rates. thank for you joining us. a reminder that it's the weekend and on v span 2 the next 48 hours beginning tomorrow morning, book tv, 48 hours of nonfiction books and on c-span 3, it's american history tv. 48 hours of american history. that's c-span 2 and c-span >> on the second friday in november, the economy added 200- 4000 new jobs last month. the unemployment rate climbed from 7.2%.

the jobs numbers rose to above expectations despite the 15 day government shutdown last month. the results are a clear september, 140 8000 jobs were added. the stock market is rising moderately. reaction from president obama this afternoon in new orleans. a day after the release of gdp numbers showing growth. you can see live coverage right 1:10on c-span set for eastern. coming up, we will hear from the assistant secretary of state for nonproliferation. the stimson center is hosting a of mass weapons instructions. that is live at 3:00 p.m. eastern. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] geneva torry heads to

meet with foreign ministers of france, britain, and germany as they type -- take part in negotiations with iran. sidetrip is ay's sign that iran is a consideration. the ap is reporting that according to carry, gaps need to -- bridgedh -- brigde with iran. >> we all feel very fortunate that we are living in the u.s., it is a very unique place. if america was considered to be a product, we do try to sell our product overseas, what is our brand? is a constitution, the rule of law, and our value system.

under that brand and that value system, there is the notion of equal under the eyes of the law. ada andat system is the trying to elevate the rights of americans with disabilities. >> this is a treaty, a treaty is a law. the emotional and political arguments in favor of the treaty -- no one can disagree with these arguments. but the question is, will the tree actually had the legal treaty-- will the actually have the legal effect. we do not hear consideration of the reports by the committee on the rights of persons with disability. we do not hear legal analysis that would be appropriate for analyzing the legal impact of this treaty. >> this weekend, more than 130 countries have ratified the u.s.-inspired the u.n. disabilities treaty.

the senate foreign relations committee took up the tree again, watch saturday morning at 10:00 a.m. on book tv, malcolm gladwell talks about the upsides of being a big fish in a small pond. on american history tv, on a crowded sacramento street, lynette fromme pulled the trigger. more sunday. place is called the mercedes-benz superdome in new orleans. where the bcs title game is, etc.. bill at the public expense. it wasurricane katrina, a national feel-good story. the public paid for all the repairs. invested about $1 billion in the construction of the mercedes-benz superdome.

the man who owns the new orleans saints keeps almost all of their revenue. why don't people rebel? one reason is many people do not understand this is taking place. the second reason is they feel like there is nothing they can do about it. it is all based on insider deals, it is, largely. the most recent time that there was a vote in miami last year. there was a vote on using public money to renovate the place where the miami dolphins play. the citizens voted against doing that. >> more with the king of sports author gregg easterbrook on q&a. fema administrator craig fugate and shaun donovan testified on capitol hill this week, providing an update on y aricane standing -- sand

year after it struck the east. this is about two hours. >> welcome to the subcommittee of >> welcome to the subcommittee of emergency management in the district of columbia. we thank you all for being here. we are here today to examine the recovery in the north east one year after hurricane sandy came to shore on october 29, 2012. as we mark this solemn anniversary we owe it to ourselves and to those who were lost a year ago to continue to learn from sandy, to improve disastrous response and recovery across the country. as we all know, the next big disaster can happen at anytime, anywhere. my home state of alaska, we have our fair share of disasters from the gulf, from the alaska earthquake to the oil spill.

we saw a flood along the yukon river. the ongoing recovery is a testament in the same type of federal, state, and local coordination that was so crucial to the months following hurricane sandy. as cochair of the national preparedness month, which wrapped up at the end of september, i believe it is also important to remember that individuals play a large role in preparing their communities for disasters. following sandy we saw citizens from around the country donating their time, money, resources, and expertise to help the affected area. nonprofit organizations like the red cross mobilized volunteers and leveraged nongovernmental resources. it is in this whole community response that proves to be the best practice in large disasters. alaskans take care of our neighbors. which is why i voted to support disaster relief funding

following sandy. we understand that the interconnected infrastructure is both of this country's biggest asset and our biggest vulnerability. all disasters begin locally and their effects can reach beyond established geographic boundaries. one of the most critical aspects of the recovery process following a disaster is learning from mistakes and integrating those lessons learned. since hurricane katrina, fema has worked with other members of the federal family to institutionalize recovery reforms. the agency has released the national disaster recovery framework just last year and it is already in used in states across the country, including my home state of alaska. all agencies represented here today have illustrated a fierce commitment to response and recovery. i applaud their efforts but we can do better. our responsibility of an oversight committee is to make sure we do better. one area that i believe requires additional oversight is the financial management of the

sandy supplemental funding. in january, congress approved $50 billion to aid with response to recovery efforts, being performed by 19 federal agencies. assuring this money is spent in a timely fashion is critical. as we know there are many communities and individuals still in need over a year from the storm. we must also assure that taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely. as stewards of the public money federal agencies must be , accountable for their expenditures and must be prepared to communicate exactly how these funds are being used. i don't advocate for burdensome reporting requirements the slowdown recovery. controls exist to protect our national investment. we must assure that laws and regulations that govern the preparedness, mitigation, is fore and recovery robust communities across the country. this must be the top priority. i look forward to hearing the testimony from today. we are doing something a little different.

we will have senator paul interrupt the flow, allowing him his opening statement. we have invited members who are not members of the committee to also participate. but they were affected by sandy. also, having senator landrieu here, who was affected by katrina in her community -- i have asked members to make sure that -- we will have your full statements in the record and then a reminder that we want to hear from any of our folks here to testify. we will start with senator landrieu. i will do an order of appearance. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i am going to leave my comment briefly submit my full statement to the record and honor the delegation from the northeast that is here. the work of senator schumer, senator schumer, senator menendez, and senator gillibrand was essential to this recovery effort. of course, welcome senator booker to the committee.

the former mayor, right in the middle of the storm as it occurred. i'm sure you can bring expertise to the senate and this committee as we struggle to build a better response to disasters of all sorts, man-made or natural. small, medium, and catastrophic, which was clearly the case of katrina and came very close in sandy. we have a long way to go. but i appreciate the work of this special subcommittee. it is what mayors and county commissioners and chambers of commerce and individual families and consumers and residents -- the citizens count on us to do our best work. in times of disaster they know their government will be there for them and helping them to recover. i will submit my full statement to the record, but i really think -- thank the northeast delegation for their extraordinary work in recovery. we managed to get a little bit of money out of the bill in louisiana to keep going with our ongoing permanent recovery of the many storms that hit our

state. >> thank you very much. senator paul does not have an opening statement but i thank him for attending and being part of this. he is the ranking member and it is important we continue to analyze all of these issues related to the emergency response of our country. the order of attendance, senator booker. you can tell he is new by his sign plate. he brought his own as a former mayor. >> a get smaller, though. >> senator menendez, you were not supposed to say that. we wanted him to learn that process. i will start with you and go to senator menendez. >> first of all -- i cannot thank you enough, this very important hearing. not only to i appreciate the opportunity to participate, but this is clearly my first hearing as a senator.

it could not be on a more important issue to the people of my state. thank those like to testifying, including a longtime friend of mine, secretary donovan who has been a partner , with me on many issues. i look for to working with him even closer now. i look forward to hearing what he has to say as well as those others who are testifying today, especially administrator few gay -- administrator fugate. in the aftermath of hurricane sandy, many people in this room played such critical roles, holding multiple hearings and advocating for robust federal response, to ensure that new jersey, new york, and although states affected had the resources and support they needed. on behalf of the people of new jersey i think everyone for their leadership and for your recognition that much urgent work had to be done. i want to especially acknowledge my senior senator, senator menendez. he is a true champion of our state.

as a mayor who had significant impact and loss of life, he was a champion of the whole state and every community that was suffering. from day one you are crisscrossing the state, surveying damage and shepherding desperately needed resources to new jersey. there's no denying the process we have made -- the progress we have made. low-interest loans, national flood insurance program payments and public assistance grants. in new jersey we are resilient, we are determined, and we are incredibly resourceful. our famous boardwalks have welcomed families and tourists to the jersey shore. cities like hoboken, atlantic city, and newark are bustling with activity. families and business people

continue to pick up the pieces and move forward. still, far too many are recovering and it is challenging. it is a daily struggle. from little ferry in north jersey were we were -- where we were, thousands remain out of their homes. countless businesses have been washed away in the storm and have not been reopened. in july i visited orderly beach. there were many signs of rebirth. i ate in some of the restaurants. i saw houses that stood like skeletons on the roadside, the façades intact but insides gutted. many of the residence i spoke to there on roosevelt avenue felt left behind and forgotten by washington. they were still in pain. any of them had challenges not just with d.c., but with trenton. i know no one in this room has forgotten those families. they remind us that we have so much more work to do. in new jersey we have an

estimated gap of $28.3 billion between what is needed for a full recovery and what we are receiving in federal support. this number considers residential and commercial sector support reimbursement of municipalities and activities. though congress passed a relief package in the aftermath of the storm, billions of dollars in federal assistance have yet to make their way to families in need. one state run federally run , package, the reconstruction mitigation grant program provides up to $150,000 to individual families, critical dollars to help them rebuild their homes. until last week, this $600 million program had yet to make even a single payment. the logjam in federal funding's is devastating. indeed the delay has put lives on hold and entire families were uprooted from their homes.

