybody else, and that is
the policy of our State. I think if the attorney general were
here, he would tell you that is the policy of his office. And
if those complaints were made to him, I am sure he would act on
them.
Senator Akaka. Governor Blanco, would you respond to that
also?
Governor Blanco. I am not aware of anything, any complaints
filed, not to say that couldn't be going on in Louisiana as
well, sir. Thank you.
Senator Akaka. Thank you.
Governor Barbour, for those of your residents who were
self-employed before the hurricane and who have been unable to
find work since then, the Federal Government now provides
financial assistance to meet their needs through the disaster
unemployment assistance.
That program now provides about $90 a week in benefits. Do
you think it is realistic to expect these displaced and
unemployed residents of your State to support themselves and
rebuild their lives on $90 a week?
Governor Barbour. Senator, as you noted earlier, we have a
labor shortage on the coast. Anybody who is earning $90 a week
through disaster unemployment or any other kind of
unemployment, it is because they choose to. Because there is
plenty of work, and there are jobs that are going a'begging in
my State, good-paying jobs. In fact, we see today restaurants
that can't open their normal hours because they can't get
enough labor.
So anybody that is getting $90 a week of disaster
unemployment assistance in Mississippi is doing it by choice.
Senator Akaka. Thank you.
According to the diary you submitted to the Committee,
Governor Blanco, Exhibit 29,\1\ on Saturday evening, Mayor
Nagin informed you over the phone that he intended to order a
mandatory evacuation of New Orleans on Sunday morning. Given
the fact that you knew it was important for as many people as
possible to evacuate, did you encourage Mayor Nagin to issue
the mandatory evacuation order that night in order to give the
people of New Orleans extra time to evacuate?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Committee Exhibit 29 appears in the Appendix on page 136.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Governor Blanco. Senator, the mayor and the parish
presidents, many of whom are present with us today, all worked
with us, and all of us were asking our people to evacuate
beginning Friday morning. We learned late Friday night that
Louisiana would be affected by the storm.
So first thing Saturday morning, we had a 7:30 a.m.
conference on Saturday morning. We also had one at 5 p.m. on
Friday night, the night before, but Louisiana was not
definitively a target at that point in time. We had just moved
into the cone of influence. But by Friday night, we knew the
hurricane was coming.
So we began immediately early Saturday morning, all of us,
urging evacuation, getting people to not panic, but to plan
their exit. We evacuated an urban center of 1.4 million people.
Now that is bigger than many States that are present and
represented on this panel. It had to be staged in order to work
properly. The low-lying areas had the mandatory orders out on
Saturday.
In Hurricane Ivan, those low-lying areas have one road down
and the same road out. They are peninsula-like regions. And
people from the low-lying areas actually got trapped and could
not get out because the urban center had clogged the arterials.
We have very limited access. I-10 is the main arterial that
goes from California to Florida. And I-10 east and west is
basically the main highway that people would mostly take.
So when that happened, we all got together and worked very
closely, and all signed agreements on how to stage an
evacuation plan. It went extremely well. As the lower lying
areas ordered their mandatory evacuations first, we were also
urging all people to evacuate.
We weren't saying, ``Stop, New Orleans people, do not
evacuate.'' We were saying, ``Get your evacuation plans going.
Pack up. Prepare to be on your own for 3 days. Bring food.
Bring chairs. Bring cots if you have it. Bring your pillows,
your blankets. Bring toys for the kids. Pack like you are going
on a camping trip.'' Those were the things that I said to the
people on the media.
But we began that process on Saturday morning and urged
evacuation all through the day Saturday. These parish
presidents were urging mandatory evacuation so that their
people would not get trapped.
On Saturday night, Max Mayfield called me. Now we had been
in our evacuation process. We had called for contraflow at 4
p.m. in the afternoon. I had called Governor Barbour on Friday
night, per our plan, our coordinated plan, and asked him if he
would also order contraflow in his State so that some of our
people could exit from the east and go north. And he did.
I let him know on Friday night that was our plan, and again
on Saturday morning, I confirmed it with him. We had a terrific
partnership. We are going to do the same thing with Texas. In
Rita, Texans came into Southwest Louisiana, the very place that
we needed to evacuate ourselves. And our highways, our
interstate was totally gridlocked for many miles.
So Governor Perry and I have conferred, and our people are
now working on a sensible exit plan to respond to these huge
numbers of people who live in Texas that may need to use
Louisiana highways. We think it is appropriate. We just need it
to be coordinated, and we could establish contraflow if we pre-
plan that.
See, I had to tell the Louisiana people in Southwest to use
the back roads as much as they could to be able to get through
the gridlock on the interstate. But we got everybody out safely
for Rita.
We did many things similarly in Katrina. Our contraflow
plan worked magnificently. I was up in the air checking it. I
watched it at major intersections, when you are blocking
traffic from entering the city, when you have all of your lanes
going outbound, and that is basically what we were attempting,
what we actually did.
So the evacuation process was complex. In fact, Secretary
Bradberry of the Department of Transportation was the person
who masterminded this, along with Colonel Whitehorn of the
Louisiana State Police. And as I said, this was a very
deliberate and well-planned and agreed-upon effort. All of the
parish leaders had to sign on and agree to have the courage to
stay with their plan.
Now when Max Mayfield called on Saturday night, I will tell
you that the mayor was probably going to call mandatory
evacuation on Sunday for New Orleans because that was in the
plan. But Mayfield actually enhanced his sense of urgency.
Mayfield called me first, and I said, ``Sir, there is a
mayor you must speak to tonight.'' He said, ``I have been
trying to reach him.'' I said, ``I have his number. Give me
yours. I will find the mayor and connect you two.''
So when the mayor got that information Saturday night, he
immediately went to his television stations and urged the
people even more. Now do you know that all through the night
Saturday night, our interstates were flowing outbound, and we
still had contraflow in place all through Saturday night until
we were supposed to close it down on Sunday at 4 a.m.
Now you can't keep these things up. You have cones in the
highway. You have barricades that prevent incoming traffic. You
have got to remove all of that before a hurricane because the
wind will then take those, and those will be flying missiles,
and that can be very dangerous.
So Governor Barbour's people had to do the same thing in
Mississippi for us all to be able to make this thing work. His
people were also using that contraflow part of the interstate
that our people were using, and I had to urge patience because
people, in tense situations, they might drive recklessly. They
might get injured.
An automobile accident, I told them explicitly. ``Drive
carefully. We don't want you to get killed in an automobile
accident. The idea is to get you to safety.'' And that was
essentially what went on.
When the mayor did call for mandatory evacuation on Sunday,
I had traveled into New Orleans and had two press conferences
on Saturday, but I went back on Sunday morning for the 9
o'clock announcement to back him up, to make sure that the
citizens understood the seriousness and the severity of what we
were dealing with.
