>> you mentioned it several times shifting troops from iraq to afghanistan. we have been in iraq for seven years and spends trillions of dollars and many american lives lost. we seem to be back to square one. this shift to afghanistan -- can you give us your assessment for what it means for iraq? >> back to square one in iraq? i do not agree with you specifically. .

we've also responded and prevented attacks at a level with the iraqi security forces who lead in so many operations, who lead now in all operations, in ways that have actually been very, very encouraging. there doesn't mean there aren't challenges, but i see a country committed to standing up this government, having elected it, and the internal feedback i get from the country is, you know, a free and fair election, recertified one. they challenge themselves, and someone said the other day, which i thought was very encouraging, this wasn't a challenge from the outside of

the country about a free and fair election, it was a challenge internally, and it was recertified as free and fair. so i'm actually encouraged. everything i get from the general is that we are in terrific shape to continue the transition. we're at 83,000 troops today, i think, and we'll be down to 50,000 by the 31st of august, and we're on track to do that. the long-term strategic partnership and relationship will be taken up in its next step after the formation of this new government, and strategically, that's still our goal. but what this does with troops that we have going to afghanistan, to about 100,000 u.s., getting down to 50,000, and over the course of the next 18 months through the end of 11, getting down lower than that, it allows us to start to

creete this time at home, which we just haven't had. with the exception of some of our forces, special forces comes to mind, and some of the specific skill sets that are still going to be at 1-1 for a while, and we have to keep a very close eye on that, so i'm actually encouraged. thank you very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> today on c-span -- former fema director james lee witt discusses government disaster relief efforts. then "washington journal," live with your phone calls. that's followed by a house hearing on mortgage foreclosure. and later, live coverage of today's g-8 summit in canada.

>> let me say to the american people, this is a change in personnel, but it is not a change in policy. general petraeus fully participated in our review last fall, and he both supported and helped design the strategy that we have in place. >> learn more about the president's choice to head u.s. forces in afghanistan. general david petraeus has been on c-span more than 40 times. watch his appearances at hearings, briefings, and other events online any time at the c-span video library. it's washington your way. >> c-span, our public affairs content is available on television, radio, and online, and you can also connect with us on twitter, facebook, and youtube, and sign up for our schedule alert emails at c-span.org. >> and now clinton-era fema director james lee witt, he spoke at the clinton presidential library about relief efforts following

hurricanes and haiti earthquake. he gave this talk before recently being hired as a consultant by b.p. this is about an hour. >> thank you. i would like to thank the foundation staff for the food work that they have done in this exhibit, as well as the library, and what this library's about. i also wanted to thank leona for all the support she's given me over the years. we're working on our 49th wedding anniversary. i told this story one time and

she told me never to tell it again. one time this lady asked her, what do you contribute to the longevity of your marriage? i said our honeymoon. i said, well, what did you do on your honeymoon? well, we took this mule ride down the grand canyon. about halfway down, that mule stumbled, and i heard her say that's once. we got down, and the mule stumbled, and she said that's twice. the mule stumbled, and she pulls a pistol out. and i said why did you do that? and she said, that's once. this little lady came up after the speech and said, did you really shoot that mule? but i want to thank senator david prior, because i never will forget when i was director in arkansas, we had this flood, and we had some house trailers

on the inside of the levee between the rive river and the levee. and fema was the nine assistants for those people. and so senator david prior and senator dale bumpers had me to come to washington and had fema there. and it was the good cop-bad cop routine, and fema helped those folks through. but also, something that was really unique, they had my confirmation hearing, and senator david prior chaired the hearing. well, senator dale bumpers and congressman ray thornton introduced me. well, the introduction and the stories lasted so long, the hearing on my part lasted about 15 minutes, which was a really good hearing. so i really enjoyed that hearing. but during the eight years that i was director of fema, president clinton, i can't tell you how supportive he was, and the things that he told me,