small businesses are still shuddered. shuttered. retirements postponed, and i have heard directed from any of those affected painful stories of strong people struggling against incredible odds that determined to make it one way or another. as i travel across my state there is understandable concern . they speak of a bureaucratic maze that forces those impacted by the storm to complete reams of what seems to be unnecessary paperwork sometimes just to be considered for federal aid. they detail stringent regulations that lead to little to no flexibility. they worry about impending hikes in their flood insurance rates as well. we must increase our sense of urgency to get funding out the door as quickly as possible, while still remaining goods -- good stewards of taxpayer dollars and always protecting against fraud. it is critical that we provide

accessible grant programs and to avoid something that has been championed by the people to my right, the rising of flood insurance rates at a time when it would bring severe economic distress to too many families recovering after a disaster. as this committee knows too well, recovery from a national disaster of this magnitude is a very long process. it is not easy. as hard as it seems for those here who have been toiling for over a year to make this work. we can be sure that it is much, much harder for the thousands of new jersey business owners and families. they are the ones deserving of a helping hand in the wake of this storm. my commitment to them is to join with all of you to ensure the folks from the maurice river to little ferry to everywhere in between get the health they need, the help they need, the help they expect and the help , they deserve.

i look forward to working with state and local officials, my fellow senators to make this recovery. period ass recovery short as possible. thank you. >> thank you very much. i have senator menendez next. >> thank you, mr. chairman. since you are going to include our full statement for the record i am not going to go through it all. or are a couple of points i want to highlight, particularly for the committee's consideration as it moves forward in thinking about future disasters. let me just say i am thrilled to be here with my colleagues from new york, who were extraordinary in our joint effort to fight for the resources for recovery in our area. i remember my late colleague frank lautenberg, a member of this committee that was passionate about this issue -- i appreciate then mayor booker doing an extraordinary job. people think it was only the thee of new jersey, but cities faced challenges. he did an extraordinary job

responding to the crisis there. that is where you really test the mettle of leadership. we appreciate his leadership in this regard and look forward to having him work in with us and continue to recover. there are many successes. secretarycommend hud as the overall chair of this, the transportation department, fema there were many successes. are also challenges. recovery is not yet a reality for the people of new jersey. there are many people who are hurting and they continue to languish. which floodose for insurance did not exist or if it existed did not make them whole. there are those who find themselves in new flood zones that mean the ability to keep their home and what they have built in their lifetime is known the crosshair because of new

requirements to either raise their homes and or a variety of other issues as well. there is a responsibility to ensure that when we give out the the taxpayer's money, even in a disaster, that we do it in a way that ultimately ensures the integrity of that money. that has to be balanced by the urgency of now. i appreciate that, hopefully part of what the task force is doing is looking at how we do this prospectively. so we do not wait for disaster to figure out what the appropriate programs are needed to set up in response. that process, in trying to balance the integrity of the money with the need and urgency of now has been a challenge. there has still been too much money flowing to the state that does not quite flow to the people of new jersey. we need to do a better job of

that. and the one thing i do want to take the balance of my time to talk about, and i appreciate virtually all of my colleagues sitting here and the chair having joined us, is the question of, not the natural disaster we face, but the man- made disaster we have if we do not rectify it. that is the question of flood insurance. the reality is that for thousands of people in new jersey, recovery is an around- the-clock effort. new jersey families and others in the nation, as we saw by the broad bipartisan support, have been hit with a triple whammy. they were first flooded by sandy and lost their homes, their lifetime of effort, many memories of a lifetime, and then the second was they had to face repair and mitigation costs and then now, thirdly, they are

facing astronomical increases in flood insurance costs built into the flood reform bill that was passed before sandy hit. the fact is that the combination of updated flood maps and the phaseout of premium subsidies for the national flood insurance program threatens to force victims out of their homes and destroy communities. homeowners would be forced to pay premiums several times higher than the current rate. and those that cannot afford the higher premiums will be forced to sell or be priced out of their home, which will drive down property values and local revenues at the worst possible time. so i want to take the opportunity to promote a bipartisan legislation that seeks to take a timeout, that seeks to say, we asked fema to do an affordability study. they have not finished it, we

shouldn't have premium increases until that affordability is done and we find and affordability mechanism so we can keep the solvency of the program, but also create affordability so people do not lose their homes and be the victims of a natural disaster. that, mr. chairman, i think is one of the most urgent things. i look forward to your help and the help of our colleagues. >> thank you very much. senator gillibrand. >> i want to get a special thanks to senator landrieu, who i have dubbed the third senator from new york. she was such a vociferous advocate for our families. she made sure we could fix as many things in advance to make sure recovery flowed on the make sure all of the logjams she experienced with hurricane katrina did not happen in new york, new jersey, and other states. she is someone who understands these programs, what works and

what doesn't work. i just want to thank her for her continued focus on recovery and preventing and creating resiliency. her leadership has been extraordinary. i also want to thank senator menendez and senator schumer. and senator lautenberg. you have never seen stronger champions than my colleagues to put themselves in the shoes of every family and advocates for what they need most. i want to thank them for their leadership in i know senator booker will stand and senator lambert's -- senator lautenberg's shoes and he will be the same strong advocate. he has shown it as mayor and i know you will show it as senator. obviously, the road to recovery is long and hard. new yorkers are strong. we rebuild, we rebuild better, we rebuild stronger. the damage was severe. we lost 61 lives. we lost hundreds of thousands of small businesses.

we lost 300,000 homes. i remember senator landrieu, who suffered far more loss of life, really could not quite conceive of the loss we separate at home -- we suffered in businesses and homes because our population was so dense. our road to recovery was difficult and different. our solutions are difficult and different. i think what you're doing is essential to meeting our goals. congress has worked hard on a couple of problems and did a few things that were necessary. we extended the critical deadline to give sandy survivor's the time they needed to document the losses, which is difficult for some families. we did ease regulations that would have invented substantially damaged homes from accessing recovery funds. we received assurances from the army corps of engineers that they will fund projects. this is something that senator schumer was very aggressive on, very early on. there were a lot of projects that the army corps has designated as necessary.

we wanted to make sure they got funded, he made sure that was the case. we have to do so much more. that is what the senators have already talked about, have touched upon. we have to continue to assure that the red tape does not get in the way of reimbursements. we need to make sure that these communities can get the financing and the money they need. we have to make sure that homeowners, individual homeowners receive the kind of resources that they need to rebuild. the senate must pass legislation that we have cosponsored to delay the added burden of flood insurance premium increases. these increases are set to take affect and no one can afford them. they are unaffordable for nearly every new yorker i have spoken to. absolutely out of reach. you cannot have a flood insurance program that is too expensive for everyday americans. it just does not work. we must do that. when fema has completed the study we can look at it and congress can help make a plan on

how to make the rates affordable. even as homeowners are rebuilding their seeing this -- these rates increase. many new yorkers may not be able to rebuild. they are out of a home they are , homeless. as we continue to recover from sandy we need to strengthen the resilience for our future storms. this is not the first nor the last superstorm. as we see storms come and more violently, more damaging, more lives lost, we know what is to come. when we rebuild we have to rebuild for the future storms. every dollar that we have to strengthen our homes and businesses saves four dollars and recovery costs down the line. earlier this year, senator wecker and i introduced a bill called the strong act, we introduced it in the epw committee. it is called the strong act. it is a bipartisan bill. it is the kind of bill that builds on the progress that mary landrieu and others have been making on these storm recovery

efforts. it also do something that engages the local government by requiring the government to develop strategies. and to assess where there are gaps and use best practices developed throughout the country. we have come a long way in the last year. as i have said, we have so much more to be done. when i read reports of how few homeowners have been actually able to rebuild, it breaks your heart. new yorkers want to rebuild, they want to rebuild stronger but they need your help. thank you so much for your dedication. >> thank you very much, senator schumer? >> thank you mr. chairman. first, let me thank you for your diligence. you have been a great force as we have had our times -- troubled times. senator landrieu has been invaluable. we have learned from the mistakes that were made in katrina and she was our guide as we went through this. i want to thank my colleagues here. we were a great team.

they did basically the impossible getting $60 billion , we were held up for too long period of time. getting that amount of money in programs that are going to work was an accomplishment we can be proudest of in our careers. i want to welcome senator booker. lautenberg'sfrank large shoes as a member. i want to say to the five of you, i have worked closely in making sure things work. you have done a great job. you have done a public service at the federal and city level. i can think of accomplishments we have done together in terms of negotiating and getting things done. ,hank you to shaun donovan , i have not dealt with ms. tighe.

she is oversight. keep an eye on us. well, you know, there's so much to say here. first, there's a question everyone asks. how is it going? it's going, overall, very well. the amount of money that has been spent and allocated is large. and at least up till now, and let's hope it continues, we haven't seen a major misspending of money. we wanted to avoid the scene of trailers being unused which happened despite mary landrieu's great efforts in louisiana. and then what she warned us of as well, lots of money sitting there that couldn't be used. so the way we structured these programs, particularly cdbg but the army corps's programs, the transportation programs, the fema programs as well, was to make sure that the money would go where it had to go and go quickly but without wasting money. so i know there was a move all

the money should be spent in three months. if that were happening, there would be still millions of people, or thousands of people, complaining that they didn't get what they needed because it wouldn't have been allocated carefully and properly, and there would have been lots of our newspaper reporters writing about, oh, all the misspent money. we haven't seen that. so it's taken longer than we would like. and it is certainly true that homeowners have not gotten the money that we would like to see them have gotten more quickly. but i believe while the first year was one of laying the structure and recovery, making sure the roads were cleared, making sure people had electricity, making sure rents were paid for the hundreds of thousands of people who were pushed out of their homes, the second year first year was recovery, but second is rebuilding. the money is flowing and flowing well, and flowing, i think, in a way that it will be better used than in any major public disaster in the history of this country. our homeowners will

see $1.4billion. we told many of them, we all did together, lay out the money to rebuild and you will be repaid. and the combination of the fema program, which is fairly rigid and the cdbg program which is more flexible, will lead to that happening. now, it couldn't happen immediately for a lot of reasons. first, people did have to rebuild. second, we weren't going to pay when private insurance should step up to the plate. so we had to see how much private insurance people were getting. what we made sure of is if your damage was $100,000 and your fema money was $10,000 and your private insurance was $40,000 and you had a $50,000 gap that the cdbg money will be there. good thing. second, we worked really hard to make sure that there were mitigation processes put in housing and transportation and in everything else we did. so when we rebuild, we'll be much more resilient against a future storm, which has been said will happen.