And Senator, there were news reports at that time saying
that no governor had ever gone into the city during the course
of a hurricane. And so, they understood the seriousness of it,
and the media was urging their citizens as well to get out.
They were supplementing our messages, and they were saying
Governor Blanco is here 2 days in a row. We know this is a
serious hurricane. We are urging all of you to get out. No
governor has ever done that before.
So our evacuation efforts were comprehensive. There are
always people, though, who want to play hurricane roulette. It
is nearly impossible to get 100 percent of the people out. Our
people are jaded, to some extent, or feel very brave at other
times. We had evacuated for Hurricane Ivan. It didn't come to
Louisiana.
We had a bluebird day, and everybody was frustrated up on
the highways. The kids are screaming, and you just want to get
home, and they had to turn around and come back. And they said,
``We did that for nothing.'' And I was so worried that this
time, they would take that same attitude because Huricane Ivan
was just the year before.
But, fortunately, most people did not. But some people
believe that they can tough out a hurricane. We have got some
pretty rough, tough citizens who feel like they can be
challenged by anything, and they choose to stay.
And indeed, they would have been right, but for the
flooding. They could have toughed out the storm, the winds and
the rain of the storm. They would have made it.
Chairman Collins. The Senator's time has long expired.
Governor Blanco. I apologize. I am sorry.
Senator Akaka. I thank you very much, Governors, for your
responses, and I thank you for the time, Madam Chairman.
Chairman Collins. You are welcome, and we will do another
round. So you will certainly get more opportunity.
Governor Blanco, before we go on, I do want to clarify an
issue involving Mr. Donchess's testimony because I think you
are under a misimpression. He did not say that the issue was
whether the nursing home or hospital was privately or publicly
owned, as you have asserted twice this morning.
Governor Blanco. Well, that was my understanding. I am
sorry.
Chairman Collins. Right. And that is why I want to correct
it for the record and just for your personal information.
His point is that although he was a designated participant
at the EOC, because he was representing a private organization,
not a governmental agency, his requests were not handled in the
same way that they would have been if they had come from a
governmental entity, despite the role that specified for his
organization in the plan.
So it had nothing at all to do with the ownership of
nursing homes and hospitals, and I just wanted to clarify that.
Governor Blanco. We will fully investigate that, Senator
Collins. There is no excuse for that. I appreciate the
clarification.
Chairman Collins. Governor Barbour, obviously, the
evacuation of nursing homes and hospitals and others with
medical needs presents some real challenges. Can you tell us
what the experience was in Mississippi? How did you go about
dealing with your nursing homes and other vulnerable
populations?
Governor Barbour. Well, first of all, the health
department, the Division of Medicaid, the Department of Mental
Health all have a piece of the action here. When Hurricane Ivan
came, Governor Blanco mentioned Ivan, and I identify with her
talk about hurricane fatigue. With Ivan, everybody boarded up,
evacuated, nothing happened. Then for us, Hurricane Dennis,
everybody boarded up, evacuated, and nothing happened.
And candidly, Friday and Saturday, we were very worried
about people evacuating. Even though a mandatory evacuation had
been called for in the flood zones on the coast, there was just
a lot of hurricane fatigue.
But we have a situation where we have got a couple of
nursing homes that are very vulnerable, and we just make them
evacuate. And candidly, that is risky. As Governor Blanco said,
some of those frail elderly, moving them is physically
dangerous for them. It is emotionally dangerous for them. But
Miramar, which is one of those nursing homes, is a slab today.
So it was obviously the right risk to take in the case of
Katrina.
Same thing with the hospitals. The health department works
with the hospitals, and we see what the danger looks like. And
we evacuate anybody that can be taken. We had a number of
hospitals that were knocked out, flooded. Hancock County,
particularly. But most of the damage was down low. As you know,
they are pretty well built, but we got a 38-foot storm surge in
Hancock County, and that flooded them out.
But I remember, not this hurricane because it was so
obviously going to be bad, but for Ivan, we had to make one of
the nursing homes evacuate. And that is where Medicaid comes in
because that is who pays them. And if they get sort of
uncertain of whether they need to evacuate, I get the director
of Medicaid to call them, and they get a better attitude.
But I sympathize. This is a dangerous thing, and we only do
it when we know or we just think there is a really big risk.
And that is really all I can tell you about it.
Chairman Collins. I have noticed that the Mississippi
Emergency Management Agency recently hired a logistics expert.
Does that reflect your assessment that you can't rely on FEMA
to be there for logistics? Or does it indicate that you found a
gap in your own preparedness, or is it both?
Governor Barbour. Madam Chairman, I don't try to micro
manage FEMA--MEMA. Sorry. Either one of them, for that matter.
But I don't try to micro manage MEMA. We are staffing up a
little bit there. We have a tremendous amount of paperwork now
that is involved with getting the reimbursements and getting
all of that done, seeing how much the State's share is.
The other thing is we are preparing for the next hurricane
season. We have 34,000 travel trailers sitting on the Gulf
Coast.
Chairman Collins. Very vulnerable.
Governor Barbour. Yes, ma'am. And they are vulnerable in
several ways. They are not only vulnerable, if houses were
blown away for 10 blocks deep, as you have seen, think of what
it will do to these travel trailers.
The other way they are vulnerable is the fear that some
people will put a trailer hitch on the back of the pickup truck
and drive off with the travel trailer, which is now hooked up
to sewer. Most of them are hooked up to electricity. A handful
still are running gas and that sort of stuff. So that is
dangerous.
But part of his logistical issue that the head of MEMA
faces now is how are we going to deal with the people on the
coast who are in temporary housing, very vulnerable temporary
housing? And that may be why, but I don't know his specific
thinking.
And as I say, I think of my job, I don't try to micro
manage all the State departments and agencies. If they think
they know what to do, I tell them to do it. If they don't, I
tell them, well, come on, let us sit down and talk about it,
and we will figure it out.
But both of those two situations may figure into that.
Preparing for the future and also making sure we are getting
all our Federal reimbursement stuff right.
Chairman Collins. Governor Blanco, yesterday Mayor Nagin
expressed his frustration over what he described as ``an
incredible dance between the Federal and State government over
who would be in charge.'' He said that the failure to promptly
resolve that issue impeded the response to Katrina.
And he went on to describe a meeting that he attended with
you and with the President in which the President presented you
with two options. Either the Federal Government could have a
unified command structure over both the active duty and
National Guard troops, thus essentially federalizing the Guard,
or you, as Governor, could retain your authority over the
Guard, and the Federal commanders would simply coordinate their
efforts with you.
The mayor said to us that he pushed very hard. In fact, he
described himself as ``I was a bit pushy. The meeting left me
disappointed. No decisions were made.''