james lee, if it affects people and it's going to be on the news, i want to know about it. and what was really interesting, when he was governor and i was director in arkansas, we always gave him a situation report in his office every morning. so when i became director of fema, i set up all fema 10 regions and then washington where they would collect all the information across the united states, and we would have it in his read file at 7:30 in the morning. well, we were at a cabinet meeting, and this is before he elevated me to cabinet level. we were in a cabinet meeting, and i was one of those staff people that set against the wall. and right at the end the cabinet meeting, he said, you know, why don't all of you send information in to james lee because he's sending me in a report every morning at 7730 and he'll collect it and send it in to me. after the meeting, i said, are you trying to get me killed? and he said, well, the reason did i that, now i know they'll

send it. well, thank you. so we had a lot of fun, put we saw a lot of devastation during the eight years we responded to 360 federal disaster declarations, everything from earthquakes to wildfires to hurricanes and tornadoes and things that was just unbelievable when you saw them. the devastation and the pain and the anguish that people were going through, and it started in 1993 with the flood on the mississippi river. it affected nine states, and the devastation was just unreal. and president clinton and i was talking about it, and governor carnahan of missouri, and i said, you know, mr. president, we can't let people go back in those areas that were flooded, and you know that he supported it, h.u.d. supported it, and we were able to buy out on a

volunteer basis and relocate people out of the floodplain so it would never flood again n. missouri alone, we bought out over 40,000 pieces of property. and in missouri, a little town, 18 businesses and 100 and something residents, when governor carnahan and i went there, the mayor proudly took us in to city hall and showed us high water marks with the dates on the wall. they kept moving their shelves up to protect the city reference. we relocated that spire town except one small business, and that was the mayor's business, a small engine repair shop. and we built a new school that was seismic resistant and also tornado resistant. it was one of the dome schools with natural lighting coming in to it.

in iowa, we bought i don't know how many residents along the river, and what was unique about it, all of the property we bought out, we put deed restrictions on it where no one could ever build on it again. they could use it for soccer fields, baseball fields, recreational, but no building. and in iowa, they worked to plant all that area back in the natural flowers, natural grass, and in just two to through years, the ecosystem all came back in that area around there. so we knew then that mitigation and prevention was going to be a huge part of everything we did, not only in disasters, but before disasters. and it worked extremely well. i never will forget, g.a.o.

asked us to do a cost benefit analysis on buyouts and prevention. when we did that, after the mississippi flood, it showed that every dollar spent on prevention saved $3 to $5 in future losses, but it did more than that. it saved the pain and the anguish that people had to go through. so i'm extremely proud of what president clinton supported and what we could do for the american people in these high-risk communities. then in 1994, we had the northridge earthquake. los angeles, pasadena, simi valley, all through there, and we had people literally living in and out parks because they're scared to go back into any homes that they could even and leona came out and volunteered her time at application centers, and they were always after, doing the

interviews, she would hide from them. but it was -- it was unbelievable. and the first lady, hillary clinton came out, and we took her to this community, this one block that had all historical homes on it. and every home on that block was shifted to the south, because it was off the foundation because it was a rolling earthquake. we came down one block, the other block, there was one house sitting there, had no damage, and they were still living in their house, and the guy came out, and mrs. clinton asked him, well, you have no damage, what did you do? he said, i went down to the library, and i checked out a videotape from fema office of

emergency services california videotape that showed you how to retro fit your house for an earthquake, and i did it myself, and i spent $1,000. and the biggest problem we have in this country, particularly for earthquakes and hurricanes, is the fact that we have inherited a traditional stock that was built before building codes and building standards and before they were ever enforced. now it's really critical that we start retro fitting those facilities, particularly hospitals, schools, public buildings, and showing people what they can do for themselves and their homes and their businesses, to protect them from devastation. president clinton authorized us to go to congress, to support a program that i wanted to start

called project impact. i had this idea while that we might be able to do more in the prevention if we created this public-private partnership concept in the community. so i go back to washington, and we come up with a name called project impact, and i take it to president clinton. he ok'ed it. we went to congress, got a little bit of money. so we started with seven pilot communities. florida had one of them. seattle, washington, was one of them. high-risk communities. and it became so popular that we went back to congress, and they gave us $25 million. and i think it was the first time in the history of the federal government that any federal agency had created a public-private partnership with businesses, corporations, foundations to support a local community to minimize the risk.