and we've done that. and that makes a great deal of sense, too. so i predict that the second year of sandy recovery will be a year when people see lots of rebuilding. and by the end of year two people will be a whole lot happier with the program than they are at the end of year one, but it's because of the good work that we all did together, the five of us here. cory, of course, doing his work in newark. the five of us at the federal level and those of you back there. it's been a strong team effort that i believe will be regarded as one of the most successful efforts in terms of getting a large area to recover from a powerful, horrible storm as well and as quickly as possible. >> thank you, senator. i would like to go through the panel. on a you for your work

daily basis on the disasters we are faced with across the country. the first to speak secretary of hud, secretary donovan, and has served in the position since 2009. thank you for coming to alaska as you have done before. he served in the new york city department of housing and development. i know you have a personal concern of what happens in new york. let me turn it over to secretary donovan. >> chairman, senators, it is a great pleasure to be joining you today. i want to begin by remembering that last week on the oneyear anniversary of hurricane sandy our nation paused to remember all of those who lost their homes, their businesses, and most tragically lost their lives. i remember visiting the region soon after the storm struck and being stunned by the breadth of destruction. $65 billion in damage and economic losses, 650,000 homes

damaged or destroyed, 9 million people lost power. it was clear that the road to recovery would be long and difficult. but if you know anything about the people from this region, and i'm proud to count myself as one of them, it's that they are resilient. they may get knocked down, but they always get back up. after sandy, they began the work of putting their lives and communities back together and president obama pledged his support of these local efforts in order to ensure a full recovery. so we created the taskforce to maximize cabinet level coordination in support of the work to rebuild this region. i have been enormously proud to chair this effort as we worked to achieve two basic goals. one, to get the assistance that you all fought so hard to make a reality, to communities as quickly as possible. to meet the immediate needs. and, second, to ensure that the region rebuild stronger and smarter than before so that it's better equipped to deal with future storms. let me begin with the work of

getting assistance to communities quickly and effectively. as you know, in january, president obama working with all of you in the congress, state and local leaders fought tirelessly to get $50billion in sandy supplemental funding in order to aid victims of the storm. it's been a priority to get these dollars into communities as quickly and responsibly as possible. that's why we thought it was critical to include several measures in the supplemental that facilitated more efficient spending of these dollars. i want to particularly call out senator landrieu for all of her help and assistance on this. a few examples. giving hud the authority to reduce duplicative environmental reviews. as a result of these and other measures, we made great progress on a number of fronts. more than 230,000 people in small businesses have received direct assistance from fema, the small business administration, the department of labor. more than 99% of sandyrelated national flood insurance policy claims totaling more

than $8billion have been paid ot to policyholders who filed claims. 97% of public beaches in the affected region were opened by memorial day 2013, sending a strong message that the shore was ready for business. and when you include the national flood insurance program, the administration has allocated nearly $40billion in funding for recipients with roughly $13.5billion of this already paid out. hud in particular, has allocated $10billion in communiy development block grants including an allocation that took place within eight days of the signing of the sandy supplemental into law. this it represented the fastest ever allocation following the signing of an appropriations bill. so relief is getting to communities. but as you have all said, we know it can never be fast enough. that's why we've been creative in finding ways to work with local partners to expedite the rebuilding process. this includes the small business administration's work to accelerate application processing times which has fallen from 61 days to 42 days,

a drop of about 1/3. the use of a streamlined permit and review process for complex, large infrastructure projects that's based on a model which is which has reduced implementation times by 51%. one example, cutting three to five years off the projects like the tappan zee bridge. the alignment of foreclosure prevention policies in disastereffected areas making it easier to stay in homes at such a critical time in their lives. and the establishment of a uniformed minimum flood risk reduction standard across the federal government for major sandy rebuilding projects, representing the first time a federal governmentwide standard has been set that accounts for the effects of rising sea levels and moving forward, we'll continue to look for new ways to remove unnecessary barriers and headaches, ensuring that the billions that flow into the region are put into use as quickly and efficiently as possible.

this complements our other goal, rebuilding stronger and smarter so that the region is better prepared to withstand future storms. on august 19, the taskforce released our rebuilding strategy for the region which included 69 recommendingions to do just that. it included steps to harden our power grid and our fuel supply chain to address the outage and gas lines we saw during sandy and steps to help families and small businesses rebuild in these new times. the strategy also identifies ways to leverage additional private funds to support infrastructure projects. investing in projects that will make our communities more resilient is vital to their safety. it's also good for our economy. as senator gillibrand pointed out, we know for every dollar we spend, we save $4 in avoided costs in future storms. every recommendation in this strategy has a detailed implementation plan, and i and my department will be accountable to the region to you, to see them through. and we will stay at it for as long as it takes knowing that eventually we'll emerge stronger and more vibrant than ever. as i mentioned earlier,

following sandy, it was clear that the road to recovery would be long and difficult. a year later, we made significant progress. families have gotten back on their feet, businesses, communities turning the page and looking to the future. we all know that much more work needs to be done. all of us in the obama administration are committed to working with local partners and with all of you to continue to get assistance to those in the process of rebuilding, ensure the region is better prepared to withstand future extreme weather events, and work to improve our recovery efforts across the nation. these are goals i look forward to working with this committee on and i look forward to answering your questions today. thank you. >> thank you very much. the next person i have on the list is has served as a deputy secretary of dot since 2009 before becoming the deputy secretary he served twice as a secretary of the maryland department of transportation. thank you very much for being here. >> thank you, chairman. and members of the subcommittee. it's a pleasure to be here today to highlight the department of transportation's role in

assisting the communities that were devastated by hurricane sandy a year ago. when the hurricane hit, the damage it caused didn't just take a tragic human toll it also dealt a devastating blow to the regional transportation system which is the life blood of the region's economy. the aviation side, three of the busiest airports in the country and 19,000 flights were effected. the highway system, as well, suffered significant damage. but what stands apart is this historic storm triggered the worst public transit natural disaster in the history of the united states. in response to this disaster, congress passed the disaster relief appropriations act which included $12.4billion in assistance for transportation programs. it's worth noting that assistance was reduced 650 million dollars due to sequestration. the emergency relief program pro prosed by president obama in

2011, later authorized by our transportation bill map 21. this emergency relief program for transit was in place for about 30 days before the disaster hit. in addition to helping transit agencies make immediate repairs, the program also supports mitigation activities that will improve resiliency and help transit infrastructure resist similar storms in the future. disaster relief appropriations funding also went to fix the rest of the transportation network as well, roads and bridges, restore amtrak service, and as i mentioned, repair airport facilities at newark, la guardia and j.f.k. to date, the department of transportation allocated nearly $7billion for repairs and resiliency efforts in response to sandy. we've learned a lot from the hurricane experience that will help us respond to future events. first, a coordinated and efficient federal response is essential. president obama's hurricane

sandy rebuilding taskforce has helped all the federal agencies involved work together to deliver the best possible outcomes for the communities effected by the storm. secretary donovan's leadership has been important in moving forward. second, hurricane sandy and other recent disasters underscore the nation's vulnerability to extreme weather events under current climate conditions. that's why one of our top priorities moving forward is to better protect existing transportation infrastructure and equipment from the impact of future natural disasters it just makes sense if we're going to spend money rebuilding transportation, let's build it to last. we'll soon be issuing a notice of funding availability for capital projects that will reduce the risk of damage from future disasters in the region impacted by hurricane sandy. we're going to do that on a competitive basis. we believe these investments in resiliency will help reduce the need for any future recovery efforts. and has been previously pointed out, research has shown every dollar spent by fema on actions

to reduce disaster loss now saves the nation almost $4 in avoided impacts. we're hoping to realize similar cost savings for the american taxpayer by ensuring that our transportation infrastructure is built to withstand future storms. however, i must caution the need for resilience investment far exceeds the available funding. the f.t.a. has only emergency relief funds available for hurricane sandy recovery efforts and nothing nationwide beyond that. that leaves us without any ability at the department to address our next crisis, including future emergencies occurring outside this region. much of my own career has been at the state and local level. i know firsthand how important it is to respond quickly and effectively. i strongly encourage congress to appropriate funds so that when the next disaster strikes and takes public transportation systems offline, we'll be in a position to respond immediately. i thank the subcommittee for inviting me to testify.

thank you. >> thank you very much. the next speaker is mr. craig fugate who was confirmed for the fema administration administrator in 2009 after serving as the director of the florida division of emergency management. in 2004 he managed the largest federal disaster response in florida history as four major hurricanes impacted the state. thank you very much. good to see you again. >> thank you, mr. chairman. senators. secretary donovan laid out a lot of the numbers. i want to come back to what you have done to set the stage for what we were able to do as a federal government and then our next steps. i'm going to start with something that you're not hearing a lot about, but i think it's important we talk about. and that's been the continuous support and funding for state and local governments and grants and emergency management grants building the capability at the state and local level to manage the impacts of these types of disasters. without that, the federal

government could not have done its job if our state and local partners weren't able to do theirs. so this is one thanks for the investment over time specifically since 9/11, those investments are paying off in increased capability and resiliency our communities have against all hazards. we would not have been prepared to respond without the formation -- the post katrina response. and i doubt very much i would be here testifying. that law substantially changed what fema mission was, requirements of the person that has chosen to lead the organization, as well as the tools required to not wait until states are overwhelmed before the federal government can mobilize. this put us in the position under the president's leadership to move resources and plays -- and supplies before any state was hit by the storm, before we knew how devastating this was going to be. again, those tools set the stage for the response and support of state and local government.