He said he pushed for this fundamental issue to be rapidly
resolved, but he told us that instead of a decision being made
at this critical meeting, where all the participants were, that
you instead asked for 24 hours to make a decision, thus
delaying the resolution of what the mayor identified as a key
impediment.
It seems to me that the options were pretty clear, the two
options. You had the mayor expressing his repeated concern that
the failure to resolve the command structure one way or the
other, and he made very clear that he didn't care which way the
decision was made, was hurting the response efforts. Why didn't
you just make a decision at that point?
Governor Blanco. Senator Collins, the mayor was not in our
meeting that I had with the President, per se. The discussion
had nothing to do with the underlying assumptions that no
decision was made. Indeed, I told the President that the proper
way to do business would be for me, as Governor, to retain
control of the National Guard and for him to simply send troops
in.
I was pushing for Federal DOD troops to come in. At that
point in time, we had very few. We had General Honore, a
magnificent general of the Army, there without a force. And I
was asking for a force to come in. And I was very clear with
the President that I, as Governor, needed to retain control of
the National Guard. There was no question in my mind ever.
The President was asking another question, and I said out
of respect to him that I would give him 24-hour notice. It had
nothing to do with my adamant decision to retain control of the
National Guard.
There is not a governor in this country, four territories,
or the mayor of Washington, DC, who would give up control of
the National Guard. You absolutely have to have the law
enforcement capacity of the Guard in these circumstances.
I have for many years, as a citizen of the State of
Louisiana and as a public official for the various offices that
I have held, worked with and coordinated and observed as a
citizen the National Guard coming in as a support system for
local law enforcement authority. They have the legal right and
the proper training to do that.
Indeed, many of the Guard members who work in security, per
se, are members of the civilian law enforcement effort that
exists in our State and in our Nation. So they know the
protocols, the local protocols. They know how to fold in with
local law enforcement very well.
I will tell you that at that point in time, Mayor Nagin had
not been in good communication with us. You know the
communication system had fallen down. The National Guard on
Friday--this conversation occurred on the Friday after the
storm.
We actually were in the process of evacuating the
Superdome. We had begun that process on Thursday and had also
begun the process of evacuating the Convention Center on
Friday. And I knew from our logistics and because I was deeply
involved in every decision on this triage mission that I
inherited from above that we were nearly completely finished
with the evacuation process.
Now that was the trauma of the week, trying to get assets
to move about 60,000 people, 70,000 people out of the Superdome
and out of the Convention Center. And that was when I was
pleading for additional assets and for additional help from the
Federal Government and waiting, well, gathering our own school
buses up and sending them in, beginning on Tuesday, picking
people up off the highways that were exposed to the elements. I
also knew that we were just very nearly finished with that
evacuation mission.
Now I had asked General Honore to be in charge of the
evacuation when he came in on Wednesday, and he coordinated all
of his activities with me. We were in constant communication.
But General Honore did not have a force to use. So he had to
use the National Guard.
We had to do a very focused, coordinated effort, and the
National Guard actually carried out the vast amount of the
responsibilities. We did ask the small number of DOD forces
there--and really, it was a handful initially and very few
people after that--to do the actual coordination.
Chairman Collins. Governor, I will come back to this issue,
but my time is expired. So I am going to yield to Senator
Lieberman.
Senator Lieberman. Thanks, Madam Chairman. I am actually
going to pick up on that.
Because this is an important question, not just to help us
understand what happened in the case of Katrina, but because
one of the questions we are considering is the role of the
Department of Defense in responding to disasters here at home,
whether they be natural or, God forbid, terrorist.
Incidentally, you provided early in December, both to this
Committee and the House investigating committee, I think it is
a 33-page narrative on what you were involved in, which has
been very helpful to us. And I will refer to this as I go
through my questions.
Let us go to Monday, August 29. Hurricane Katrina hits
landfall. Am I correct at that point or even before, had you
begun making requests--and here I am speaking particularly for
military assistance--from both your own National Guard, other
National Guards under the so-called EMAC program, and the
Federal Government for active Army support?
Just tell us a little bit about who you spoke to after
landfall at each of those levels.
Governor Blanco. Well, before landfall, the Louisiana
National Guard was being activated. We had, out of a force of
about 11,000, approximately 5,000 available to us. The rest of
them were in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. So we immediately activated all 5,000.
Senator Lieberman. I want to make that clear. Your
intention was to activate every available National Guards
person?
Governor Blanco. Every available member of the Guard in
Louisiana.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. General Landreneau, who is the Adjutant
General----
Senator Lieberman. Adjutant General, right.
Governor Blanco [continuing]. Of the Louisiana Guard also
began to make calls to some of our nearby States, and they had
already begun, before landfall, to deploy force in some numbers
into Louisiana.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. In the aftermath of the storm, General
Landreneau and I worked very closely. We were trying to
determine exactly what our needs would be, and he began
immediately to call the adjutant generals of other States, and
governors from many States across the country----
Senator Lieberman. And how did they respond?
Governor Blanco [continuing]. Were calling me and offering
assistance, as well as I was calling others to ask for specific
assistance.
Senator Lieberman. By what time----
Governor Blanco. I got it in every single case.
Senator Lieberman. Good.
Governor Blanco. They responded quickly and with force.
Senator Lieberman. Let me try to focus on that a little
bit. By what point did you have the 5,000 members of the
Louisiana National Guard activated?
Governor Blanco. I think that was probably by Monday----
Senator Lieberman. Later in the day, after landfall, or
during the day?
Governor Blanco. Well, I would have to go back and actually
look at the record. But I know that they were activated before
and converging on the scene. They were stationed away from the
destruction because you don't want too many of them to get
caught.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. Now we had some also in the area. We had
some embedded in the Superdome.
Senator Lieberman. Right. So when did the National Guard
start to arrive from other States?
Governor Blanco. Oh, on Monday, and I think prior to the
storm, probably on Sunday a few. But in large numbers, Tuesday,
Wednesday, and Thursday.
Senator Lieberman. So is it fair to say by----
Governor Blanco. By Thursday, we had a significant number.
Senator Lieberman. Can you take a guess at what it was?
Governor Blanco. I know that we had probably more than
2,000 because part of what I needed right then on Thursday was
this effort to settle the issues of the lack of law enforcement
in the city down.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. The media had certainly amplified the
lawlessness going on.
Senator Lieberman. Hold off on that a minute because I do
want to come back to that. Let me now ask you at what point you
began to specifically request what I would call ``regular
Army'' involvement? I know you have said, correct me if I am
wrong, that General Honore came onto the scene, and you met
with him on Wednesday, I believe you said in your narrative.
Does that sound right?
Governor Blanco. Right.
Senator Lieberman. But at that point, he had few or no
active Army troops?
Governor Blanco. Well, I had requested it when we had begun
talking on Tuesday.
