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Bush Returns Again to Gulf Coast for Katrina Anniversary

Posted on: Monday, 28 August 2006, 06:00 CDT

By David Jackson

WASHINGTON -- When he arrives on the Gulf Coast today, President Bush will visit the scene of a storm that devastated the area and damaged his political standing.

Bush plans to tour the area ravaged by Hurricane Katrina today and Tuesday to discuss the ongoing recovery from the deadly storm. Bush will emphasize efforts since the initial response to the storm and subsequent flooding, widely criticized as inadequate by Louisiana and Mississippi officials.

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said the administration "was really slow to grasp the magnitude of this disaster," and that sluggishness has shadowed efforts to rebuild. "That got everything started off in the wrong direction," she said.

When the storm hit the Gulf Coast in the early hours of Aug. 29, Bush was at his Texas vacation home. He didn't visit the area until after he made a speech in San Diego on the 60th anniversary of V-J Day, including a defense of the Iraq war.

By the time of an Aug. 31 flight over New Orleans, most of which was under water, much of the public relations damage had been done.

In his weekend radio address, Bush said the floods "revealed that federal, state, and local governments were unprepared to respond to such an extraordinary disaster," but all three have learned lessons and are working together to rebuild the region.

"We will stay until the job is done," Bush said.

Tariq Abdul-Mu'Min, 42, who runs a kitchen-design business in Gulfport, Miss., said Bush's trip fulfills "his responsibility as the head of this country," a job in which he faltered a year ago.

"Poor. Terrible," Abdul-Mu'Min said. "He should have reacted much sooner."

Angela Jackson-Moore, 42, an interviewer at a local jobs center, said Bush was one of many government officials at fault. She predicted the government's response to the next disaster would be better because of the bad publicity officials received over Katrina.

Making his 13th visit to the Gulf Coast since Katrina, Bush is expected to emphasize the $110 billion that Congress has approved to rebuild the Gulf Coast, including programs for housing, education and business redevelopment.

The White House has defended the Bush administration's post-Katrina record in the face of a new series of critical reports in the media and from various think tanks.

Last week, it issued lengthy fact sheets detailing steps to help hurricane victims and rebuild damaged areas.

"There's been some promising progress, but there are many areas that have been left untouched," said Amy Liu, author of a new study by the Brookings Institution on Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

The Brookings report and others list a variety of post-Katrina shortcomings throughout the region: The federal government has decided not to rebuild the levees to withstand a worst-case Category 5 hurricane. Housing programs are geared more to help Gulf Coast residents who own their homes and not renters or public housing residents.

Bush said programs are being designed to make sure that money is spent effectively. He cited progress with debris removal, infrastructure repair and rental assistance, in partnership with state and local governments and businesses.

Bush asked for patience, saying he wants "the people down there to understand that it's going to take a while to recover. This was a huge storm."

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said Sunday that the administration was doing a good job of getting money to the state, but it was not reaching cities such as New Orleans fast enough.

Bush may have hurt himself the most when he praised the work of Michael Brown, then director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said Douglas Brinkley, author of The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

"We live in a sound-bite culture," he said. "And the 'Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job' is the sound bite that's going to live forever."

Americans take a dim view of Bush's handling of Katrina. Only 37% approved of it in a recent USA Today/Gallup Poll, compared with 43% who answered that way immediately after the storm.

The storm did not have much effect, however, on Bush's job approval rating. His approval rating, currently at 42%, was already heading down last summer amid violence in Iraq and rising gas prices.

Lydia Saad, senior editor for the Gallup Poll, said there were declines in Bush's image as a strong and decisive leader that seemed tied to the Katrina response.

In the year since, the administration has offered periodic updates on its post-Katrina response and has stepped it up in recent weeks.

Don Powell, coordinator for the office of Gulf Coast Rebuilding, also has made a string of media appearances, touting such items as $16.7 billion in housing assistance, and the clearing of more than 100 million cubic tons of debris.

(c) Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Source: USA TODAY

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