cleaning costs. as of september 7, fema's provided more than $584 million of assistance to individuals, of which $494 million was provided in the form of housing assistance to more than 138,000 households. furthermore, fema's activated its transitional housing program to allow eligible disaster survivors to be temporarily housed in participating hotels or motels. . flood insurance helps those from flood events. as of september 7, over 25,700 claims have been filed with the national flood insurance program. speed up the process, they gave money to those in louisiana who sustained damages, providing expedited relief to survivors. when no other solution fits the circumstances, fema may provide for h.u.d. approved manufacturing housing units to provide a mid-term solution for

up to 18 months. we work with state and local officials to make sure that the placement of these are part of state and local zoning codes, ordinances and are consistent with the needs of the local community. we continue to work closely with the state as they continue to engage with their communities and work with those for the public assistance program. they have kickoff meetings with local officials. in each of these briefings and meetings, fema will work side by side with the state as they support their local communities in the recovery, planning and execution. in conclusion, fema's working to support the state of louisiana as a state pours its local communities and residents. while a lot of progress has been made, the recovery from the significant disaster will take time. as local communities find shortfalls with the state and the state calls on fema, they will marshal with the resources. they will help survivors until

our job is done. again, thank you for the opportunity to testify today. i look forward to any questions the subcommittee may have. mr. mica: thank you. we'll withhold questions until we heard from all of the witnesses. the honorable junior shelton, mayor of central louisiana. welcome and you're recognized. mayor shelton: thank you very much, mr. chairman and committee members. we appreciate the opportunity to come here today about what's happening in the local municipalities. let me begin by saying what i say here today has to do with the procedures, the rules, the regulations, not the people of fema. mr. robinson has worked very closely with us. in fact, i wished fema was rife with people like tony ramos and i wish he was cloned and we have a lot of him, but unfortunately it's not so. because of that we have some problems, and i wish to outline those. i was going to read a speech but i decided i want to speak from the heart and let you know exactly is happening in our city. let me give you somics. the city of central was incorporated 11 years ago.

we're a young city. we have 27,900 citizens. of those 27,900 steps, approximately 25,000 were impacted during this flood. 25,000. we have 11,100 residences in the city. we estimate nearly 90% of those homes were damaged significantly. when i'm talking about damaged significantly i mean at least two foot of water or more. congressman richmond said it best when he said, this is not about property. this is about lives. what you see in pictures that have been handed to you, the debris that's out there, that's not debris. that's people's lives. can you imagine if you were 60, 70 years old and you lost everything that you had? how do you start over from there? quite honestly, we have mental health problems taking place in these municipalities that are represented here today.

we have suicides. we have mental breakdowns. we have families being torn apart because honestly they don't know how they're going to get back on their feet. let's talk about the response from are fema. i understand the hierarchy that fema is to work with the governors -- the state governmental agencies, and i want to compliment our governor and our state for the work that they have done. i have no complaints whatsoever from there. however, it is important that this gets drilled down to the local municipalities because that's where the problems are. i should not have to go to the governor's office with individual problems presented to me by my citizens. we should have contact, constant contact with fema. 21 days following this event is when i got a liaison appointed to me. a nice lady but she has absolutely no authority. every question i've asked her she's had to go up the chain,

and i can only imagine how that chain is placed upon her to try to get answers. so i don't blame her. i blame the system and that's what we're here today to talk about. disaster recovery centers. there was an announcement there was going to be a disaster recovery center set up in east baton rouge parish. one. i went ballistic on the radio. that a parish as large as east baton rouge parish would have one disaster recovery center. within the day, i had a call from fema saying we would have one, and i think it's only because i got out there and complained about it. now, it was explained to me there was going to be more disaster recovery centers set up but the information being given to the public made it sound like only one was going to be there. that disaster recovery center is often the first contact anyone has with fema representatives. and i asked a series of questions and i must tell you after hearing the series of

questions i believe they're set up to exclude people instead of categorizing their needs. let me give you an example. if someone were to say to them in that interview -- do you have a place to live? and they say, well, yes, i'm staying with my in-laws. they're immediately put off on the side saying they don't have a housing need. we all know that's not acceptable. instead, that question should be -- how long will you be able to stay there? well, maybe a week. ok. we'll get back with you in a week and see if you still have housing needs. instead, it's put on that citizen in this time of turmoil and unrest to have to come back to ask for housing. that's unacceptable. these people need help. they don't need to be put off to the side and make them come back to ask the questions. we had a town hall meeting that was set up by fema.