Senator Lieberman. Who did you talk to?
Governor Blanco. I called General Landreneau----
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco [continuing]. And asked him to go through
the channels. I mean, he is military. DOD forces in Iraq and
National Guard work side by side.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. So I asked him to see what he could do to
bulk up and get DOD forces. He called General Honore. Now these
two men have a great deal of respect for each other, and
General Honore is from Louisiana.
Senator Lieberman. I could tell that General Honore was
from Louisiana when I heard him speak, yes. [Laughter.]
Governor Blanco. You could tell. He has a wonderful
Louisiana accent.
Senator Lieberman. He does.
Governor Blanco. Well, his son is in the Louisiana National
Guard as well. So he called General Honore, who promptly showed
up on Wednesday. Now I was under the impression that--also on
Wednesday, I spoke to the President directly.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. And told him, I was trying to explain the
magnitude of our situation. That was very different, as
Governor Barbour has said, from his situation.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. Right.
Governor Blanco. We had water for a month, that we had to
dry the place out. But nonetheless, I was excited when General
Honore actually showed up on Wednesday. I thought we had gotten
the response that I had requested.
Senator Lieberman. Can I go back a ways? Did you ask the
President that was in a phone call on Wednesday?
Governor Blanco. It was in a phone call on Wednesday.
Senator Lieberman. For specific additional regular Army?
Governor Blanco. Military assistance.
Senator Lieberman. Yes, and let me ask you this question.
Were you looking for additional numbers? In other words, you
had a growing number----
Governor Blanco. Yes. Boots on the ground.
Senator Lieberman [continuing]. Of National Guards people,
or was it special capabilities that you thought the regular
Army would have?
Governor Blanco. Well, it was both. We needed troops. We
needed people on the ground.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. There was a huge amount of work to be
done. And indeed, when they did come in, beginning on Saturday,
they worked for weeks. It was hard work, going house to house
and trying to find any people left. But I asked in a phone call
on Wednesday. And then later in the day Wednesday, I thought
that my request had been honored and----
Senator Lieberman. When General Honore showed up----
Governor Blanco. On Wednesday.
Senator Lieberman [continuing]. You assumed that was the
response to your request to the President?
Governor Blanco. I did. And I was very pleased and honored,
and I thought that was pretty rapidly deployed.
Senator Lieberman. Did General Honore then tell you that he
was going to be bringing in regular Army troops?
Governor Blanco. Well, he never actually committed to that
because I think I have to assume that he couldn't make that
call by himself. But he came, as he explained to me, in an
advisory capacity. I then asked him to please take over the
coordination of the evacuation process.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. And we worked very closely together. I
mean, we were in constant communication. But as I said, the
National Guard then had to actually do the evacuation. But they
all worked together. It was very well done.
Senator Lieberman. OK. Let me ask you a question. Now we
are going to Thursday of that week, and I am basing this on
your narrative. It happens to be page 12 of Exhibit 29.\1\ You
met, you tell us, with General Blum, who is the head of the
National Guard for the country, to discuss what was happening.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Committee Exhibit 29 appears in the Appendix on page 136.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
And in that narrative--and you correct me if I am wrong--
you state that General Blum advised you that you, as Governor
of the State, that your National Guard forces should not be
federalized. Is that correct?
Governor Blanco. That is correct.
Senator Lieberman. What were the circumstances under which
that came up? Were you worried that there would be a request to
federalize the forces, or did General Blum initiate----
Governor Blanco. This is what was going on. We understood
the magnitude of our need. So General Landreneau at one point
came to me, and he said, ``Governor,'' he said, ``I have been
calling in to these States, but I need General Steve Blum to
make a national call.'' Because I kept saying, ``How many
troops do we have coming in now?'' And we were just looking at
the whole picture.
And then you must remember this was not just New Orleans.
This was St. Tammany----
Senator Lieberman. Sure. Right.
Governor Blanco [continuing]. Washington Parish, St.
Bernard, Plaquemines. There were many needs. Jefferson is a
huge parish, huge geographic parish. And we needed people
deployed in all of these regions, and a lot of people live in
those areas.
Senator Lieberman. Excuse me for interrupting, just because
the time is going.
Governor Blanco. I am sorry.
Senator Lieberman. No, that is not your fault at all. I
appreciate it.
In the conversation with General Blum, were you concerned
or was he concerned that there might be a request to federalize
the troops? Or did he just say that as part of the normal
operating procedure of the National Guard?
Governor Blanco. No. I told him that I had asked the
President for DOD forces.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. And then on Thursday, and I guess maybe
before that, the word ``federalization'' had been floating
around. And as I appreciated, I asked General Blum to explain
what exactly that would mean.
Senator Lieberman. Yes.
Governor Blanco. And he said it would mean that the
National Guard forces would become a part of DOD, and then we
talked about the law enforcement capabilities that I needed.
And in federalization, it changes, all of that changes. You
lose the law enforcement capacity.
Senator Lieberman. Correct. Because of posse comitatus, and
all of that.
Governor Blanco. So I asked him because, really, I didn't
want to be negligent, and I said does it prevent DOD coming in
with force, if we don't do this thing, this federalization
move?
Senator Lieberman. Yes, because----
Governor Blanco. And he said absolutely not.
Senator Lieberman. It doesn't prevent them?
Governor Blanco. It does not prevent them.
Senator Lieberman. OK. Let us go to Friday, the meeting
that we have heard about, whether it was a dance or not I guess
is up to the participants' vision of it. But the President was
there. Mayor Nagin was there.
Was it at that larger meeting or at what we have heard
described as a separate meeting right afterward that you and
the President had that the idea of federalizing the Louisiana
National Guard was first raised?
Governor Blanco. It was in our separate meeting.
Senator Lieberman. Right. And who was there besides the
President?
Governor Blanco. Well, in our private meeting, I think it
was just the President, myself, and I think his Deputy Chief of
Staff, Joe Hagin.
Senator Lieberman. Right. Was there an explanation given
about why you were being asked to federalize the National Guard
of Louisiana?
Governor Blanco. The President was just asking me what my
thoughts were on it. It was just really an honest discussion
about the pros and the cons of coordinating, how would you best
coordinate two forces. I would describe that as a very honest
and open and direct conversation, and I shared with him mainly
the things that I have told you.
Senator Lieberman. So you tell me if I am drawing a wrong
impression from what you just said. Though the question was
being raised by the President, I take you to be saying you
didn't feel like this was a demand or a coercion?
Governor Blanco. I did not feel at that time in that
meeting that there was any demand or coercion. I thought that
he was seeking an honest answer. And indeed, on Saturday, he
announced the organization just as I had suggested it, and the
organization worked.