and it was really interesting. at our last project impact summit, he had 2,500 participants. legislators, mayors, councils members, city councilmembers, individuals, businesses, we had nascar as a partner passing out 62 million pamphlets on prevention. they painted kenny irwin's car at the daytona, first daytona race, project impact color green, and he was our spokesman, and then he got killed in new hampshire in a wreck. but they participated in that summit. they brought their racing teams up there. they brought simulators up there. four top nascar drivers were there.

this was the fastest growing public-private partnership prevention program the federal government has ever done. we had 250 communities in that program. what was interesting is the third year anniversary of seattle, that night they had a 7.0 earthquake. the next day, the mayor was on cnn, and they said, mayor, you had very little damage, very few injuries, and only one death, and it was by heart attack, what did you do? he said project impact. we retro fitted our schools, we retro fitted our bridges, we retro fitted the hospitals, public buildings, and people took it upon themselves in low-income housing, volunteer organizations, did all of this.

that was the very day the bush administration cut the program. gone. even home depot, lowe's were partners. in florida, home depot and lowe's, they had one whole aisle in their stores of products that people could use themselves to retro fit their homes for hurricanes. they had training classes ever saturday for these individuals to come in to learn how to do it themselves. and it was a very exciting program, and a lot of communities are still doing it on their own. we had communities that wanted to join just to join. they don't want any money. they just wanted to join. they thought this concept was the best thing since mom and apple pie. because it brought people together that's never worked together, that's never tried to do what they need to do for the

community. so i was excited about that. we have to do more before things happen to save lives and save property. and project impact was a way through a public-private partnership that we thought would really work, and it did. and hopefully the with us dosm our administration and congress will put this program back in place, because we would provide a little bit of seed money, and i won't forget west virginia. it was a small county that leo and i went to, and when we got there, they had this really bad flooding problem, and there was five ladies, because they had bake sales, they had pie suppers, they had car washes, they did everything they could do to raise money to help fix the flooding problem in their counties.

so they just were declared a project impact community with their partnership, had a big signing ceremony. and these ladies were just amazing. they collected all their recipes, put it into a cookbook, and they sold cookbooks just to raise money to fix that flooding problem. well, what was interesting is they we want to the governor, they got a little bit of seed money from us, about $300,000, they went to the governor, got a million dollars from governor, and they fixed the flooding problem in that county that had been there for years and years and years for $750,000. so our first project impact summit, she won the citizens of the year award. her name was katie. katie was 84 years old. katie stood up at that podium

that night, and she looked out across that audience, and she pointed her finger, and she said, if i can do it, anyone can do it. and all her buddies were in their 80's. but they were fired up, i promise you. but we faced a time in our country, whether you believe in global climate change or global warming, if you notice not only here in our country, but around the world, the different events that are happening today and what's going on, the floods in france just recently, the 20 people that lost their lives in arkansas just recently at a federal park, the people that lost their lives in haiti. people that lost their lives with the tsunami in indonesia and thyland and sri lanka.