but the other part of that, which we oftentimes talk about the money and the supplemental, overshadows something i think is very fundamental, a change to the stafford act. and that was the sandy recovery improvement act. many of the issues that we still had, that became impediments to recovery. probably one of my best examples was in debris. we were actually increasing the cost of removing debris because we had rules and policy that said if you use your folks and your public works department to pick up debris, we're not going to reimburse you for those costs. only their overtime. if you hire a contractor to do that we'll pay you the full cost share on that. it was these tools that we began to implement. we have used them in disasters post. these were not sandy specific, but sandy became the catalyst of how we would be better stewards of getting money out effectively

to empower local and state governments to rebuild faster without losing the ability to maintain the fiduciary responsibility of ensuring that the dollars go towards the things they were intended to go. we have used these not only in now sandy but in some of these that we were allowed to go to previous disasters, where we've been able to use estimating tools in vermont to did a big challenging project there. we have been able to do some things that quite honestly they always made sense, but you gave us the tools. and although it was only a few tribes impacted, this came after sandy, i think for our sovereign federally recognized tribes also something that was very unheralded. you finally gave federally recognized tribal governments the recognition of their sovereignty that no longer requires them to go through a state to request declarations. and we implemented that program after the law was signed. the first tribal government that came ins with the eastern band

cherokee. we did not wait for the rules to catch up. we did not wait for our procedures to catch up. we implemented the law as intended and have successfully executed disaster declarations at the request of tribal governments. we have a lot of work to do. not only we tend to look at oneyear marks. but i knew going in this was going to be a multiyear recover -- recovery. i think senator schumer said it right, that the first year is oftentimes those initial steps where you see a lot of progress in the beginning and then it starts to slow down. because now we're starting to move in the rebuilding. and from the president's direction on down, what we want to make sure is we rebuild for the future and not the past. we know that we can make these improvements and make investments that we may spend a little bit more in the front end, but we assure the delivery of critical services and infrastructure in the future. and then lastly, senator martinez, again, we agree the administration's position on the reauthorization of flood insurance programs, we needed to

have affordability, but we found that in the legislation past, we did not have the tools to allow us to use that to build affordability before the increases took place. so, again, we look forward to working with congress to get a tool that allows us not to keep kicking the can down the road but address affordability for people that live in their homes but also ensure we're not building back the same way, putting people and future generations at risk. thank you. >> mr. chairman, martinez was my former colleague from florida. >> sorry, senator mendez. >> we're both cuban but we don't all look the same. >> yes. sorry. >> great. thank you very much. >> let me also say i really appreciate the work you did with the tribes. that's a huge opportunity. thank you for that. next person i have is ms. joellen darcy, assistant secretary of the army civil works which is primary supervision over the u.s. army corps of engineers. prior to her appointment, ms. darcy served as the advisor

to the senate finance committee responsible forest conservation, -- for environment conservation and energy issues. good to see you again. thank you. >> thank you, senator. thank you for the opportunity today to testify on the corps's continued working on the recovery from hurricane sandy. the federal support during the response to sandy was unprecedented. the corps was part of an interagency team to include state and local governments which provided technical assistance and rapid response activities across the impacted areas. the disaster relief appropriations act of 2013 provided the corps with $5.35 billion to address damages caused by hurricane sandy. this money's being used to reduce future flood risk and increase the longterm sustainability of the coastal ecosystem and communities while reducing the economic costs and risks associated with large floods and storms. the corps has made significant progress in the year since hurricane sandy. and in the time since the passage of the appropriations bill.

the corps's hurricane sandy recovery program has three major components. first, it's our nearterm component that supports emergency operations and repair and restoration of previously constructed corps projects along the coastline, dredging federal navigation channel and repair of corpsoperated structures. secondly, investigations component that expedites the completion of ongoing studies at full federal expense and funds the north atlantic coast comprehensive study. thirdly, our construction component rehabilitates, repairs, and constructs projects to reduce future flood and storm damage risk in smarter and more sustainable ways. as part of the near-term component, the corps started beach repair and restoration of existing projects along the atlantic coast in february of 2013 and is scheduled to conclude these actions by the fall of 2014. to date, the corps has placed approximately 12 millioncubic yards of sand to repair dunes and berms and will continue work

to restore them to their original designed conditions. also, the corps has obligated almost $390 million to restore damage projects. of the total 33 projects in this phase, seven are completely restored, 22 have been have awarded contracts, construction contracts, and four are in the design or preaward stage. nearterm efforts also include addressing the storm's impacts to our navigation infrastructure. the corps's operations and maintenance work began in february of 2013, and most projects are scheduled for completion by the spring of 2015. by the end of fiscal year 2013, the corps had obligated over $160 million for this work with 35 projects completed and 28 in construction. for the investigations component, the corps is using funding to expedite completion of 18 flood and storm damage reduction studies in the northeast that were underway when sandy occurred. $20 million of the investigation funding is for the comprehensive study which will assess

31,000 miles of the north atlantic coastline bringing together experts and coastal planning, engineering and science from more than 90 governmental, academic, and nongovernmental entities. the comprehensive study team has developed a draft framework that's currently under review. and the results of the study, we think, will inform our future planning efforts. the corps was also directed to conduct a performance evaluation study to evaluate the effectiveness of completed corps projects during hurricane sandy and to include summary recommendations for future improvements. i signed the transmittal of this report this morning. so it should be here on the hill by now. [laughter] the third component of the program will construct projects that were previously authorized but not constructed at the time of hurricane sandy's landfall. potential projects identified for implementation following the investigation process and projects that will fall within our continuing authorities program. planning, design, and expedited

reevaluations are underway for the 18 previously authorized but not yet constructed projects and the corps anticipates construction will begin in early 2014. the corps expects to complete construction working on roughly half of these flood risk reduction projects by mid 2015. of the identified continuing authority projects, massachusetts, connecticut, new york, new jersey delaware, maryland, and virginia are currently scheduled to receive beach erosion and coastal storm damage risk reduction projects. and we expect 70% of this work to be completed by 2016. there will always be residual risk for americans who live in coastal regions. expected changes in sea level rise, extreme weather, and other impacts are likely to increase the risks facing these areas. together with noaa and fema, the corps of engineers developed a sea level rise tool to help communities anticipate the influence of sea level rise.

we will use base flood elevation maps from fema, the coastal mapping capabilities of noaa. and a sea level rise calculator from the corps of engineers. this tool yesterday was recognized by the president and was awarded the green government climate change champion award. so the collaboration between our agencies as a result of sandy has already produced a future looking sustainability and tool that we can all use throughout the federal government. in addition, noaa and the corps of engineers are working together to help rebuild more resilient and sustainable coastal communities. while working on post sandy recovery efforts in new york and new jersey, noaa and the corps set systems, rebuilding principles in order to promote a unified strategy for activities in restoring the coast. collaborative efforts on all levels continue to explore and implement solution that reduce risk from coastal storms such as appropriate land use planning,

nonstructural solutions, and well communicated evacuation planning. mr. chairman, and members of the committee, i thank you for the opportunity and look forward to any questions. >> thank you very much. our next speaker is ms. kathleen tighe, chair of the recovery, accountability, and transparency board while continuing herr position as inspector general for the department of education. the board has been charged with tracking federal dollars being spent on the sandy recovery. thank you for being here. >> thank you very much. mr. chairman, senators, i want to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. as chair of the recovery board, i will be speaking to you about the board's role and the oversight of funds expended in support of hurricane sandy recovery efforts. the board was created in february 2009 as part of recovery act. it consists of 12 inspectors

general and its mission is to provide transparency of the use of recovery funds and to prevent and detect fraud, waste and abuse. we meet this mission by managing the federalreporting.gov website through which recipients of recovery funds report and by displaying that spending information in unique ways on our public website, recovery.gov. we also develop the recovery operations center or what we call the roc, as a central data analytics service to support fraud detection and prevention. the roc has the ability to rapidly aggregate and analyze large, complex volumes of data to screen for potential risks or identify targets and provide deeper investigative information in the support of audits, investigations and prosecutions . while the board was originally due to sunset on september 30 of this year, the sandy legislation extended the board through september 2015 with additional duties for the board to develop and use our resources and oversight mechanisms to detect and remediate fraud, waste, and

abuse in funds related to hurricane sandy. our oversight efforts related to hurricane sandy have focused on applying the techniques and processes developed by the roc to examine the spending, primarily working with our ig partners. in coordination with the department of homeland security office of inspector general, we conducted a review of 104 entity that received hurricane sandy debris removal contracts from 32 cities in new york and new jersey totaling over $329 million. among the particular risk indicators we reported to dhsoig were firms whose owners had federal and state tax liens, ones that had been listed on the federal list of suspended or debarred bidders, and companies that had filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy and had federal tax liens. in addition to this work, we have provided assistance to dhsoig on its investigations of other fema, hurricane sandy public assistance grants, and to

other ig's and their sandy work. for the state of rhode island, we undertook a proactive analysis of 10,000 potential hurricane sandy contractors against our data bases that would show potential risks and reported information back to that state. in addition to our work in the roc, we are using our website, federaltransparency.gov to display what information is available on hurricane sandy spending. we visually display hurricane sandy awarded contracts from the federal procurement data system and agency award information as well as links to fema spending by state and state hurricane sandy websites. we also display the department of justice's disaster fraud reporting hotline. we are currently in the final stages of moving the hurricane sandy information to our recovery.gov website to be able to better use the functionalities of that website.

since commencing our work on hurricane sandy mission, we've identified a series of challenges that we continue to face. the first is a painting accurate and complete hurricane sandy spending data. with no mandated centralized reporting such as in recovery, access to standardized data is limited. while the federal procurement data system and usa spending have information related to hurricane sandy, each has its limitations. for example, on usa spending, hurricane sandy grants and loans lack a unique identifier, making it problematic to accurately extract and analyze hurricane sandy awards. in addition, the lack of sub recipient data will further complicate our work. given the types of hurricane sandy grants expected to be awarded, prime recipients of these awards oftentimes will be a state or a municipality but historically the majority of fraud occurs below this level by entities performing the actual work. that concludes my testimony. thank you for the opportunity to discuss the activities of the board. i look forward to answering any questions.