Senator Lieberman. So, again, why the question was even
coming up, to the best of your knowledge, it was just being
described as a matter of administrative what, effectiveness
or----
Governor Blanco. Well, I guess what I would say that at
some junctures you could sort of boil it down to just trying to
figure out how to make it work for everybody.
Senator Lieberman. OK.
Governor Blanco. I was trying to get more people in, and
another concern of mine was if they gave my National Guard to
the DOD general, they might then consider that all the force
that I was going to get. And I needed more people. I needed a
lot of people.
Senator Lieberman. Let us go to Friday night, and again, I
am depending on your narrative. Close to midnight on Friday,
you received a phone call from the Chief of Staff at the White
House, Andrew Card. Is that correct?
Governor Blanco. No. I received a call from General Blum--
--
Senator Lieberman. OK.
Governor Blanco [continuing]. Who was at the White House.
Senator Lieberman. Was Mr. Card on the phone?
Governor Blanco. Not the first two calls, but on the third
call.
Senator Lieberman. And they all happened that night?
Governor Blanco. All happened that night.
Senator Lieberman. Am I right that, at that point, you were
being requested to allow the federalization of the Louisiana
National Guard, and they faxed you this memorandum of
understanding that we have since----
Governor Blanco. Essentially, I would say yes.
Senator Lieberman. What was the reason given for that
request?
Governor Blanco. For a midnight call?
Senator Lieberman. Yes. Three, apparently.
Governor Blanco. Right. Well, the reason was that the
President was going to make a statement the next morning.
Senator Lieberman. And was going to announce that the
Louisiana Guard was going to be federalized?
Governor Blanco. If I would agree to it.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. And did General Blum, who had
advised you earlier in the week not to allow the Guard to be
federalized, continue to take that position? Did he say
nothing, or did he urge you to allow the federalization?
Governor Blanco. He explained to me that he was at the
White House, being asked to make this call to me, and he had a
schematic that he asked me to agree to. He actually didn't
explain anything. He asked me to sign a letter that he was
sending and wanted me to return it in 5 minutes.
Senator Lieberman. That was the memorandum of
understanding?
Governor Blanco. That is correct. And I told him I could
not do any such thing without legal review and that I certainly
didn't want to make midnight decisions, even though I happened
to be very wide awake.
Senator Lieberman. Mr. Card then was on the second call?
Governor Blanco. On the third phone call, I think.
Senator Lieberman. Who was on the second?
Governor Blanco. Blum.
Senator Lieberman. Calling back and asking----
Governor Blanco. It was Blum, and then Card came on on the
third call.
Senator Lieberman. Card on the third call with the same
request?
Governor Blanco. Right.
Senator Lieberman. And again, any reason given for the
request?
Governor Blanco. They just thought it was--at that point in
time, Andrew Card determined that he thought it was the best
way to go.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. Did you feel under pressure at that
point, as compared to the conversation with the President
earlier in the day?
Governor Blanco. Well, it was a very different kind of
pressure, but I still told him no.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. And that is the way it ended?
Governor Blanco. That is correct.
Senator Lieberman. Thank you very much.
Governor Blanco. I was very definitive, sir. There was
never a question in my mind as to the lines of authority.
Senator Lieberman. Thanks, Governor. I apologize, Madam
Chairman. I just want to ask Governor Barbour a quick question.
Were you at any time asked to allow the Federal Government
to federalize the Mississippi National Guard?
Governor Barbour. I was never directly asked. I made it
very plain from day one that we didn't need Federal troops. We
didn't need the Federal Government to run our National Guard,
and they never attempted to.
And when General Honore came onboard, it was made plain to
me, and I made it plain to the Federal Government that we loved
having General Honore, but he wasn't in charge of anything in
Mississippi.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. So, in a sense, you preemptively,
if I may use that word, made it clear that you were not going
to allow the federalization?
Governor Barbour. Nobody ever asked me. But when the talk
started----
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Barbour [continuing]. I was very emphatic. It was
the wrong thing to do. It is the wrong thing to do, but nobody
ever asked me to do it. As far as I know, nobody ever tried to
impose that.
Senator Lieberman. Thank you.
Governor Barbour. Yes, sir.
Chairman Collins. Thank you. Senator Warner.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR WARNER
Senator Warner. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
I welcome you, Governor Barbour. Nice to see you again. And
Governor Blanco, I welcome you as well. Both of you had a very
arduous task and a challenging one, and history will have to
unfold and make its judgments, but I have been impressed with
your testimony this morning.
I have been on an issue for some months up here in the
context of these tragedies, and that is the doctrine of posse
comitatus, which controls the authority of the Federal troops,
that is the regular Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, when they
are involved in situations like this.
It is a time-honored doctrine that prohibits them from
involving themselves in what we call the ``normal police
activities'' by a municipality or State or otherwise. And I
support that basic doctrine.
But then given the magnitude of these tragedies, I think we
should go back and address the doctrine once again, determining
if there may be cases for making some exceptions to that. And I
have so wrote that to the Secretary of Defense, and that study
is under way. But I think your views on it would be helpful.
Recognizing that when the Guard and regular forces are
integrated in the confusing, often tumultuous situations that
evolve in these catastrophes, the average citizen can't
distinguish from one uniform or the other. They are about the
same.
And if a law enforcement situation arose where the local
law enforcement needed the assistance or wasn't available, and
citizens had to turn to such troops that were present, the
Federal troops would have to step back and relinquish the
entire responsibility to National Guard, which does have the
legal authority to integrate and work on law enforcement
problems.
Now given that history and doctrine, was that a factor in
some of your considerations with regard to Federal troops, I
ask you, Governor Blanco?
Governor Blanco. I am not sure I understand the question.
It was what?
Senator Warner. When you decided about the utilization of
the Federal troops, you wanted boots on the ground?
Governor Blanco. I wanted boots on the ground to help with
our----
Senator Warner. And you wanted those boots to have full
authority to assist law enforcement?
Governor Blanco. No, sir.
Senator Warner. You didn't?
Governor Blanco. No. I have the National Guard for that.
And that is why I did not want the Guard federalized. It is
very important for a governor to be able to retain control of
the National Guard precisely for its law enforcement
capabilities.
Many of the members of the Guard who work as security
forces are actually civil law enforcement officers in their
daily work. So they know the rules. They know the parameters.
They know the language of local law enforcement, which is very
different from military protocols.
And so, I think it is very important to respect the time-
honored issues of posse comitatus. I would urge you not to do
anything to alter that.
I think that the recommendation that I would make is if and
when a governor requests additional Federal troops, in our
case, we needed people. We needed people who could go in and
carry out very difficult missions, which, indeed, they did
afterward. And that was going from home to home, doing the
searches. Doing even some more rescue efforts at certain times.
But I would say if a governor calls, please send the
troops, and they can work out their coordination details upon
arrival. But as we support the local law enforcement efforts at
the State level with the National Guard, I think that having
the Federal troops support the National Guard is the correct
procedure.