and we noticed it all the time, because, you know, we grew up doing this. but right here at home, we have the earthquake 1811, ran the mississippi rivers -- mississippi river backwards for at least races, rang bells in a boston church. i'll never forget when i was in arkansas, governor clinton and i were talking and we need to pass some seismic building legislation for arkansas. and, you know, we worked with the legislators and got that legislation passed for seismic building codes for eastern arkansas. and i thought one day, arkansas highway department, we were over in eastern arkansas and they were building a lot of bridges, you know? i came back, and i said, you

know, we need to have seismic building codes for those new buildings, the highway department building, because if all those bridges collapse, how are we going to get relief supplies to those people when something happens? and so i recommended to the highway commission and them to talk to california and get their building codes for the highways and bridges and so forth, and they did that. but from northridge earthquake, we spent just fema, spent $20 billion in that recovery effort in california. then in 1995, we had the oklahoma city bombing. which was cause for some individuals, and the time that

we were out there and the families that we visited with, and the 15 search and rescue teams that i brought in, it was probably hardest disaster that i ever had to deal with. because we brought out 168 victims out of that building. but today around federal buildings, you see they've mitigated that risk now. they've put the barriers up where that cannot happen. but every event we have, we learn lessons. and we learn from our mistakes of the past and hopefully can prevent a lot for the future. but when you think about in arkansas, you think about our schools, think about our hospitals, think about our nursing homes, you think about communities and the risk that they face from earthquakes, tornadoes, no hurricanes

hopefully, but we lost 13 trees at the farm from hurricane katrina, so it does have damage. but we can minimize that risk. this exhibit, when you see this and you walk around and look at this, this is real. and people's lives were lost. i never will forget spencer, south dakota. we had a tornado that hit spencer, south dakota. little bitty town. do you know what was left in that town? no bank, no post office, there was five houses left in the entire town. and when i was out there and i walked around, and there's this antique store. the only thing left was the foundation around it, and these two women were there, and i said, is this your store? and they said, no, this was our grandmother's.

and i said, well, is she ok? yes, she was in the store when the tornado hit. i said, and she's ok? yeah, she's got bruises and cuts, but she's ok. you know what she did? she heard that tornado coming, she opened that door, and she had her cane and two by fours were flying at her, and she said, i whipped that tornado. but there's so many stories of people -- we were in florida after hurricane and tornadoes come through, and i was down in one of the counties with the sheriff, and they said, did you see that mattress up in that tree? and i said yeah, and he said there was a 3-year-old boy that landed in that tree on that mattress, and he was alive. one came across georgia, 21

miles on the ground, tornado. we were flying across the path of it in a blackhawk helicopter, and the state director told me, see that pond there? and i said yeah. you see the foundation? there was a house on that foundation, and it was gone. you see that chest of drawers sitting there? and i said yeah. he said, well, the father and mother couldn't find their baby. and they were looking everywhere, and they were going to the pond, checking, trying to find the baby, and they heard something, they opened the top chest of the drawer, and the baby was in it. just amazing stories that we've heard of events like this. but i tell you, one time, we were in california, i flew out with vice president gore and senator f.b.i. stine, because

california had this huge flood, and the water had surround this had one town, and they had volunteers coming from everywhere. and we land on this highway, and we start walking up to where all the volunteers were and where they were putting sandbags on this levee, and they had this big ditch, and so we were almost up there, and one of the reporters came over to me and said, director, could you get the vice president down in that ditch and throw some sandbags with those guys for a photo op? i said, yeah, i think so. so we get up there, and i said, sir, they'd like you to get down in the ditch and throw some of those sandbags to these guys for a photo op, and he said ok. he walks up there, and he said, hey, guys, i'm going to help you. he goes in in that ditch, secret service goes crazy. one of them hangs his toe on a

sandbag and flips, nearly breaks his leg. and the vice president gore is down there throwing sandbags to these guys, and they're up there taking pictures. he gets back out and he said, what was the matter with the secret service? and i said, well, i just found out all those guys are convicts down there in that ditch. he said, that's why that guy asked me for a pardon? it was so funny. but there was a lot of times like that that humor helped you get through some of those tough times. and we had a lot of those moments. and i can't ever thank president clinton enough for what he did for us and our family. i have to tell you a story.

