Senate panel urges replacing disaster agency

By Joanne Kenen

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Senate panel on Thursday
recommended that the heavily criticized Federal Emergency
Management Agency be replaced with a new agency that would be
better able to respond to disasters like Hurricane Katrina.

The recommendation to replace FEMA was the first of 86
issued by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Committee in a post-Katrina report focusing on FEMA’s
bureaucratic flaws, which it said were beyond repair.

“We propose to abolish FEMA and build a stronger, more
capable structure within (the Department of Homeland
Security),” the report said. “It will be an independent entity
within DHS, but will draw on the resources of the department
and will be led and staffed by capable, committed individuals.”

The new agency, which would be called the National
Preparedness and Response Authority, or NPRA, would have
responsibility both for natural disasters, such as a hurricane,
and a possible terror attack.

Its director would report to the secretary of the
Department of Homeland Security, but would have a direct line
of communication to the president during catastrophes and would
have “political authority” to direct federal employees outside
of the agency, the committee said.

The report also said the director should have “significant
experience” in crisis management.

The panel did not call for the resignation of Homeland
Security chief Michael Chertoff. It has had a series of
hearings excoriating Chertoff, former FEMA chief Michael Brown
and the government’s handling of one of the worst natural
disasters in U.S. history.

The August 29 storm killed about 1,300 people, displaced
hundreds of thousands and shattered New Orleans and the
Mississippi Gulf Coast. Many people throughout Louisiana and
Mississippi are still without permanent homes and much of the
region’s infrastructure is crippled.

Government investigations of the Katrina response have
pointed to poor lines of communication among federal agencies.
There has been considerable debate in Washington about whether
FEMA should remain part of Homeland Security, which was created
after the September 11 attacks, or become a separate agency.

The committee’s recommendations went into great
organizational detail, calling for more regional offices than
the 10 FEMA now has, the consolidation of three interagency
coordinating groups into one and greater funding for
preparedness at the state and federal levels.

“Preparation for domestic events must be done as robustly
as that for foreign threats,” the report said.

President George W. Bush is set to travel to the region on
Thursday to applaud the thousands of volunteers who have come
to the Gulf Coast to lend their help.

A full report by the panel is expected early next month.
The House Government Reform Committee in February issued its
own report, written by the majority Republicans, which found
the U.S. government was unprepared to react to the catastrophic
impact of Katrina.

(Additional reporting by Peter Szekely)