>> thank you very much. for our last speaker, again, i want to thank you for being here. i just want -- before i mention you and your title, i want to make sure the folks know for the record we did invite representatives of both the new york state and new jersey state government. they declined the invitation. so we're happy a local government person is here. i appreciate that as a deputy mayor for operations on august 4, 2011, as deputy mayor, mr. holloway oversees offices including the police department, fire department, office of emergency management. i was going to say mayor michael bloomberg, but you had an legislation last night. i'm not sure what it is today. we're glad you're here. we appreciate it, especially from a local perspective. so, please. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. just for clarification, the inauguration is january 1. so i still have my job for the next 55 days. [laughter] >> and so does the mayor. >> very good. good afternoon, mr. chairman and senators.

thanks for the opportunity to testify about the role and effectiveness of federal aid to new york city's recovery from hurricane sandy. i want to begin by thanking you on behalf of mayor bloomberg and all new yorkers for answering new york city's call after the unprecedented devastation caused by hurricane sant sandy. from president obama and members of his cabinet, including secretary donovan who's here today to entire agencies of the federal government, particularly fema, hud, and the army corps of engineers, to assets including generators, fuel, food, and many others to the billions of dollars in recovery aid that congress made available through the disaster relief appropriations act of 2013, what i'll refer to as the sandry recovery bill. the federal government has been there for new york city since well before sandy made landfall on the new jersey coast last october 29. sandy was the worst natural disaster to ever strike new york city. it took the lives of 44 new yorkers, caused unprecedented damage to public infrastructure and private property and triggered an enormous and on

going response. i will touch on the role of federal aid in three components of the recovery. before and up to five months after the storm the second stage housing recovery efforts that are underway now and will continue for the next 12 to 18 months and the city's plan to protect and mitigate against the climate related impacts that have become an increasingly frequent part of everyday life. i'll start with the pre and immediate after sandy aid. our partnership with federal agencies began well before sandy moved up the east coast to the united states and took that left ward hook that would subject new york city to the storm's most devastating impacts. as the city implemented its coastal storm plan, fema and the national weather service were embedded with us at the city's emergency operations center. and i was there for days. so i can attest we had much support. though the storm did tremendous damage, the prestorm evacuation operation was largely successful. and post storm surveys indicate that most new yorkers knew about the storm, knew if they lived in

a vulnerable area, and knew they should evacuate. after the storm together with fema and the new york national guard we removed an estimated 700,000 tons of storm debris through some of the contracts that mrs. tighe mentioned. fueled more than and the defense logistics agency. distributed more than 2.1 million meals ready to eat and canvassed more than 100,000 households in affected areas to distribute food and water, sanitary items, and make referrals to healthcare case management services. as we reported to you when congress took up the act, the city suffered an estimated $19.5 billion of damages due to the storm, including nearly $5 billion in direct recovery costs, hundreds of homes were totally destroyed, thousands of families displaced. given the density of new york city and the challenge of relocating, mayor bloomberg made it a priority to get people back into their homes.

thanks to the creativity of craig fugate and his team at fema, we developed what fema called the shelter and temporary essential power program step. in new york city we called it rapid repairs. rapid repairs was an innovative approach to shelter that is based on a simple premise, the best temporary shelter is permanent shelter. step enabled the city to hire contractors to make emergency heat, hot water and power repairs to victims' own homes. in only 110 days since we went into the first home on november 21, the city was able o complete repairs on 11,800 homes and multifamily buildings. that enabled roughly 54,000 new yorkers to return to their homes. and our survey data indicates that many most people, the vast majority, are back in their homes in new york city although many still need to recover.

they have additional recovery to do. all federal dollars are accounted for properly and we want to make sure they're properly spent. it's been a priority for new york city since the beginning. will we have established monitoring programs overseen by the department of investigation for each of the housing initiatives we have undertaken. we will continue this rigorous oversight. and we can provide reporting at any level that the committee would like. while rapid repairs helped thousands of new yorkers to move back into their homes, that was the beginning. thousands of families need much more work to be done to make a full recovery and make their homes able to better withstand severe storms and other climate impacts. thanks to 15.2, it was 16 unfortunately due to sequestration, of community developed block grant funding, and the leadership of shaun donovan and the federal recovery taskforce, we launched build it back, a $700 million program in june, with the city's first allocation of cdbg funding and the basic idea is to help homeowners continue that recovery.

as october 31, nearly 26,000 families have signed up for the program and approximately 500 of those had homes that were destroyed. we have encouraged many new yorkers to seek this help and we're glad that they've done so. of course, the overall need and demand does exceed supplies. so we will need additional allocations and to make sure that the neediest get funding and support first. we've prioritized by income level and those who are the most damaged. we estimate that between 55% and 60% of all of these applicants are in our first priority group and we're focusing on them. right now we're actually working, and we have 8,000 people who are going through insurance verification processes, tier two environmental assessments, and secretary donovan's been very helpful in trying to streamline those processes to take advantage of the work the federal government has done. at the homeowner and building level, the greatest remaining challenge for new yorkers is the affordability of flood insurance. members of this committee is well aware of it.

the city commissioned an independent study that shows that only 35% of property owners in the floodplain who were required to have flood insurance actually had it. premiums could go up for the new fema maps that are going to be coming out from an average of $430 a year to$5,000 to $10,000 a year. so we are encouraged by the legislation working its way through to delay until affordability can be addressed in a real way. of course, the greatest longterm challenge we face is protecting new yorkers over the long term. at the same time that we are getting families back into their homes and repairing the city's principle structure, the mayor commissioned a study on the impacts that new york city will face between now and the 2050's. the result is this plan, stronger, more resilient new york. i brought some extra copies for the committee. you can get it on our website, ncc.gov. it has initiatives to protect new york city's 520 miles of coastline as well as critical infrastructure and service networks over the long term.

sandy took out huge segments of the power grid. 95% of the telecommunications network in this lower manhattan. it took out hospital row on 1st avenue, closing down hospitals around the city. this plan is an achievable, affordable way to mitigate the most most of these impacts when the next big storm or other climate event, whether it's a flood, downpours or drought, hits new york city. and we are on track to complete 43 critical milestones before the end of the year. the army corps of engineers is one of our most important partners in this effort. we estimate more than $1.5million of cubic yards of sand were lost. 3 million more cubic yards are n the way. i have to say having worked with the army corps for the last seven years, the work that they're doing on the beach right now is the fastest i've ever seen them operate without exception. >> can i have you summarize? you're a little over the limit. >> sorry about that. >> don't worry. your statement will be included

in the record. >> great. i just want to note, new york city can't do all of this recovery alone. there are many areas over which we have little or no control. the power grid, telecommunications, and other critical networks. and so we want to work with congress, with additional allocations that we'll get to make sure we can implement this plan. clearly we have a long way to go and we'll need additional allocations. but if the support we've received from congress and the federal government so far is any indication, i'm confident we'll be able to meet those needs and better prepare new york for whatever climate challenges come next. i'm happy to answer any questions. >> fantastic. thank you very much. i'd like to go to the ranking member and then i'll come back to me and then down to the other two members that are here. senator paul? >> thank you. thank you. i grew up on the gulf coast, so i know about hurricanes from personal experience. we appreciate all of you trying to help in the aftermath of a terrible hurricane.

question for secretary donovan. do you think that sandy relief funds ought to be spent on tv ads? >> i assume what you're referring to, senator is that there has been an effort in a number of states not just in sandy but historically as well in many, many prior storms to encourage economic development. we did see a small amount of cdbg money that was used for an economic development campaign to encourage people back to the beaches. >> do you think it's a good idea or bad idea? >> the evidence that we've >> spending funds on tv ads. >> the evidence that we have seen is that those campaigns are effective in growing economic development in those areas. and, therefore, they actually reduce the cost of recovery to the federal government. >> i don't think we need to argue about whether ads work. ads work.

but do you think ads for sandy relief should be spent on tv ads? yes or no? a good idea, bad idea? >> as i said, we looked at the evidence and we have seen it encourages economic development. >> my understanding is you all gave -- you have to give a waive to do this. >> senator, if i could -- the community development block grant is a very flexible program. this is clearly within the legal boundaries of what congress has determined the program can be used for. it was demonstrated to us that this could be an effective tool. and actually lower the cost of the federal government. >> it gives a little bit of a black eye to something that maybe a lot of it is going to a good purpose. but i would say that if i were in your position, i would have said no, we're not going to spend ads. here's another problem. some of these ads people running for office put their mug all over these ads while they're in the middle of a political campaign. in new jersey 25 million was

spent on ads that included somebody running for political office. you think there might be a conflict of interest there? that's a real problem. that's why when people who are trying to do good and trying to use taxpayers' money wisely, they're offended to see our money spent on political ads. that's just offensive. in new york, you actually have a rule. they're not allowed to do it. so new york did the same thing , which i object, but at least they didn't put someone's face on the ad and their family. it looks like a bioad. i think, yeah, come to new jersey but it's like, i don't want to pay for ads for someone's advertising out of sandy relief fund it gives the whole thing a black eye. but it isn't just sandy relief funds. we spent $684 million advertising for obama care. well, it's a fairly contentious issue that was very partisan and passed by one party. should we then get to spend taxpayer money advertising for political purposes? i don't think a penny of taxpayer money should go to advertising. tv advertising. here's the other criticism.