last october, he called me, and he said, james lee, can you meet me up at white plains, new york? and he said, what do we need to do? i want you to go to haiti with me. and i said ok. so i go up there, he doesn't realize how hard it is for me to get to white plains, new york, from arkansas. so i get up at 3:00 in the morning, you know? i fly to la guardia, get a car and driver, and go to white plains, new york, by 8:00. so we flew to haiti, and on the way down there, i told him, you know, mr. president, because you believed in me and gave me an opportunity, i'm still able to help a lot of people in my company and what we do, and that's true. i think leona and i contributed a whole $500 to this campaign. because we didn't have any money.

and we get there about 9:00 at night, and we have dinner at the palace with the president and prime minister, and then we go to the hotel that you saw on the news that collapsed. we stayed there. we were there for three days, and the people of haiti, average income is about $2 a day if you have a job. unemployment is about 80%. because they got last year with four hurricanes, and they were in bad shape before this earthquake, but now they're in terrible shape. and so while we were there, we were meeting with the different women's groups, the parliament, different n.g.o.'s, volunteers that were there. and we went up to this little plant where they were taking in garbage and we were separating the garage, the plastic and stuff, pulling out the paper,

and they would take that paper -- anybody ever churn butter? ok, they were putting it in like a big turn, had a pole about that big around, and they were turning, putting water in that, churning that paper up and pulverizing it in that wheelbarrow, and they would take it over, and they'd stir it up in that wheelbarrow, and they would fix three hydraulic jacks that they could take and pour that in there, and the cylinder is about this big around, and they would compress that paper and those cylinders and then punt it out, cut it about this big, about that big around. and they were making brick thes out of paper. for people to cook the food on in their cooking pots, to try to keeppthem from cutting trees down and making charcoal. and i saw all this plastic, and i said, you know, mr.

president, we could probably get northwest arkansas, joe brooks and them, put a sleder and a baylor and bail this stuff up and recycle this plastic for them and create jobs. well, he liked the idea so well, he announce it had to everybody that we were going to do this. so we are very, very close right now of having that put in place in haiti. it's going to create jobs. but more important, the second phase of it is what we want to do is to build a plant there that will take that recycled plastic and make building out of it so that haiti then can become the recycling country for the whole caribbean. so this is a pretty exciting thing.

and then president clinton was very, very concerned about this hurricane piece. now, this is before, you know, all this stuff happened before the earthquake. and he was really concerned about it. so i said, well, you know what we could do? we could -- over in haiti, the women are the ones that stay with the family and take care of the kids and everybody and the men all run off when something is happening. so they're the ones to get injured. and so i said we could do a certain training program down here for women, train the trainer program that would train them, then they go out in their communities and train other women. we could do this, we could put the kids together for them, put the training into french creole, translate it, and we did that. he said, this is great. and so we committed to spend

$250,000 supporting this program and do the program for you. through the clinton global initiative. and it took us a little while to get all of this put together and all this translated in the kit and everything put together, and our team was on -- they were ready to go on a tuesday the week of the earthquake. and i said no, wait, i've got a meeting with president clinton in new york. i said he may have something else, then you go. so we held off sending the team over there, and, of course, i was at usaid meeting with the new administration on wednesday morning, wednesday afternoon, 5:00, that big earthquake hit. well, that changed the whole meeting in new york. it changed it to a response meeting. and then president clinton

asked me to go with him to haiti after the earthquake, and i did twice. and i just want to tell you, with the support of mayor bloomberg in new york and commissioner bruno, and the new york city firefighters and emergency management and the team that they volunteered to use to help us to do the training, we just -- sean penn has an n.g.o. organization in haiti, and they're managing a camp of 60,000 people in haiti. so he volunteered for his organization to support us, to train in their camp first. so we just completed the training and the certificate ceremony for 415 haitian women, train the trainer in haiti, and that one camp, and it was so