we were elated about that. we had 1200 persons come to a church to hear questions being answered by fema. they weren't answered. had it not been -- for representatives from the governor's office, there would have been very little substantive answers given there. the very first comment that the representative from fema said to this group with 1,200 citizens seeking help was, hey, if we tell you no, come back and ask us again. that's telling those citizens, we're trying to put you off. we're trying to wear you down instead of, hey, we're going to try to help you. we're going to try to figure out your needs. they're trying to exclude instead of include. the m.h.u. or mobile housing unit issue, that should have

never been an issue. i want to give you a statistic that not many people know. in east baton rouge parish or county, we had 33,000 homes lood that are not in the flood zone. had 31,800 flood in the flood zone. you heard me right. we had more flooding outside the floodplain than we did inside, but the policy was an does not go does not go in a f zone, but yet we're going to put them in the flood areas that outflooded even the flood zones. so that policy should have been eradicated from the very beginning, and this goes back to my point i've been saying

time and time again, that nstead of having these -- this one template to take care of every disaster, you need to have templates for each type of disaster, a trigger that puts a certain team in the place for certain events. and we're going to back to the idea this is not an event that's like an earthquake that may only happen in california or tornados in oklahoma or kansas. this is a rain event that can happen in your hometown, and we better get this right or it's going to be you sitting on this side of the table giving this testimony. there's one issue that has really disturbed me lately because it's something that we're faced with now. the major issue -- are these citizens go to have to rebuild and raise their slabs? that's the number one question right now. but yet in the local newspaper over the weekend, there were two articles written in which fema was stating, hey, we're not telling to raise their

slabs. it's the local municipalities and their ordinances that will do that. what they left out is those local ordinances in the municipalities have to agree and have to be meeting the rules and regulations from fema. so quit putting the blame on the local people. we want them back in the homes. we want them to have help. so in conclusion, i just want to say that it's astounding to that i'm sitting here today that congress and the president can send millions and billions of dollars overseas but yet our own citizens have to beg and plead for help. those citizens who put that money in the coffers that can be sent overseas, all they want is help now. you were given some pictures from the city of central. i ask you look at them. there is a picture of a very typical street where you see the debris that might be six,

seven, eight feet tall. that's their lives, as we talked about. in addition to that, there's a couple of family pictures there, and i want you to look at those. i want you to look at the faces of those people. they're proud but they're broken. they're hopeful but they are shaken. the city of central will take care of our citizens with or without federal government help, but i'm here today pleading with you, please, help these people with these lives. it's american families looking for help. thank you. mr. mica: thank you, mayor. will recognize the honorable -- gerard landry of denham springs, louisiana. you are recognized. mayor landry: it is true that

90% of my homes in my city received water. 90%. that's hard to comprehend that many homes had water. of the 4,200 homes, approaching 3,000 had over 18 inches and that triggers the mitigation piece that we're so concerned about going forward. but this is such an unprecedented event when you have 25 to 30 inches of rain in 72 hours. we talked about trillions of gallons of water coming down upon us. it is unbelievable what we have just gone through. and we talk about so many of these folks, 70%, 80% of the folks didn't have flood insurance. the reason they didn't have flood insurance, we never had that issue that bad. the crest of the river was five foot above the highest recorded flood stage we ever had back in 1983. how do you even prepare for that? so our folks in -- at least in my community, don't live there without flood insurance because

they want to live dangerously or because they can't afford it, they didn't need it. so this is such a unique and rare event that has occurred. it has just devastated all of us. we can go into great detail about the response from fema. i have documented a lot of that in my brief that i have submitted to you, but the biggest single issue -- there's two single -- there's two big issues. one is the inconsistency of the information that is given to us and to our citizens and the mitigation piece. we talk about mobile housing units and how we need those desperately so our seniors can get back to their homes and our kids can get back to school because school starts again in a week or two. they need to be back in their communities. they need to be able to go back home and live in their driveway in a trailer of all things so they can put their houses back together again.