people pointed out it's taken a while for money to get to people. i think it was like one article said one house or one homeowner in one instance coming for an department yet the money tv advertisers got through quickly. when people want to advertise and promote themselves, all of a sudden, boom, money is on tv it ad.nd so is thereeir i would just ask i know you want to do the right thing. reconsider whether or not it's a good idea. my understanding is it took a waiver from your office to use these grants for this and that the tv ads had to be approved in that sense by your office. the other thing is, there have been community development grants given to something called a river festival in manhattan. i sure hope none of this money is going to it and that i don't find out in a year the river festival got money for this. because the river festival is full of all kinds of great and groovy things like performance art, bunch of people showing up

and holding their cell phone up playing the same songs. that would be a lot of fun. i would thereof attend. but i hope we're not going to find sandy relief money went to stuff like that. as you said, community block grants can go to anything. so i sure hope that someone is watching the taxpayers' dollar. that's all i have. thank you. >> thank you very much. secretary donovan, can i follow up? i want to make sure we're clear on one thing. the cdbg money, as a former mayor and i think now senator booker would say the same thing, it can't be used for anything. there's limitations. is that correct? >> exactly correct. i did not say it could be used for anything. it has very clear statutory purposes. we reviewed and made sure that it did meet those purposes. if congress determines that economic development campaigns should not be included, then obviously that could be added to legislation. but currently they are within the bounds of the law. >> let me get to a broader question. and this is one -- i have a chart i've seen. i'm trying to analyze this.

fema -- i think i know the answer, but i want to have at least a three agency people, other than fema, answer this. feelia, when i look at the money -- fema, when i look at te money of appropriated, obligated, expendeds, you're fairly high up there. you've moved the money out there. the other is in the process or not as much in the percentages compared to what's appropriated. so maybe if i could start with mr. donovan and then go to the next two, just so i understand why there's a lag -- i think i know the answer, but i want to make sure i hear this for the record. i understand fema, because you've got to get in there. you don't have the luxury of waiting three years and bring the money after the fact. so help me understand that. because that's one of the questions that i get a lot of times when they see the reports and say where's the money being spent? can i start with you? >> absolutely. i think this is a very important point. one of the things that's critical to understand is by law

it is only allowed to be used on needs that are not met by other funding sources. >> so you're the last bucket. >> we are the third step effectively for homeowners, for small businesses. first, i think we've seen very consistently that fema moved very quickly to make that first allocation. but only up to $30,000 can be used for homeowners, for example. and that takes care of the moderate damage. you must make sure that your insurance company has paid their full claim. and that process needs to happen. and then only when those two have been utilized can we then make cdbg available. and that's why cdbg only began to pay out more recently. let me just give you one comparison. at the point where we are today, since the appropriation was made by congress, we are more than 20% faster in sandy than we were under katrina. we are more than 300% faster than we were in ike on cdbg. so clearly we have improved the process. are there things we could do?

legislatively or within our own power to make it faster? yes. we are working on many of those things. but relatively speaking, i think we both have been faster and more careful in the way we're using cdbg money in this storm. >> as i move i ask you, some of those ideas at some point legislatively or regulatory, you can share those with the committee at some point? so if there's things we could be doing to help in the future, as we continue to improve that flow, that would be helpful. >> absolutely. i would just compliment the committee on having made many changes for sandy that have sped up spending already. >> very good i was going to ask you if i have time, i'll ask about the bridge issue and how you used the techniques. i want to know more about that. >> mr. chairman, thanks. an excellent question. the transportation funding that was provided in the supplemental is being used for very specific transportation purposes. and i'll quickly go through. the federal aviation administration with the direct

appropriation has repaired the damage to the three major airports in the region. that is work that we've done ourselves or with contractor forces. the federal highway administration first released money within hours of requests under what we call quick release authority to get the work started on rebuilding the highway system. and then its emergency relief program operates on a reimbursable basis. so the work gets done. it's done by state or local governments. and the federal government reimburses at the end. that is a way that we protect and make sure that we get the project built the way it should be. and in this case with some resiliency for the future. the transit program, we've made extensive use of what we call preaward authority. so specific transit projects as part of the sandy recovery have been given preaward authority where the transit agency will be rebuilding those facilities according to federal requirements and then reimbursed as part of the process.

that's a way to get project underway quickly and make sure we get the product that the taxpayers deserve. >> very good. joellen? >> as i said in in my opening statement, we have several buckets of money. some for investigations, which is ongoing studies, as well as our comprehensive study. so the spendout rate is not as quick as would be for our emergency money. the emergency money that we had, we've expended nearly most of our expenditures. and that will be completed in the early part of next year. those were the repairs to our existing projects. repairing the sand dunes that had been devastated. and the third bucket is for construction. what we're doing is we had 18 projects that were authorized but unconstructed. and some of those projects had been authorized several years ago. so what we're doing now is looking at those projects to see whether in the light of climate change and sea level rise, whether those projects are still will be sustainable and resilient.

so that study is the less expenditure. but once we go through that study process, once we do the design preconstruction engineer and design which is a smaller amount of money, once we get to the actual construction, that's when you see the outlays. >> one quick question. then i'm going to go to the members. we're trying to do five minute rounds. i'm going to speak in a moment. i'm going to substitute myself back to my mayor days. the frustration always with the state organizations was they would get this money and then you'd hope and pray it would come down to you at some point in some rational deliverable way. can you give me your sense of how that worked or could have have been main maybe later give

recommendations, how did that work? cdbg, i don't know if it went directly to state or local. but can you tell me how that worked when money went to the state? and you're there waiting for it? >> well in this case, mr. chairman, the funding new york city got its own direct allocation, which was great for us. the level of damage that we sustained and our ability to take those resources and really start working with them immediately is really strong. so far, the allocation that have come, there's a separate allocation for the state of new york and new york city has gotten its own allocations from that perspective, it's been great. >> that's worked? >> yes. >> let me stop there. i have additional questions but let me go to senator booker. >> senator from new york, who has a wonderful view of new jersey would like to go first because she has someplace to go. >> please. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you very much, senator booker. i appreciate all the work you've done and every single one of you has done extraordinary work in terms of getting money flowing, getting large projects done,

getting things up and running. i appreciate it. but what i hear from my constituents is not good. i hear so many stories of constituents who can't rebuild, who haven't gotten money. there's so much red tape that they cannot possibly find their way through. so i want to ask each of you some issues of red tape that concern me that hopefully you can give me the road forward so i can let my constituents know that relief is possible. secretary donovan, this one seems very difficult. a number of my constituents were dismayed to learn that because they accepted small business administration loans that they are now ineligible for cdbg funding. i understand the need to make sure there's no duplication in getting federal benefits and we want to protect against fraud, and that is absolutely critical to the integrity of this program. but is there any distinction that can be made between grants and loans under the duplication of benefits regulations? and under the current federal regulations what are the options for sandy affected homeowners who accepted sba loans but who

believe they are at a financial disadvantage relative to homeowners who chose not to accept an sba loan? >> this is something your office raised with us and that others did. and we actually made clear that even if a homeowner or business had been approved for a loan, they were still eligible for sba assistance. so, in fact, it is not accurate that they are ineligible. >> but they had been told they're ineligible. is that something we can fix in terms of those communicating? >> let me be clear though. like everything else in cdbg, it is up to local communities to determine exactly how they use these funds. and one thing that we have encouraged communities to do, and i want to be clear about what situation the homeowners you're talking to, if a homeowner -- if a small business can afford to repay a loan, we

do not think, and we've made clear, that communities should make grants available because these are precious, limited dollars. so what we've encouraged communities to do is to do an evaluation. and i have heard frustrations from business owners, homeowners. they say, well, somebody else is getting a grant, i'm getting a loan. fact is, if they can afford that grant -- i mean, that loan, then we encourage communities to do an underwrite and evaluate that and to use grants only where a homeowner or a business cannot afford to repay a loan. so that's the guidance that we've given. but we do leave flexibility for communities to make that determination. >> i would appreciate that you make that guidance very clear when someone's looking at an sba loan. they need to know what limitations they will be under in the future. it needs to be clearer. >> i agree there was confusion. we have absolutely worked with your office. you've raised this before, to try to clarify that. >> thank you. deputy mayor holloway, we've

done yoman's work on so many infrastructure issues. but there's still enormous challenges for homeowners. while fema caps the payment at 30k, very few people receive the full payout. their home might have been destroyed and their eligible for a grant $8,000. so while we do our best, it's not enough for these homeowners to rebuild. and in fact, there are families that are still homeless a year out. that's horrible. for breezy point, staton island, the rock aways, how quickly do you think cdgb money will get to homeowners? what percentage have received any? >> each of those areas having been there many times and worked with particularly in breezy point the homeowners association, we have done a lot to try to advance building. it's not only getting the money. it's being able to actually build. put things in the ground.