well received that they had literally -- literally had to turn people away. they wanted to help so bad. and our hope is now that some n.g.o. and organization will pick this up and help us. our goal was to train 20,000 people in haiti in one year. but, of course, now it's more difficult, but we can still do it, but we're going to have some help to do it. i'm going to close with this, and i know you're very glad. each of us, no matter who you are, you can make a difference in someone's life. you can help a neighbor. you can help yourself and your family, or you can help the business you're working in, just develop a family plan for your family. if you got kids or grand kids at school, if you got most families now, mother and fathers work, and if you're at work and your kids are in

school and something happens, where will they go? what will they do? have a plan of where you will meet or someone that lives outside of the state that a relative or friends, a phone number that they know they can call and say i'm ok, and everybody knows it. particularly people with special needs in communities. it's really important that our churches get involved. it's really important that we know who those people are. i know david maxwell was here with his wife, and i know they're through adam in arkansas, they have special needs left, but sometimes not everyone's on those list, but your local churches, your local senior citizen centers know these people, make sure those lists are up to date, because they can make a difference in someone's life. but i'm going to close with

this, and i was at a fundraiser for the john leeland institute seminary in virginia, and there was this guy from argentina. and this baptist minister said this, he said, in argentina, we have a saying, if we're not part of planting the trees of the future, we don't deserve to stand in the shade of the trees of the past. so we need to plant some trees. make sure everyone sees this exhibit, because it's got some valuable lessons in it of what has happened and things that you can do. they're very important exhibits, and i'm very, very appreciative of the clinton foundation library for putting this on, and i'm very, very thankful for state farm -- or allstate, i'm sorry, for the support of this.

and let me tell you about allstate. they have been a huge sponsor of our organization that ad moirl james lloyd and i are co-sharing for the last five years. i'm going to tell you why. if you look not only in eastern arkansas afor earthquake insurance, if you look in california for earthquake insurance, too many people in california have earthquake insurance, less than 12%. do you know why? the policies are so high, and the deductible is so high that the people can't aaford it. and so what we have, we have a vision of creating a catastrophe fund in every state that's funded by the insurance industry, because they buy reinsurance. when reinsurance, when they

have to buy reinsurance, guess where the reinsurance money goes. it doesn't stay in america t. goes to lloyd's of london. it goes overseas. so if they can take a percentage that have reinsurance money, put it in a state catastrophe fund and that grows interest over the years in a nonprofit, tax-free fund, and it builds up, then our goal is to have a fund like that that would then create a market for other companies to come in to lower the cost of a premium, lower the dubblingtible so people could afford it, to create that competition. the other goal, which we have legislation in congress right now in the house, is to pass a national backstop that would be funded by the industry that would grow, then if a state got overwhelmed from their fund, they could borrow off the national fund, and as the

state's found grew back, they would pay that back to the fund. i want to tell you, folks, people along the gulf coast and the east coast all the way to new york, and the middle of the united states, the west coast, insurance premiums are so expensive. and it's not a bailout. the bailout comes when people don't have insurance and the federal government through fema has to go in ann pay for the recovery. that's the bailout. so we need to change that. and we're hopeful that hr-2555 will pass. we just hope that the senate will follow the path -- but they have been a very, very strong supporter of us, and i'm glad they're sponsoring this,

because it is very important. ed collins with the insurance company, he's really been tireless about this. so i will shut up, and i know you're glad. i'll tell one more story real quick. i've given a speech one time like this, and the audience made me look bigger, and i've given that speech, and this guy was in the front row, and in the middle of my speech, he gets up and starts walking out, and i said, where are you going? you get a haircut. why didn't you get one before you came? didn't need one. but i see you've got your hair cut. you're all right. but i'll be happy to take any questions if y'all have some that you'd like to ask, and let's not -- let's go.