but it starts off with, mr. meyers, you need a trailer so we'll get you one. and then the next day or two, somebody comes by and says, oh, no, mr. meyers, you can't have it because you're in a flood zone. fema guidelines say you can't put one in a flood zone. well, who needs it more than anybody else than someone who got flooded? there is no rhyme or reason there. we were instructed last week, ok, fema relaxed the guidelines. we can now have mobile homes in a flood zone. but you heard me talk about mr. meyers. he's a 90-year-old war veteran. guess what, fema went to his home last tuesday and said, no, we changed our mind. you can't have one. where is the consistency and message to our people? and you know why they're frustrated? they don't know who to turn to. they can't get the information they need to make an intelligent decision. to say i'm disappointed and frustrated and angry is an understatement. my community, unlike mr. shelton's, is very old.

we've been around since 1828 when mr. denham came and discovered some springs. hence the name denham springs. it is at that point in time when this community started to flourish and we have large families, a lineage of generation after generation, such a strong sense of community in that we all pull together and we all support each other. and so this disaster is about real people. it's not something you just see on tv and you don't connect with. but we're all -- we are definitely all in this together. y community has an antique district. the buildings go back to the early 1900's. we have football. everybody has football. we also have football, but you know what it is? we sell season tickets and we sell out of season tickets to high school football. that's the kind of community that we have. our citizens love our city and i love my citizens. voice.ry to be their

another 90-year-old. mr. hewitt. he served our country in the second world war in the coast guard. has always been to the veterans -- has always attended every veterans function. he's such a proud man and now his home had 57 inches of water. he has a bride of 59 years is how long they've been married and they want to just go back home. but with the possibility of having to elevate their home at a cost of about $100,000, you can't afford that -- he can't afford that. the home is only worth $100,000. he is 90 years old. he wants to go back to home and enjoy his kids and grandkids and great grandkids. to show how dedicated he was, some of the possessions that he were -- they were able to remove them from the home before the floods and then after the floods they went back to go and retrieve some of those and when mr. underwood

walked into his storage room, the first place he went to was the drawer where he kept his medals, all of his service medals from the military back in the second world war. that's how much he served his country, that's how much he loves his country. but now the country is not serving him with the ridiculous guidelines and the procedures that fema subjects him and his family and everybody else in my community and these other communities is uncalled for. it's unbelievable. you have to be on the ground to truly understand exactly what our folks are going through. i would challenge anybody from the fema headquarters, play undercover boss. come to my city. go work the streets and see what your folks are telling my people. i had a 70-year-old man, gentleman in my office yesterday in tears. he was out of town during the flood event. came back home, drove into his driveway, saw the devastation. his wife had a heart attack. she is in hammond in a

hospital. her sister is taking care of her while this poor guy is back home trying to take care of his possessions, trying to gut out your house. a fema representative said, you have to tear your house down. it devastated him. he came to me. he said, mayor, what am i supposed to do? we sat down and we talked and we talked and we're ok. but the response from fema has been totally uncalled for. so in closing, my biggest challenge to you is to make fema change the mitigation piece because if i had 3,000 homes that had more than 18 inches of water and therm deemed substantially damage, they want us to elevate them, that will be the death of my city. i received an email the other day a guy that lives on geraldin drive. four of his neighbors said they're leaving and he's strongly considering doing the same. that piece does not need to go into effect. please suspend it.

please use some common sense. the fact is you're going to make somebody raise their house on a 1,000-year event, a rain of such epic proportions nobody could ever comprehend what is -- what was going to happen. so do not, please, i ask you, please do not make us raise our homes. thank you very much. mr. mica: thank you, mayor. we'll hear -- thank you waiting patiently, mayor ramsey. mayor rick ramsey, walker, louisiana. thank you. you're recognized. mayor ramsey: thank you, chairman micah, for coming to louisiana and seeing the devastation we've been going through for the past three weeks and calling this hearing. i think it's extremely important. i want to reiterate what my two mayorial colleagues have said. i agree with every point they made on fema. my experience with the fema representatives on the ground is they're actually caring

people that feel the hurt and the needs of the citizens of our area. the problem is their hands are tied. the bureaucratic maze that they have to weave their way through to get anything done is impossible. the other issue is that from what i've seen probably 50% or more of them are either rookies that have no experience with a previous disaster or part-time employees that have no previous experience. we had a large group that were brought in from puerto rico that really has no idea what louisiana's about and what we're going through in this area. they're good people. they're trying. their hands are tied. they cannot do anything. there's too many rules. there's too much of an effort to make this a cookie cutter approach. i've heard 100 times, look how much we've improved since katrina and i said, in all due respect, i've seen no improvements since katrina. this is not katrina. this is a blue-collar community