Senator Warner. Governor Barbour, do you have some views on
that subject?
Governor Barbour. We never asked for any Federal troops,
partially because we didn't need them. But we never lost
continuity of government. Our local police and fire, Waveland,
Mississippi, population 7,000, 26 policemen. There is not a
habitable structure in Waveland, Mississippi.
At 9 p.m. the night of the storm, all 26 policemen were on
duty. And so, we never got to the situation where we even
thought about Federal troops. We do have Federal troops. We
have military facilities, and particularly the Seabee base,
they were fabulous. But never in any law enforcement role.
Never wanted them in any, never needed them in any, never asked
for them in any.
And I would not be for making any change in posse
comitatus, and I would not be for using Federal troops. The
truth of it is, Senator, the National Guard, most of them are
not trained for law enforcement. More of that is they can help
with important things. The uniform makes people behave.
But I would hate for my National Guardsmen to have to go
out and start arresting people because they are not trained to
do that. They could hurt somebody. So we tried, as much as
possible, except for the MPs and other specially trained
people, to not let our Guardsmen get in a true law enforcement
situation. There was plenty of other stuff for them to do,
don't get me wrong.
But I think that not only is the doctrine of posse
comitatus important, I think it is important that these folks
are not trained in law enforcement. And lots of them are
warriors, and the training they got is not exactly what you
want from law enforcement.
Senator Warner. Well, the Department of Defense now is
looking at the future of the Guard, and I am among, I think,
most of us here who want to support the Guard and strengthen it
in every way.
Should we add, as a requirement, that Guardsmen receive
some basic training in law enforcement in the event that they
may be called in to situations?
Governor Barbour. I am not sure it is necessary, Senator. I
would not advocate that if it took away from training for their
true mission for the country because their mission is critical.
I just had 3,500 come home from Iraq, and they did a fabulous
job because they are trained. And I wouldn't want us to train
them on something superfluous.
But, yes, if there is extra time. If it doesn't interfere
with the real mission. Lots of them are going to do some kind
of duty that is close to law enforcement during their period in
the Guard, but I sure wouldn't let it interfere with the real
mission.
Senator Warner. No, I don't think that.
Governor Barbour. Yes, sir.
Senator Warner. But as you know, those of us who went
through basic training in the military, you are given a
diversified spectrum of training initially, and they don't have
to have that as their primary mission. But it might be helpful
in the event of these contingencies.
This was an extraordinary event in the history of our
Nation, and great people stood up and provided assistance for
which they had no training at all. And they acted magnificently
in a wide range of areas.
Governor Barbour. Yes, sir. And the Guard was indispensable
to us. We had about 12,000. Every National Guard of every State
in the country did something. But we had about 12,000 actually,
as they say, boots on the ground. And they were indispensable,
but we tried not to let them have any true law enforcement
assignment unless they were trained for it.
Senator Warner. Good. Thank you.
I hope to press these questions with General Honore--
because he distinguished himself in this area--Madam Chairman,
when he appears next week. I thank each of you.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Governor Blanco, you were very clear this morning that
Mayor Nagin did not participate in the private discussion that
you had with the President in which you did definitively turn
down the option of changing the status of the Louisiana
National Guard. And that contrary to what the mayor told us
yesterday, you did reach a decision during that meeting. Is
that correct?
Governor Blanco. I was very clear, yes. I was very clear
with the President on the way that I believed the structure
should function. I was much less concerned with turf than with
tactics. I needed people, and I did not need to do a paper
reorganization at that moment.
Chairman Collins. I am trying to figure why, if you
rejected that offer at that meeting, you got three phone calls
after midnight that night and a memorandum of agreement
concerning the authorization consent and use of dual status
commander for Joint Task Force Katrina was faxed to you.
If you told the President that you didn't want to change
the status of the Guard and the decision was, in fact, made at
that meeting, then----
Governor Blanco. I am not saying that about the decision. I
said we had an honest discussion, and I left very clear on what
I wanted to do. I told the President--he is the President of
the United States--that with all due respect, if I changed my
mind, I would let him know within 24 hours.
How that conversation was reinterpreted by Mayor Nagin is
another conversation I was not privy to. At midnight, a hybrid
offer, I suppose, was called in for my consideration. But
essentially, it had the same effect, in my estimation.
Chairman Collins. Well, that is what I want to clarify. I
want to clarify two points. Then, essentially, Mayor Nagin is
correct that a final decision was not made until later, but you
are saying you made a tentative decision?
Governor Blanco. I did not. I gave the President my idea of
how this structure could work. And on Saturday morning, he
ended up agreeing with me when he went to his press conference
to announce that he would be sending additional troops.
I was there to ask for additional troops. I wasn't there to
talk about structure. The structure was their conversation or
their concern, not mine.
Chairman Collins. I want to clarify a second point related
to the structure, and it is in Exhibit 5 in your book,\1\ if
you want to look at what I am reading.
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\1\ Committee Exhibit 5 appears in the Appendix on page 132.
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This is the memorandum of agreement that the White House
proposed, and I think it is important that we look at it
because when we use the word ``federalizing'' of the National
Guard, most people would believe that meant that you would lose
control over the National Guard. But in fact, that is not at
all what the White House proposed to you.
Governor Blanco. It was a hybrid arrangement at midnight on
Friday night.
Chairman Collins. It is. It is dual-hatting, and it says
specifically under State Command and Control, ``The Louisiana
governor will provide command and control over the supporting
National Guard forces. As a member of the Louisiana National
Guard in a State status, the dual status commander is subject
to the orders of the governor of the State of Louisiana.''
What really was being proposed is that General Honore, the
active duty general, would report both to you and to the
Secretary of Defense. Is that not correct?
Governor Blanco. Well, that is probably essentially
correct. As I said, it was a hybrid. Apparently, they spent all
day trying to figure out how to federalize without actually
federalizing, I guess. I am not quite sure what that exercise
was all about.
In essence, the drama moments were settled by the Louisiana
National Guard and the Guard members from 50 States, 4
territories, and Washington, DC. And I couldn't get one Federal
Government to move its troops in to assist. So, at that point
in time, this hybrid arrangement coming to me at midnight just
seemed a little like posturing instead of a real solution.
Chairman Collins. Well, let me make clear that I think it
would have been helpful to you to have active duty troops in
your State earlier than----
Governor Blanco. I agree, Senator.
Chairman Collins [continuing]. When the bulk of them
arrived, which was not until Saturday. You did have General
Graham and his staff in the State on Wednesday. But significant
numbers of troops did not arrive until Saturday.