so we've been able to advance that. i think in terms of fema recovery that really is a casebycase determination of their assessment of what the damage is. we now have 26,000 families that have signed up for build it back. and we are in some stage of financial assessment for them. so as secretary donovan said, the cdbg money is money of last resort, which means that you have to do an insurance verification, figure out whether they got any other fema money, any funds from any other sources. we're working closely with insurance companies. but we have 1400 request for verification from one company in particular that hadn't been met. and these steps in this process, which we're not opposed to in any way because you do have to make sure that the dollars are going to people who actually need it, but they do take time. now, i think we have had some cdbg money flow, but i will say

the mayor is not satisfied that it's gotten to enough people yet. i think you will see -- i'm confident you will see between now and the end of the year we will begin to ramp up to hundreds and then ultimately thousands who will be getting funding. >> thank you. let me address some of the red tape your mayor is probably experiencing with regard to administrator fugate. fema worked with these throats submit project worksheets which makes them eligible for reimbursement. over the last year many of these project worksheets have still not been paid. and these delays have cause the set theback setbacks to projects. do you know how many project worksheets fema is processing and what the anticipated time frame for returning those around is? >> it depends upon the project. a project worksheet is a tool to determine what's damaged and what's going to be needed to make repairs. we have prioritized working with the state. some of the first projects we're going to be were going to be

all debris and all of the emergency costs that were expended. those were dollars that went out the door immediately. so as we've been going through that, we have to have documentation to demonstrate the cost so that we can satisfy the requirements that they did the work. it was expended. and we reimbursed that. we have put out most of the emphasis has been on the initial cost. there are some that were still either needing more documentation and if you got specifics, we'll work on them. the rebuilding piece of those project worksheets is going to take more time. once we get in the permanent work, we have several different tools we're trying to use to speed this process up. but we still have to work through the processes to ensure that is this over 50%, are we going to be to mitigate this? and what is the longer term requirements to build? >> thank you. for assistant secretary darcy, obviously long island is so important. people are very concerned about

the time it's taking for the stabilization projects within the study to be started and to know when these emergency stabilization projects will be done. can you just give a quick update about where we are on that process? >> with the fire island to -- >> correct. >> we have begun doing some of the emergency response which was part of the rebuilding what was there. but we're currently reviewing the fire island to montauk point as i mentioned. it's unauthorized but un an authorize but unconstructed project. we have to look at that time to make sure it's in today's sea level rise and climate change lens that we're look through and building to the right dimensions. we're committed to doing some expedited review processes for all of these projects. >> thank you very much, senator booker. we'll probably have time for another round if there's available questions. >> i just want to say, again, thank you for holding this hearing. i have a lot of affection for you even though we've only been colleagues for six days.

[laughter] that affection is born from the fact that you know what it's like to be a mayor and the difficulties you have grappling with the real issues on the ground every single day. people don't know what a secretary's number is. they don't know what a legislator's number is but they know where you live. it's something that i take very, very seriously. i just want to say to the panel assembled, i'm grateful that you're here. only been here for six days. i still have that new senator smell, i'm told. i've had a chance to deal with the secretary on multiple occasion as mayor. i think the obama administration has many stars and frankly none of them shine brighter than you do. the frustration my office already has is that we are dealing with lots and lots of people who feel the sense of discontent, ill at ease, frustration. and a lot of stories. and we're unraveling them. the team assembled here has been incredible with my office. again, i look forward to meeting

with you and bringing a lot of the individual concerns that were not necessarily necessary to go through here because you've made yourself so available. i'm sure, and i expect, i'm sure i can expect, the ability to meet with all of you as i deal with what is a sense of urgency for my office. shaun, excuse me, secretary donovan -- thank you very much. you can call me cory. i know the best thing about you is that your head is with the entire state but you married a new jerseyan, so your heart is with new jersey i'm sure. >> as your colleague says, i married up. >> yes. most exceptionally. so for me and my office, and we plan on spending time in the district over this next month meeting with a lot of families because many of them don't know who to call. they're so frustrated. they don't feel like they can rely on government anymore. they've gone through some of the red tape and gotten nowhere. as we stood two points to make. to the chairperson, i'm hoping that we can do more of these as a recovery continues. this is to the going to be

finished in a month, in two months, in five months. but this is very good as awe -- as we move forward. >> quickly on that, i will sell you one of the goals of this committee and another committee that i chair is one of the roles the senate should do more of is oversight so we're not waiting for a crisis to occur but six months from now or a year from now we're going is have these same conversations because we want to keep track of how it's going. and if there's legislative and regulatory changes, we should be trying to do that in concert. the idea is to have oversight and to work with agencies to improve what they're doing and make sure people are getting what they thought they were getting. >> my hope -- >> that shouldn't count against your time. i'm telling that to the staff, the clock holder. >> senate is a generous institution i'm finding. >> he is new.

>> the point is that sense of urgency you get from being a mayor is the sense of urgency we're going to treat this problem with. we have challenging counties on the western shore of new jersey who feel they've been left out of this equation, who feel like there's everything from debris still in bodies of water to houses still destroyed. so my hope with everybody is we set up our internal benchmarks, that we'll be able to touch base over a regular period of time to make sure that your professionals are operating with that constant sense of urgency and driving your teams as hard as possible to meet the needs of the state of new jersey. in the 90 seconds i have remaining to my friend, again, a leader i have respect, when we stood together just about two weeks ago when i was still senator-elect, we talked about the next tranche being released. it was interesting. i heard from the mayor's assembly and some individual frustrations so my hope is there's going to be a third tranche. and you've done a lot to expedite funding compared to

what happened in previous -- you brought it to a whole new level. but my concern is, it still doesn't seem fast enough. i'm wondering, secretary donovan in the few seconds i have remaining, could you just talk generally about things you're doing to further expedite it and help me understand your expectation on that third tranche which is so critical. >> thank you for your leadership in newark as well. the city is much stronger. many families that would not have gotten help without your leadership i have know there is still pain there. but thank you for your leadership. i know you're going to bring the same energy to the senate as well. i think the problem with talking about these is this is blocking and tackling hundreds of small decisions that are made along the way. i could give you a list of 20 or 30 key changes that we've made that have made a difference. just one example, there was some cruel irony that anyone who started rebuilding themselves wouldn't then be eligible for

cdbg help. we changed that with urging for many of your colleagues so that now somebody can get reimbursed. that's just one small example. historic preservation reviews in the environmental. we followed on with fema's good work, made a programmatic agreement that sped that up. so there are hundreds of small things like that. i think the areas where i would say big picture are most important, the insurance process. not just on flood insurance and having enough reviewers and other things in a very, very dense area like new york or new jersey but also getting homeowner policies align sod that families can know often they get their insurance. then they can't even get access because their bank is there. and that's something we've worked on. i think that's critical. and then the environmental reviews. the committee did something very important in giving us the authority. when fema puts money into a project to just accept their environmental review, we don't

have that authority for any other agency. it's something we think legislatively ought to be done. that's an example. be happy to provide you a longer list. >> ok. thank you. >> i'll get back if you're able to stay. we'll give you another round. but senator schumer? >> thank you. the first question is to secretary a assistant secretary darcy. i'm really worried about more bureaucracy getting in the way of doing rock away, fire island. one of the problems we ever as omb, even though we gave the secretary the authority to approve general reevaluation reports, without extra review by omb, they seem to be demanding review. i've called omb about this. we've talked about it. but i'm really worried about their getting in the way of both the fimp study and east rock away inlet to rockaway inlet.

if they have to review everything, it's going to slow things down too much. that gives me worry about another storm. could you tell us what's happening, what's your view, your candid view, of o.m.b.'s shall i say meddling here? and what we can do to speed things up. >> one thing that we're doing, senator schumer, with both the limited reevaluation reports as well as the general reevaluation reports is we're having monthly meetings with c.e.q. and o.m.b. with our division commander who's behind me, to give them a status report on a monthly basis of where we are on each of these of the 18 projects that you're referring to that were in the interim two report so that we can all know what the status is where we are so that that will help to speed that review. it will be ongoing before there's even a final product. >> it's my understanding i was

probably the lead author of this legislation -- that we didn't need o.m.b. approval for the things that were already authorized like fimp are they seeking such approval and is it in the way? i don't mind your consulting with them. that's fine with me. >> at this stage, senator, those a say we're going to be -- those, as i say, we are going to be consulting with them and reviewing this. but we will follow the law as it was. >> so, without being too confrontational to your dear friends, you're agreeing with me that the law does not require their approval? >> that's correct. >> thank you. very good answer. [laughter] >> that was a perfect answer. >> i'm not sure i feel comfortable about it. [laughter] >> yeah. perfect from this side of the table. >> let me just say if i can, senator schumer, your honesty and your forthrightness is greatly appreciated. >> right. ok.

>> next we're going to -- >> i can feel it. >> to secretary -- another -- i mean it. you guys and gals have done a very good job. bacari is from rochester. so that explains a lot of it. in any case two questions. when can we expect an announcement of the remaining 5 billion in f.t.a. emergency relief funds? and more importantly, federal highway relief money cannot be used for mitigation, like on ocean parkway. that's why we turn to other funds to help us with ocean parkway. but, are you considering using any of your authority to use f.t.a. money for resiliency on other transportation modes? you can do that should you wish, as i understand it. it wasn't used on ocean parkway

but it should be in other places on long island and in new york city. tell me a little about that. >> you're correct, senator. first, the authority exists under the act for the secretary to transfer money to another mode. first to answer your question on the next tranche of transit money -- again, that's the singe biggest need in the transportation network. as you well know. we have a notice of funding availability that's in internal review right now. we will have that completed very quickly. it will be for $3 billion, specifically awarded on a merit basis for resiliency projects. we will coordinate it with the taskforce by, for example, making sure that we have corps, hud, fema and other reviewers looking at that from a systems perspective to make sure -- because this $3 billion is a fraction of the niedermayered

out there. -- of the need, needed out there in the transit network. the thinking is also there are real projects that may fall into that same category. there are shared facilities which you're well aware of, substation 4 is it, an amtrakowned but serves both new jersey transit and inner city passenger rail. and either through the award process directly or through the secretary's transfer authority, there may be real projects. we do not anticipate going beyond transit and inner city passenger rail projects with that. >> right. i have just hope you'll keep an open mind with the remaining $2 billion in terms of resiliency using your authority to transfer so we can build better to avoid the next storm. very important. >> resiliency will be our focus and we know given the vulnerability of the whole transportation network. but in particular, the transit system -- and what we know about sea level rise, for example, we have a lot of work to do.