where the people work. they go outside. they want to come back. they want to fix their homes and they want to get back to work and that's what these two mayors are telling you and it's the same thing in the city of walker. i think we're getting no national attention because there's a national misconception about louisiana. we're not below sea level. we don't all border on the ocean. we all aren't on a river that floods. my city is east of denham springs. it's six miles from the amy river. it's 100 miles from the coast. it's 32 to 40 feet above sea level. i can give you statistics from wikipedia and i know it's not a scientific basis. boston at 20. new york city at 13. portland at 27. philadelphia, 21. and they list washington, d.c., as 16 feet above sea level. my city flooded at 32 to 40 feet above sea level. the problem our flooding was different this time. yes, we had a catastrophic rain event.

we were prepared for a heavy rain event. we have a really good meteorologist in baton rouge and he called us and told us, be prepared for a 1983 event. we were. our canals were cleaned. our culverts were emptied. everything was ready. we expected double-digit rains. it's not unexpected for our area. we get a lot of double-digit rains in louisiana. we've endured juan. we've endured allison, rita, katrina. 2013. 17 inches of rain is nothing unusual. we got 27. yes, that's unusual but that was over a seven-day period. our drainage was holding. lake ponchartrain, lan manchek was at a low level because there was a westerly wind. the drain was holding. on saturday afternoon when the rain stopped and i believe that was the 13th, water fell to three to four inches in walker. three to four inches. people quit worrying.

they went into their homes. they drank a beer. they watched tv. they were celebrating. and at 10:00, 11:00 at night, water came up to their beds. we had a wall of water come down interstate 12. five to six feet in depth. this interstate was just completed less than two years ago. it's the city's contention that we raised the flood elevation in our city by five to six feet. areas that would not have flooded flooded. yes, it's a 1,000-year flood. we would have minor to moderate flooding to walker. instead, we had catastrophic flooding in walker. we had homes above the basin. my home built in 1973 and never flooded. through every rain event since 1973 -- excuse me -- 1979, never flooded. this is unacceptable.

we have a situation in southern louisiana where a barricade is being built across our interstate system. good intentions. absolutely good intentions. it was to save lives because we had lots of collisions on the interstate. we lost 13 lives in flooding, but you're not hearing in the city of walker where a 67-year-old man put a rifle to his temple in the best western plus and killed himself two days after the flooding. or a mother who took the knife and cut the throat of an 8-year-old daughter and killed herself after the flooding. did the flooding cause that directly? no, i can't say that. was it a contributing factor? i think there's no doubt. i think everybody agrees with that. i've submitted pictures to your group. i've submitted thumb drives to your group. i would love for y'all to review them. the videos that show this. we're not a group that likes to go out and ask

for help. the hardest thing i've had to do is to ask people to help me in my home. louisiana people, country people, they take care of themselves. this has been devastating. i'm looking for it to be even worse. and the biggest problem i have right now -- and i don't know if i'm stepping on y'all's toes i xpanding on it, but as understand the biggert-waters flood act, if you have a flood event then your flood insurance goes to 100%. if it goes to 100% and you have flooded, you are going to be paying from what i've seen locally from people that sold their houses anywhere between $800 to $2,000 a month for flood insurance. per month. depending on your home. what that is going to do is bankrupt that area. banks, mortgage companies because people will walk away from their homes. they cannot afford a mortgage

and flood insurance at that rate. we have got to reform that. we got to give assurances to the people they are not going to have to elevate their homes. we got to give assurances to the people that their flood insurance is not going to become so onerous they can't afford to pay a mortgage. it's true it's a 1,000-year flood, exempt them. don't penalize them from being flooded at a time when this shouldn't have happened. i could go on, as everybody here could. i see i've done my time. we'll be happy to talk to you afterwards. sorry i got off on a tangent about the irissue on the interstate. i had a very renowned meteorologist tell me that that did not impact flooding is insane. so thank you. mr. mica: again.