>> please raise your hand so we can recognize and you then wait for the microphone to get there. let me take a point of -- a personal thank you for coming. welcome. welcome. and you did a great job. would you comment, if you can, on the oil spill? this is probably the laggers catastrophic event our country has ever seen. we thought the val disease oil spill was at that time, but this is very, very devastating. we've been working in louisiana for five years since katrina and gustav and ike, and we know those parishes, we know those people. and even before this oil spill, they were losing the ocean wetlands, they were losing the size of a football field every day. and now this oil has gotten

into those marshes and shut down the oyster, shrimp, fishing, it's going to devastate the economy down there. and i'm really proud of what president obama did meeting with b.p. in about getting that $20 billion fund set up, because that's going to be really important for sustaining at least some of those businesses, some of those fishing vessels and stuff down there right now. this bill is so large, and the thing that concerns us is that you see the spill on top of the water, but now they have plumes of spills that goes down 1,000 feet out in the gulf. what really concerns us now is we're 18 days into hurricane season, which goes to november. and the ocean is 44% warmer this year than it was last year

for hurricane season. and we've been in what they call -- if you're familiar with it -- el nino season, where the jet steam stays down south, but now we're going into a lot l.a. anyone yo season where the jet stream is moving north, which is going to open up just like a trough coming through. and nooa was talking, kind of a model of what would happen if a major hurricane got in the gulf. in some cases, it could help a little bit, but if the storm surge was big enough, and if it was a big hurricane, then you could have contamination inland for miles. that's what's scary. and then you don't know, and they can't tell us whether or

not the rigs they have out there, drilling those two wells down to stop this flow, they can't -- they can't tell us whether or not those rigs will withstand the hurricane of major proportions. so this is going to be with us for a while. and the folks down in louisiana are going to be suffering for a while. our hope is that if the president keeps the pressure on him that they'll at least have a look. i hope congress has been putting the pressure on them as well. they have a new person, bob dudley, that's going to handle the long-term recovery efforts, which works for b.p., but he's on the board of b.p., and from all indications that i have seen from him, at least he's american.

>> wait for the mic, please. >> i'm bar radio jones from the christian church, zpismse christ, which covers arkansas, louisiana, and mississippi. we have lots of hurricanes. my question is, when you were on the cabinet, we knew where to turn for those disasters. mitigations and recovery, when you were not there and katrina hit, it was a mess. and we had difficulty finding help, and we have just now gotten back on our feet, and i'm talking n.g.o.'s, and i'm talking recovery, and we have had to do it on our own at churches, etc. so we are very afraid of what's coming this season, and we've got a conference call coming next week with the new administration, what kinds of

organization is there now? where would we turn now in terms of government agencies? how is it set up now? >> well, you know, i'm not there, but we had a very, very strong relationship with a volunteer organization through each state. and we worked with them very closely and depended on them, technically for the individual assistance and shelters and particularly in the longer term recovery and even short term. we even had agreements move on with people, we combursed them. also, we even had a -- the places were set up set up for people and would reimburse our cost if they would come in, they donated all their labor,

which sometimes people want to evacuate if they want to take their animal to the shelter, which is not good. but i do not know -- you know, we had a whole division set up in fema that worked with volunteer organizations. i do not know what they have set up now. i know in katrina, sylvia matthews of the gates foundation called me. and they wanted to send a million dollars to louisiana to help to make a difference and said, who should we send that to? and i said send it to the voad organization in the state, because they're on the ground. they're there every day, and so that's what we did. but i don't know what they're doing now. i just don't. most states have, within their state plan, you know, the volunteer organizations and exercise with them and everything, but i do not know

what fema has now. i know they support the volunteer organization, but i'm not sure how much. >> please wait for the microphone here. >> do you and the people you work with see to be any greater number of extreme weather events creating disasters or does it just seem that way? >> no, there is. i mean, look at what happened yesterday. what was it, 32 tornadoes in minnesota. we are having more events, and they are more devastating than we've seen in the past, and it would be interesting in one of the institutes would basically, through climate change or whatever would track this and report this in a way that

people have a better understanding of what's happening in what areas of the country, as well as around the world, the institute puts on the a book every year on the state of the world. they usually do a chapter in that book of what's happening. but you look back, and from the eight years we were there to today, the events are much more frequent, and usually they're more devastating than we've seen in the past. but we have what we call at cnn disasters now. you know, they're at every disaster. they report everything. so, you know, back other years, we didn't have a cnn. but i don't think it's just the reporting. and we always try to keep up with it and follow it. look at china that's been hit so hard.