>> you bet. could i ask one more question with your indulgence? >> almost time for a second round. this goes to first, mr. holloway and then shaun donovan of as is obvious, it's not news. homeowners are complaining they're not getting the money quickly enough. there are all kinds of reasons for that. as i said, i think the second year they're going to be much, much happier with the moneys in the pipeline and flowing. the spigot is open. but what, in your opinion, mr. holloway-- and i'm sure this would be true for your colleagues in long island and westchester as well -- is the biggest red tape problem getting in the way of aid to homeowners and projects at the federal level? >> i'll start by saying that there's been a lot of red tape that previously had existed that's been cleared up. so that has been tremendous. i think that it is a challenge,

since cdbg is essentially the backstop, it is a challenge to get to the backstop. >> right. >> now, that is not to say that that is necessarily hud's issue, but getting verification from insurance companies, getting everybody's financial conditions in order is very challenging to do. so if i had to say what would relieve that issue, figuring out the right kind of way without opening up the specter of duplication of benefits and all of those things which have really driven a lot of the creation of a lot of process to basically get enough data to say, ok, we're pretty sure we're pretty good -- that -- you know, we can give you some portion of the funding even if you're not at the end of the verification process. i know that would be difficult to do. but that's the challenge.

>> and, yes, a lot of that -- we don't want to pay when insurance has already paid. would you agree that, shaun? secretary donovan? >> i think it is absolutely the center of many of the things that appear as red tape to homeowners. whether they're necessary or just, frankly, unnecessary delays. one of the things that as we started to work through this my team began developing is something i call a program in a box. one of the problems that you have is that each state or locality developing, particularly smaller localities, new york city has as high capacity. i'm a little biased here. but as high capacity as any city in the country. but for many of the smaller communities that have been hit to create a brand new program, to figure out how to do these checks and other things is a major barrier. so what we've begun to work on is a program in a box where

literally we could say here's the model, just adopt it and it will allow you to move faster. i don't think that takes care of all the issues. but it certainly could remove some of the unnecessary red tape. and then i think it's worth going back and thinking about on duplication of benefits are there things that we could do to simplify and streamline that while still not running afoul of basically subsidizing insurance companies? >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, senator booker. >> thank you very much. let me have a couple of quicks ones and then to senator booker. it dawned on me in your testimony you mentioned the impact of sequestration to some of the resources in this next round we're about to hit, the cr and january, potential sequestration if we can't get a budget, will that have an impact on the additional resources you have? i don't know -- >> generally speaking, senator, it was a onetime reduction of -- so specifically for the $16 billion, it was a 5% reduction down to 15.2.

that's pretty much across the board. >> that's -- ok. good. let me, if i can, if i can ask you a question, you had suggested some reporting process that aren't in place. are you going to prepare at some point or you could prepare, i guess, for this committee, kind of what those items would you recommend to ensure that at least there's more transparency in reporting of how the expenditures are being done so people like yourself and others can review them in a more accurate way? and if that is done by regulation or legislation. that's the first question. second, have you in what you have been seeing and looking at, uncovered any questions or hot spots that might say here's an area we better be looking at today in regards to some of these expenditures. and if the answer is yes to that, is that occurring? does that last question make sense?

>> yes. mr. chairman, we're happy to send you information on specific recommendations that we would make. but just to sort of give you -- one thing we really learned from recovery is the public is very interested in where money is going, really specifically where it is going and what it's being used for. a lot of our impetus, you know, is on transparency of information. it seems like an easy fix to us to do what the federal procurement data base already does, which is when a hurricane or a special event hits, they give it a special code. and why can't we do that on usa spending so that we know what on that website is being spent for hurricane sandy? it just seems easy to us. >> what's the response? >> it had to be something done right out of the box. it isn't something we can do now.

it isn't something -- >> let me pause you there. >> please. >> we have four agencies here. >> yes. >> so your statement is a good statement. so i guess here's my question if i can pause you for a second to the four agencies. can you set up a system now or into future -- i assume there's no disaster coming, would be a mistake. there will be one at some point. can you do this simple system here? >> senator, let me address because we have been working with the recovery accountability and transparency board on this. we have set up a system to collect data. we do have a website available monthly with information on spending. i think the issue is not that we can't do that. it's that to get to the level of detail and information requires additional steps and so we do believe, and in fact, it was

part of our sandy recovery taskforce report, that we ought to have a legislative requirement for future appropriations like that we create a project management officen that there are data requirements -- >> do you need a regulative requirement? why don't you just do it? >> the simple answer is that because -- the extent of work ws enormous to get to that reporting. it means inserting in hundreds of systems across the federal government particular lines or codes. and that is not something you can do overnight. >> like -- she wants to jump in. can we go back? >> well, i don't know. i must confess to not knowing the mechanics of what happens on the federal procurement data system. but every contract let by the government, it's a system that g.s.a. has set up in the federal procurement data system that you have to just fill in a box that says, yes, this is a hurricane sandy. it gets a national interest

action code, i think it is called. i think we're really talking about something that i think usa spending itself could generate. i don't know if it has to mean changes to thousands of agency's systems feeding data. i know that the hud taskforce has done a good job and they do have a website that does discuss spending. it's just it's at a very high level. and the secretary is right that what we're really talking about is a level much more granular. now, usa spending has some of that. it's just that, you know, it does not separately capture or you can't, you know, search by, hey, what's a code for hurricane sandy. there's no reason why the major portal we have for federal spending can't do that. i don't think -- i'm not a person who can tell you what the mechanics are of having that done. but i think it can be done without actually legislation, i don't think.

there just has to be a decision made to do it. >> let me hold you at that. i've run out of time. let me ask you that last -- first part of the question. can you produce for the committee that shopping list? >> absolutely. >> ok. would you submit that? and if you can indicate if you think it's regulatory or legislative so that can help us do a little understanding of what we can do here or what we can press to have happen. >> we will. >> fantastic. senator booker for your next round. >> i take solice in the fact that this committee as others will have hearings in the future. obviously this is probably one of the worst top two storms that has hit our country in the last century in terms of its impact, damage, and cost. especially in our region in the greater new jersey region, which

is one of the most productive. this is obviously something of great concern. not just to our region but to the country as a whole. i wanted to mark for the record my gratitude that everyone shook their heads up and down about their willingness to meet with me and work with my office as we try to tackle these problems. the one thing i'll bring up and i know i'm looking forward to meeting with mr. fugate and discuss this issue. i guess i'm confused. i know at the municipal level things don't make sense. but at the national level, i'm sure things are more rational here in washington. the thing that has chilled my understanding of what's going to happen to my region when the flood insurance rates go so up, it's going to devastate, completely devastate areas of new jersey. not only it will affect homers , but they won't

even be able to sell their homes. who's going to buy their homes often with such high insurance levels? for my understanding, just my beginning to dig into this personally, when bigger waters passed it required fema to do a study about the insurance affordability and the impact on the region. it seems like a critical thing before you allow the phasing in it of these incredibly high insurance rates that we would know sort of what we're going to do to that region. so i guess -- a matter of the record for now and something we could get into more when we talk, could you let me understand what's going on with that study and what it really says about the devastating impact this could have to regions like mine? >> yes. the goal was to move towards an insurance sound program that would encourage private sector participation because we would no longer subsidize rates below market value. there were many pieces to that. generally when you would see

legislation that would tie specific action before further action would go, the language would have been written so that the affordability study would have been requirement before you went to the next steps. the way the legislation was written, it was all done concurrently. so the phase-in was not tied to an affordability being done. it was affordability study to be completed but not hold up any of the other implementations. i think this is the area we've come back and worked. senator menendez asked for drafting assistance that the initial funding that we were given and time frames -- we went to the national academy of science. they informed us they could not complete the study. >> does that even seem rational to you to let the phasing in happen without understanding how the study is completed? >> the ability to not phase in was not permitted in the legislation. there were certain time frames that we were required to implement those phase-ins to

start moving towards actually based -- a year ago we had already done secondary homes, commercial and repetitive loss. the next steps were for those that were currently subsidized, phase them in over a period of time. and then the one that's causing the most immediate problem, there is a very limited phase in. and all of these changes were predicated upon when the legislation was passed, you had certain time frames to get that done. and the only delays was the regulatory process of implementing those rules for that. so the affordability study, although still required, again, we provide the technical drafting assistance that we need to be able to expend the funds, the national academy of sciences would be required and allow the time frames they stated it would be allowed. and then postpone the increases for those areas until that study is done. >> that sounds like a recommendation. in other words, it makes sense to do the study. the study right now is not being

done, nor do we have the money to do the study. yet we're still moving forward with the phasing in in. it sounds like you're saying it's an advisable thing to do, to do it right, to actually understand -- to do the study, allocate whatever resources are necessary so we understand and don't fly into this blind and hurt a lot of people. >> again, understand that as the legislation was signed into law, we've been implementing the law. as it's been designed. this is an area that when senator mendez and the previous hearing that i testified on flood insurance, he specifically asked for us to support technical drafting assistance. and that is exactly what we've been working on. how do we make insurance o so -- insurance so that we don't subsidize risks beyond which there's a return of benefit to the taxpayer? but the intended goal should not to be place people out of their homes because we make insurance so unaffordable. >> i understand that i guess what i'm missing is the link. i'll talk to the senator about this. i guess i'm missing a link. in other words, you've provided

the technical assistance. but it's still not done. >> it still requires legislative action to change this to be signed into law. as we understand the law, we were not given any flexibility in implementing the time frames once we had the regulations done that the affordability study was not -- the increases were not dependent upon affordable study being done. it was written in such a way that it was all being done concurrent. >> you're saying it's on the legislature to act in order for this to be done the way it should be done. >> as i testified last time, we have not found any way to delay those implementations without at assistance of congress giving us the ability to suspend some of those increases until such time as an affordability study is done. >> we're rushing forward with this not knowing the impact that's going to have, not knowing if we've struck the right balance. that to me just seems a mill