i thank each of you for being with us. it's, again, i came back just in shock. and this is about people and families and their lives just disrupting beyond anything we could imagine. the human toll is one of the greatest i've seen in anything, and, again, having been on the panel longer than anyone and around the country and floods in the dakotas and iowa and missouri, up and down the mississippi, louisiana and many incidents in florida, never seen anything quite like this. we do need the flexibility with the federal program to be able to address this type of disaster and others yet to come. we've got to learn from -- we learned some from the mistakes of katrina, but it doesn't appear that we've come that

far. and i have some questions and i'll lead off with those at this point. first, mr. robinson, presenting fema, we had last week 143,000 claims. is that correct? that up or down or -- mr. robinson: as of yesterday, 140,000 claims. mr. mica: 140,000. and how many -- how many of ?hose have received any funds one time they told me 40,000 when i was there last week. mr. robinson: i have to get back to the record. mr. mica: i think that's very important. pardon. mr. robinson: i have the dollars that have been provided. i don't have the number. mr. mica: they told me about 40,000 which about a third of them had received something. then i need to know the average

amount of money which you could divide by the money given? can't some of the staff behind him give him that information? i think that's very important to come to the committee. mr. robinson: as of this morning the average was about $8,000. mr. mica: i'd like to know how many. give us the math on that. most disturbing to me is -- and, again, we went through this fiasco with the trailers that had formaldehyde but we knew we had shelter for people. we still have a quarter of a million people displaced. again, wrong questions are asked. they're living with family. some of them are driving all the way from the new orleans area for shelter. it's a situation that is not acceptable. and when asked to see what shelter fema had provided -- this is more than two weeks out

-- again, we had the one -- you guys put up the one unit. now, i was told there were 17 up and the press accounts told me last week there were only five of these units up -- actually up and the others were on their way. do you know how many modular units are up? mr. robinson: as of last night we had 110 on site. mr. mica: that's not the question i asked. how many are there and functioning for people? mr. robinson: i'd have to get back with you. mr. mica: that's not acceptable either. this is -- the one unit two weeks later. and the -- again, we -- the most essential thing is housing and we had one unit and they were told $60,000 or more. that's for a bigger unit and that was the only one actually deployed and livable. somebody in it. we had 73 on the lot that i

visited. they're lined up there. they told me they had 250 approved for placement, but they were not deployed. i asked the question -- was there a contract in place to deploy and erect them these? they said yes. so something's dramatically wrong. we'll be a month out on sunday and we have these units sitting there. only a handful deployed. a quarter of a million people displaced. the other thing is these units are useless for 95% of the locations. they don't fit in people's driveways. the only place they could be deployed is to -- the only place they could be deployed to a rural area. and we had those incidents. we have 1,000, i'm told, on the way but the -- what are these people going to do in the meantime? this is not an acceptable

solution. i talked to administrator fugay. it's not acceptable. i know they can rent campers or portable units. has any attempt been made to get that kind of equipment so that they could put them on site, stay there and repair their homes? mr. robinson: chairman micah, there are things we are going. as the governor did was shelter in place. mr. mica: i have questions about that. my question is -- do we have other types of housing that can be located at the site where they can -- to do the shelter in place they got to have a place to stay and live even while they're doing the repairs. mr. robinson: under the rental assistance program, an individual can -- mr. mica: rent is available. but, again, has there been an effort made to get some types of units made available, either a call to the industry to help or anything? i asked fugay about this because, again, they can get these houses back, according to the program, to shelter in

place, but they got to have a temporary place to stay. mr. robinson: under the rental assistance program, a survivor can rent a travel trailer. mr. mica: has there been an outreach? is there something online that tells them this is an eligibility? mr. robinson: our program since it's for 18 months, they have h.u.d. -- mr. mica: again, that doesn't nswer my question. the other thing, too, governor, when i was there, it took a long time to get the shelter in place. i think it was the incident was the 11th, the 24th, was that the date that you finalized the shelter in place program? i think you testified to that. governor edwards: sorry. mr. mica: again, i'm told it was the 24th. it was just before i got there. i'm saying, why hasn't anything been done? they said, well, the state has not approved a plan, and i

guess -- i got there on sunday. on thursday you had approved the plan, the shelter in place. governor edwards: i would not characterize it, nothing had been done before that. mr. mica: again, when i go to fema they say, we have to wait on the state to have their plan. that plan was not -- there was some delay, according -- usually when you have a disaster within a week you get the assessment and a plan. this was a couple weeks in drafting. so i'm just telling you what i heard about excuses for them not deploying this faster. governor edwards: well, as you know, the shelter at home program is a state plan, but it is underwritten from the -- mr. mica: by the federal government. so they have to have your plan before they -- i'm telling you the excuses they gave me. my job isn't to hammer you.