We did ask General Landreneau whether the fact that those
significant numbers of active duty troops that did not arrive
until Saturday harmed his ability to execute any missions. And
his response was that while the National Guard forces had to
perform the missions with smaller forces than was ideal, he
told us, ``I cannot identify a mission that was compromised.''
Do you agree with that assessment?
Governor Blanco. Well, our people worked very hard, and
that is what Louisiana's trademark is. We have hard-working
people who will do whatever it takes, no matter what the
circumstances are. And that is, I think, what he was defining
that while we would have probably felt better about having more
boots on the ground, we did with what we had.
And that was the story all week, that story of that week of
misery that our people had to suffer. We did all that we could
with what we had, and we worked very hard and saved a lot of
lives. We saved 1.3 million before the storm, and we pulled out
over 70,000 in the aftermath of the storm.
And so there are a lot of Louisiana heroes. They are in the
National Guard. They are sheriff's deputies. They are city
police officers. They are firefighters. They are volunteers.
We had a State senator, Walter Boasso, and another in the
affected region, who lost his home and business, leading rescue
missions. My lieutenant governor was leading rescue missions.
Another State senator outside of the area organized volunteers
and brought volunteers with their boats in to lead rescue
missions.
We did with what we had. It was miraculous. We did a
fabulous job, Senator. And I can only tell you that the
Louisiana heroes are long in number, strong in courage, and
they did a magnificent job.
Could we have used more help? That was what I was trying to
say. And I believe the help could have come on Tuesday or
Wednesday. The Federal forces could have been leaning forward
under the annex part of the disaster planning that FEMA has.
They could have leaned forward and come.
Even without me asking, they could have come. But I was
asking, and I just want to make that clear for the record.
Chairman Collins. I am just going to ask a couple final
questions to each of you, and I am going to start with Governor
Barbour--and ask you the same question.
Looking back, what do you believe is the single greatest
deficiency at the State level that you had to confront, and
what reform are you going to implement at the State level to
improve your response?
Governor Barbour. The lack of a survivable interoperable
communications system is the single biggest problem. If you
can't communicate, you can't lead.
My head of the National Guard might as well have been a
Civil War general for the first 2 or 3 days because he only
could find out what was going on by sending somebody. He did
have helicopters instead of horses, so it was a little faster.
But same sort of thing.
But that is clearly the biggest problem, and I would
suggest for the Federal Government, the Federal Government has
a dog in that fight, too, and that it should be involved in it.
But that is the thing. If it is one thing, that is the one
thing.
Chairman Collins. You have anticipated what my second
question was going to be for you, and that is what is the
single most important reform that needs to be done at the
Federal level?
Governor Barbour. Well, in my testimony, you will see I
make some suggestions about how to improve debris removal,
temporary housing. And I will try not to run on.
Chairman Collins. Take your time.
Governor Barbour. But we think the biggest single thing is
to get your people home. If your people come home to rebuild
their community and have hope and optimism, then they will
stay, and they will rebuild the Gulf Coast bigger and better
than ever, which is what is going to happen.
They have got to have temporary housing. Got to get the
kids back in school. Got to have work. One hundred fifty-one of
our 152 school districts in Mississippi were open October 10.
The last one opened November 6, and it would have been opened 2
weeks earlier except the portable classrooms got delayed.
So our kids are back in school. Over 99 percent of
Mississippi school children are back in school in the community
where they were before the hurricane. Now some of them are not
in the same school building because it doesn't exist anymore.
Some of them maybe have gone to another part of the county.
Second, we have 34,000 people living in travel trailers
right now. I am going to come back to that. We have already
talked with Senator Akaka. There is work. The biggest problem
for getting people home, once you get the electricity on--and
don't underestimate how critical that is. Everything runs on
electricity, it turns out.
And our electric utilities, Mississippi Power and Entergy
Mississippi, were fabulous. After Camille, a much smaller
storm, it took 8 weeks to get the electricity back on. Twelve
days after the storm, Mississippi Power gave electricity to
everybody who could receive it. Unfortunately, there were about
70,000 houses that couldn't receive it because they had been
destroyed.
But the temporary housing thing has been the toughest
mountain, and I say in my testimony, please, come up with
alternative temporary and transitional housing solutions. The
single solution of travel trailers and mobile homes is just not
enough. These guys have put in more travel trailers than
anybody, maybe two or three times the pace. It is just not good
enough.
We have got to have other solutions for temporary housing
because you cannot rebuild your community if people can't have
a place to stay at home. They start going to Texas and going to
Georgia, getting a new job.
And our whole goal was to get people home as fast as
possible, to give them a stake in rebuilding the communities,
and give them optimism and hope that they are going to be part
of building back the coast bigger and better than it ever was
before.
Chairman Collins. Thank you.
Governor Blanco, the same questions for you. What is the
number-one reform that you are going to be pressing for at the
State level, and what is the most important reform that we need
to do at the Federal level?
Governor Blanco. I think, as I remarked in my comments, my
opening statement, that communication network is probably the
single most important thing that hampered our ability to
understand what was going on in the field and respond to the
needs of the local leadership. So interoperability and a
communications network is extremely critical to Louisiana's
response efforts.
We are working to acquire mobile communication networks,
command units that can be deployed into a disaster area of any
magnitude right now. We also know that the monies that we
received for that are dedicated 80 percent to the local
governments and 20 percent to the State. We have begun the
process of developing an interoperable network that will
transcend into the local level so that everybody is on the same
page and that we can all communicate on the same network, and I
think that is extremely important.
As to the Federal side, again, Governor Barbour and I have
the exact same problems. We experienced a lot of the same
frustrations. Ours was a magnitude and a dimension that was far
greater, and I guess that is our essential difference. The
storm hit an intensely urban area.
But I will tell you that the big frustrations come through
FEMA contracts. These local leaders will tell you that they
could have effected a clean-up for far less money, and the
money that you have expended on the clean-up could be going to
restoration and to rebuilding housing instead of debris
removal. The contracts could be done earlier at the local level
if given some flexibility.
And the Stafford Act definitely needs to be revised to
handle a catastrophe of the magnitude that we are dealing with.
Specifically, the costs of sending in temporary housing
sometimes equate per unit to the cost of buying new housing for
our citizens, permanent housing.
And I think that the Stafford Act needs to be reviewed, and
I believe that a lot of FEMA people who have to work with it
will be in agreement with us. It is faster to fix apartment
units that have gone down--but that is permanent housing, they
are not allowed to do that--than to run out and try to find a
bunch of trailers that don't exist on the scene.
I think they had to order some 150,000 trailers, and this
Nation, in the early stages of this operation, could produce
3,000 per month. So you see the longevity efforts.
Now the trailers are in place, but they are spending a lot
of money putting up the infrastructure for the trailer
communities. And again, this is all temporary housing, and it
is estimated that sometimes it costs as much as $75,000 to
$100,000 per unit to establish. You could buy a house for that
amount of money.