it's just -- i don't know. it's changed. and we don't have one-inch rain anymore or half inch rain. it's either three inches or 10 inches. you know, it's just different. and i don't know if i remember it this hot this time of year. >> questions? yes, right back here, sir. >> the newsy seen on tv and i've been reading has given me the impression that the government's response to the oil spill in the gulf has just been disorganized to the point of chaos, and i'd like to know, is that your impression too or something else? >> i think that -- i think that the federal response to that has been -- i think it's been good. it's a difficult response.

they've been working very closely with b.p. in trying to -- in trying to stop the oil and put as much assets that the federal government has down there. you know, some said they ought to put the military in charge of it. well, the military don't clean up oil spills. you know, they just -- you know, they're good at securing stuff and providing relief and so forth and protecting our country around the world, but the coast guard is the right agency to be down there right now to deal with this. you know, i was talking to the governor the other day, and i said, well, governor, maybe you need to ask for a federal disaster declaration, you know, for protective measures. and i think, in a lot of cases, the states along the gulf, i think there was a lot of stuff like that simply because they want to make b.p. pay for what

damages they have. they don't want -- they want b.p. to beg for it. and i don't blame them for that. but i think president obama and i think the federal government has as much resources as they can possibly put in there to support this effort. has had been perfect? no. could it have been perfect? i doubt it. it's a very difficult thing to deal with, and i don't think -- i hope we never see something like this again, because environmentally, it's catastrophic. there's no doubt. and there will be a lot of lessons learned from this event, and there will an lot of changes, not only in the federal government, but nalls state and local governments around this from these lessons. and it will be interesting to do the critique of the response to this. and i know that that will be done. i'd have to say that they've

done a decent job in it. i do. >> questions? yes, sir? >> he's coming with a mic. >> i used to work in floodplain management with the state, and i still have my certified manager certification, and it's dealing with the situation in mississippi county. i've read a lot about the 1927 flood, but also, when i worked in that job, i met with some people in mississippi county, especially the mayor of a real small town and said, we can't have any kind of development since our town's flood plain, all of it. what do you think of the remapping and what can best serve both parties? obvious well safety being first. >> i've looked at the remapping , and i understand why they want to do that, because they

wanted -- if there's a possibility of anyone could be affected by a flood, they'd like for them to at least have an opportunity to have insurance. and to have that coverage. some people say that, well, they've gone from 100-year floodplain to a 500-year floodplain, because they were behind $23 billion from katrina, they want to make that up. i don't think that's true. i think they're trying to manage the floodplains in the sense of people being covered if they've already -- if they've already built there. if you're going to build a 100-year floodplain, you're taking your own risk yourself. you know, it's just not good. but for that reason i think they're doing this is to manage the floodplains in a sense that

people cannot have insurance and we'll be able to purchase the insurance. that's the only reason i think they've done it. we started -- we started the program back when i was at fema , all the floodplain maps. you can go online and you can see where that floodplain was, and i know they've been finishing that program and working on that hard, which is a good thing. but i think that's the reason they're doing it. i know in eastern arkansas, it's a marriage problem right now. and i know that people that's lived in a 500-year floodplain from a river or a creek or a stream that have lived there for 50 years and never seen the flood. they're not too interested about flood insurance. i know that. but if you live in an area like

that and you're going to build a new house, and those floodplain maps are 500-year floodplains, and you don't have flood insurance, you're not going to build that house there. >> before i ask terry garner, the director of the clinton library, to come give you a preview of this great exhibit, let's give a round of applause here. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> coming up next, "washington journal." then a house oversight hearing on mortgage foreclosures. and later, live coverage of today's g-8 summit in canada. >> in about 45 minutes, "washington journal." .