it's to hammer the feds, but i go to the feds and they tell me the state hadn't responded in a timely fashion. i'm just telling you what -- governor edwards: and i'd like to comment on that, mr. chairman. we developed that program jointly. in fact, it was with the administrator's first visit we first discussed doing something like shelter at home. mr. mica: again, it didn't trigger the federal action for almost two weeks is what they're telling me. so we need to look at some way to narrow that time frame in the future. then, one of the other things, i heard mayor shelton and landry tell me, mr. robinson, 21 days to have a contact with officials who -- communities are practically wiped out. when you get someone there, a contact, they have a contact that can't make a decision. it's essential we get with the

community leaders in a disaster and identify a contact immediately. did that did not happen, did t? mr. robinson: we put people in the -- mr. mica: mayor landry, how long was it before you got a contact? you held that slip of paper and told me the name of the individual. mayor landry: it was in excess of two weeks and it was a contact that was assigneded -- supposed to be assigned to me. one conversation on a sunday afternoon and i have yet to hear back from them since. mr. mica: mayor shelton, how long did it take you? mayor shelton: 21 days. let me state this, being in contact with the parish officials does not drill it down into the local municipalities. mr. mica: again, you described the destruction, your community. then, mayor landry and mayor shelton told me we had no

disaster recovery center. you had no disaster recovery center two weeks afterwards. did you finally get one? >> we did. mr. mica: you did. but he had none. then, i went back to the field where we had -- we had these units, portable units sitting in the fields. this picture doesn't show it. there were multiple of these portable ones, and i went back and said, we need a portable unit in denham springs. that's not acceptable. and they're sitting in fields, not deployed. mr. robinson: sir, there was about a two-week discussion on whether or not we could have a d.r.c. because we were in a flood zone. mr. mica: again, we have a portable unit that was not -- portable unit sitting, again, next to the trailer, the modular units, saw them. water. ok.

housing, then water. in florida and other disaster areas, we're prestaging water, one of the essential to get to people, house, shelter and water. i was told it was four, five days before fema water arrived, is that right, governor? governor edwards: yes. mr. mica: mayor shelton? mayor shelton: if it were not for congressman graves, we wouldn't have any. mr. mica: people in the cage un -- cajun, the navy, they were helping people get water i was told for days before fema's water which is supposed to be prestainled ever got there. what was the problem? they said, communications. mr. robinson, why can't we get -- why couldn't we get the water to them that fema has prestaged? mr. robinson: sir, we have

water and meals in camp bowry guard. the national guard dwribts that. mr. mica: what happened to it not getting it to the communities? they told me it was a communication problem? are you familiar with it? mr. robinson: no. mr. mica: we find to -- we need to find out what went wrong. >> no one from fema contacted me to see that water was available. i had to go through congressman graves' office. mr. mica: housing and water are not there. we have a shelter which we're paying $60,000 a unit or more and $20,000 to erect them and they don't fit 95% of the sites and we have a handful of them deployed. this is a pitiful federal response by any measure. we got the federal regs, the

little circle going around about raising the houses now. something's got to be resolved with that. i don't know if a waiver can be done. i talked to the ranking member. we'll talk to mr. richmond and others. but people are left in limbo because they don't know if they can rebuild their homes. people are walking away from their homes. i met at dinner with a young man and his wife had just bought two years ago. young people mortgaged a house up to the hilt because they're trying to get their own home. he doesn't know whether to walk, to turn the keys over to the mortgage company. he was not in a floodplain, has no insurance. it is a pitiful situation, and they relied on federal floodplain maps and now the economic impact in this region is going to be devastating. not only have they lost their homes, they're going to turn the keys in, the finance --

financing of houses, probably the depreciation 25% to 30% of every home there because of what's happened. homes will be not only -- had they were not only underwater but they will be underwater and walking away and the jobs. the recovery in denham springs, they'll lose 50% of those businesses will never come back. it's almost impossible. they lost their stock. they lost their location. and then there are no customers because people don't have jobs. well, you can tell this is frustrating. we do have mr. graves. i think mr. cedric -- mr. richmond, we have a codel going down to look at that. governor edwards, administrator fugate told me he could handle this within his existing budget. now, i don't know about the cdbg grants, but he -- that's what he had told me.