But there is a prohibition against permanent housing. And I
hate to see good money thrown after temporary situations when
we could, in effect, be putting in permanent housing.
Chairman Collins. Thank you. Senator Lieberman.
Senator Lieberman. Thanks.
Governor Blanco, one of the questions we are focusing on
here is why all levels of government--but we are particularly
focusing on the Federal Government, of course--didn't heed the
warnings that in the big one, a big hurricane hitting--I am
speaking specifically about New Orleans now because of the
water all around and the topography, the bowl effect--that the
local and State governments would be overwhelmed and that the
Federal Government would have to come in. And one of the
questions we keep asking is why they didn't do it earlier.
Last fall, before a House committee, the former director of
FEMA Michael Brown testified, when he was asked the question
about his biggest mistake, just as you all were just now, he
said, ``My biggest mistake was not recognizing by Saturday that
Louisiana was dysfunctional.''
I presume that you are familiar with this comment?
Governor Blanco. Yes, sir. I am.
Senator Lieberman. I don't know if you ever had the chance
to talk to him about it. It was last fall after he had left
FEMA.
Governor Blanco. No. I chose not to speak to him.
Senator Lieberman. Yes. So how do you react to that? And
what do you think the basis for that statement was?
Governor Blanco. Well, let me just capsulize it by saying
that Mr. Brown was removed by the President, and I thank him
for it. Mr. Brown has now set the record straight, and I thank
him for it.
Senator Lieberman. That was very gracefully done.
[Laughter.]
Let me ask you a factual question now, which is, and I am
asking everybody this. In your opening statement, you remarked
that we would not be here if the levees had not failed.
Absolutely right. But fail they did.
I am interested in knowing when and how you first learned
that the levees around New Orleans had broken or been topped?
Governor Blanco. Starting at about noon on Monday, probably
at a pretty strong period, high pitch of the storm event for
the New Orleans area, the region, we began to learn of many
levees breaking. You cannot do anything during the course of
the storm. Everybody has to stay put. There is not very much
you can do.
Senator Lieberman. How did you learn?
Governor Blanco. Well, we were hearing it, I guess, to some
extent, from our own internal reports. We had people out in the
field, and the reports came in. And I remember that I went to
the press briefings and reported it out to the media as well,
through the media.
Senator Lieberman. What went through your mind when you
heard that the levees had broken?
Governor Blanco. My heart sunk.
Senator Lieberman. Yes.
Governor Blanco. Yes. We expected some overtopping, and we,
indeed, got that in some of the low-lying regions. We were
depending on those levees to hold.
Senator Lieberman. What steps did you take after you
learned that?
Governor Blanco. Well, when I spoke to Mayor Nagin later in
the afternoon, I immediately called General Landreneau and
asked him if he could begin to organize an effort by the
National Guard to go sandbag the breach. He started that
process immediately.
Now you can't bring helicopters up as long as the winds are
blowing, and not all helicopters can be flown at night either.
So they organized a sandbagging operation.
Senator Lieberman. From the ground? On the ground?
Governor Blanco. Well, no. They had to do it--they couldn't
do anything from the ground.
Senator Lieberman. So, in other words, they waited until
the hurricane had subsided?
Governor Blanco. They had to. Yes, sir.
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. You have no choice in that. There was
still gale force winds and tropical force winds late Monday
afternoon. So, in the next day or so, they began to organize a
sandbag operation, and the general called me, I needed to
report on what was going on. And so, he called, and he said,
``Governor,'' he says, ``I hate to tell you this. We are
dropping 3,000-pound sandbags into that breach, and they are
disappearing as though we are doing nothing.''
Senator Lieberman. Right.
Governor Blanco. So with the Department of Transportation,
Secretary Johnny Bradberry, and his public works people,
together with the National Guard in those early, those first
days, they tried to figure out how they could stop the breach.
They had to build a road to the area, and also the West
Jefferson Levee Board was helping the Orleans Parish Levee
Board. And they brought all their equipment in, and they had to
build a road. There was a bridge that prohibited getting in by
boat.
Any kind of complication that you can think of was there,
but they began the process. Then they designed 10,000 pound
sandbags, and for several days, they brought that in. But on
Friday, the level of the lake and the level in the canal became
the same. Before that time, the lake was very high and pushing
water into the canal and into the city.
Senator Lieberman. Right. Thank you.
I have no further questions. I just want to come back to a
line of questioning and leave you with something to think
about, if I might, and I ask your thoughts, which is the whole
question illustrated, in some sense dramatized, by the
conversations you had, Governor Blanco, with the Federal
Government--the President, etc.--about troops coming in.
There is no question that one of the reactions, certainly
here in Washington, to Hurricane Katrina was to ask, looking
back, why didn't we move Federal regular Army troops in, in the
specific case of New Orleans, quicker?
But now to look at an increasing role through the Northern
Command of the regular Army, so-called Title 10 forces, in
homeland defense and disaster response. Again, thinking both of
natural disasters and the possibility of a terrorist attack.
And I think it is very important for the governors and your
State adjutant generals to think this through and give us your
counsel on it, both in terms of whether the Federal role would
be critical just for more personnel or whether they, and you
said both, Governor Blanco, would bring some extra capability?
Presumably, the regular Army could have set up at least
right after the storm, maybe right before, a communications
system that would have literally weathered the storm. And under
what circumstances you, as governors, would like to see that
happen?
And then I guess you both made pretty clear what
administrative arrangement you would like to see, which is that
you, as governors, remain in charge of your National Guard
State, but that the Federal presence be separately under the
command of a Title 10 commander. In this case, it was General
Honore.
Anyway, these are real important questions. I know the
people at the Pentagon are thinking about them. I know that
Admiral Keating of Northern Command is thinking about them. We
are going to have them testifying before us in the next week or
maybe afterward. I believe next week.
And you are at the middle of this because you are going to
be the people who are going to be on the front lines,
literally, and we need your counsel as to how best to create
both the assistance and appropriate command and cooperation.
I thank you both, and I thank you, Madam Chairman.
Chairman Collins. Thank you. I want to thank both of you
for your participation in this hearing today. Your testimony
was very helpful to us in getting a better understanding.
I can't imagine two governors in the United States who have
been tested through such an ordeal more so than you have, and I
do want you to know that, as we go forward, we are also very
mindful of the recovery and reconstruction challenges that you
face. And both of you, in your written statements, give us
advice and recommendations and requests, and I want to assure
you that those have not gone unheard.
Your full statements will be included in the record. I do
anticipate that there may be some additional questions for the
record. So the record will remain open for 15 days.
Again, thank you for your participation.
Governor Blanco. Thank you, Senators.
Governor Barbour. Thank you, ma'am.
Senator Collins. The hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:25 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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<all>