so i don't know about whether we'll need that. there's lots of money available, i am told. we'll have to sort that out. i'm not certain. and the cdbg grants is probably the fastest way to get some action because it comes to the local communities and they can eliminate the red tape and go for it. >> and i would like to respond to that. the administrator told me the same thing with the budget authority that he had pursuant to the previous appropriation for the agency, you can absorb the cost that fema costs even at the 90% share. governor edwards: but cdbg, that is not contemplated -- mr. mica: right. that's a different -- there are different funds here. we got some s.b.a. issues. we have -- and i'm concerned about, too, i've gotten reports of possible fraud and some of

the claims for food stamps and assistance, how that's being monitored and cooperation even between state agencies is not what it should be. t we rely on the state for accessibility to some of those public assistance programs. that's got to be addressed. we'll have some more questions on that. let me yield now to ms. duckworth. ms. duckworth: thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to start off by recognizing former mayor landrieu. i would like to look at some of the issues. it seems to me fema has policies, much of it specified by congress what you can do, what you cannot do. i'm just trying to figure out if there are specific challenges that are affecting this particular recovery operations and what we in congress can do to help you be able to do that. and let me just -- i'd like to start off with the food and

water issue here. mr. robinson, you said that the prepositioning stockpiles of food and water are in conjunction with the state and then the louisiana national guard actually is who deploys them. so did that happen? were those stockpiles there and ere all those stockpiles deployed? mr. robinson: yeah. they put it in a system called webb e.o.c. if they have the resources locally they'll task the guard to do it. if not they'll ask us for assistance. ms. duckworth: so governor, did the national guard deliver? governor edwards: yeah. ms. duckworth: food and water? governor edwards: i am not going to quarrel with the mayors when they said they needed water.

there was not anyone that wasn't timely in terms of delivering to the parishes when asked to. it wasn't lack of water. it was lack of communication as to where that water needed to go. that was one of the primary purposes of my visits to each of those parishes while we were still responding to get face to face, both with the parish president and the director of the office of emergency preparedness in the parish to make sure there were requests coming through webb e.o.c. were being fulfilled. never did one time in all honesty, did they tell me to the contrary. i can't tell you they got water. i can only tell you we met every request we got at the governor's office, homeland security, for water and for meals. ms. duckworth: mayor shelton, did the parish leadership contact you say you could make the request for water and m.r.e.'s? mayor shelton: let me state that i have been mayor for two

years. during this process we discovered once the administration changed i was to be contacted by someone from fema to get me updated what to expect in case of an emergency. that was never done. i had no contact from fema until 21 days into this thing. what i'm saying, i wasn't given the procedures prior to any event that would take place. so i had no idea that we could make those requests through the parish. i did call congressman graves. we did get water. ms. duckworth: i think congressman graves should be applauded helping. absolutely. i am still worried about the breakdown in communications. if fema didn't come to you but then the parish leadership apparently didn't brief you either that you could put in the question, right? because it goes through the parish leadership. mayor shelton: i had been given a call by jo ann morrow, who is fabulous in our mayor's office to say if there is anything

needed let her know. well, that's fine. that covers a broad variety of things. by that time i had already contacted congressman graves and it was on its way. ms. duckworth: sounds like there are breakdowns both with fema not briefing you and then also with the local, state and parish leadership as well because you didn't get that information specifically that you could request it. i do also want to touch on one other thing before we return to this discussion. mayor ramsey, just -- i'm going to give you a chance in just a second. i want to give you an opportunity to think about what you said and i think it was because in the passion of the moment and the frustration you said, yes, you heard fema has improved since katrina but this isn't katrina. these are blue-collar working folks who just want to get their jobs, not like in katrina. i don't think you meant to say the victims in katrina were not

hardworking, blue-collar families also. mayor ramsey: this is a subarban -- suburban community versus a rural community. they are traveling to their work. they don't walk to their work. they don't have issues. i would like to comment, though, on the last statement. ms. duckworth: sure. mayor ramsey: one of the biggest problems that we had was there was no communication. atal bihari vajpayee failed ompletely -- at&t failed completely. verizon was sketchy. at&t was out. getting into our parish communication center was very difficult, to say the least. they were overwhelmed. i know that when i finally got the national guard to deliver water and m.r.e.'s to walker, they delivered it to a staging area four miles from where the disaster actually was. and when people have no transportation, it makes it impossible for them to get to that area to get the supplies that they need.

i even tried to deliver, but then going back into fema regulations, they would not allow me to load up a city car with cases of water and m.r.e.'s to take to the area. they said they had to be broken into individual bottles, and idual m.r.e. packets counted before it goes into my car from the staging center to people that needed it. ms. duckworth: are these fema policies, regulations, manuals, s.o.p.'s, same thing? do you need something from congress to say you can put an m.h.u. in a flood area so you can put people into housing or that your staging center can actually break down cases of water or don't have to? mr. robinson: there are lessons learned. we worked very closely of the governor's office, homeland security and emergency preparedness and we have people

at each of the parishes. what you heard today is how we typically see that process where the parish then makes the request. just like the points of distribution being discussed. those are run by the national guard. we don't run those operations. we certainly will circle back and make sure we commun indicate what -- there's not regulations that we impose upon them. ms. duckworth: ok. governor, do you have in your national guard, communication units, the teams that go out because they've been deployed all around the nation now? these are mobile teams that go out and actually provide the communication nodes throughout a disaster? do you have one of those in louisiana? you should have a -- i don't know if you do or not but i would recommend. governor edwards: i don't know if we deployed any communications teams. we have an elwynn system that had 135 units. we didn't have less than 134 working throughout and there

were problems talking by cell phone and i know that that's the -- i see all the cell phones out on the table now. but the emergency folks, the first responders never had a communication problem. will tell you, when the at&t cell service went down, it impacted everybody. it made things much more difficult than it would have been otherwise. but the emergency communications network performed very, very well. in fact, we probably have the best in the country because of upgrades after katrina we continue to invest in and update every year. so i will -- i don't know if we ever deployed any national guard communications units but i don't know that it would have helped us in any way to do that. ms. duckworth: well, there are these units that the national guard has and they have been deployed over 18 months nation -- actually, they were longer than that that come out and provide the mobile services,

wireless both for internet and also for cell phones so that those in the local area, and if louisiana doesn't have one of those, you might want to take a look at requesting that. i just think there seems to be breakdowns in procedures. and, again, mr. robinson, you haven't really answered my question. are there things that we in congress can do to give you the authority, whether it is exceptions to policy, whether it's us asking the administration, the white house to give you exceptions so you can face an m.h.u. in a flood zone so that those folks who are affected can actually have a place to stay while they're trying to fix up their houses? or is that something that fema can actually review its own procedures and do yourselves? mr. robinson: to answer your question, obviously post-katrina reform act were all things this body did that helped us deliver our assistance and be more proactive. we are going to meet today the ayors, myself with the

associated administrator wright. we can place m.h.u. in a floodplain, not a floodway, as long as we meet certain criteria. and we will meet today to see what we can do there. ms. duckworth: ok. are you going to have meetings with these mayors and the parish? it seems like there's a breakdown between the municipalities and the parish and the state and fema. fema and state seem to be working together very well. and you got kudos from mayor shelton who said, i wish there were more of you out there but once you make the connection it works. but he didn't know he needed to send his water request up to his parish leadership. that's a failure of the fema representative but also a failure of the parish leadership that didn't let him know either. i feel like somebody needs to come in here and say, all right. we'll sit down at the table and figure out how we do this better. is that happening? mr. robinson: yes, ma'am. we have weekly calls that we're establishing with our mayors

now. we have a robust in governmental affairs to provide a point of contact where we can work through continues and we'll continue to have our liaison at the parish office to talk to the mayors on a frequent basis. ms. duckworth: ok. i have run over time. i yield back. thank you. mr. graves: thank you. i recognize myself. mr. robinson, let me ask you a question. every other person sitting at that table and probably you as well could introduce you to hundreds of people in their communities. that will tell you a story that goes something like this. i have a home that is worth $200,000 before the flood. it's flooded and gutted right now. so that home flooded and gutted, pick a number. it's worth $100,000. it's going to cost me $80,000 to get it back in shape again. i lost all my clothes. that's going to cost me $10,000. i lost both my cars, that's going to cost me $40,000. add these things up.

you can throw in an elevated home, whatever you want to do. without question you're getting into six figures. the individual assistant cap is $33,000, is that correct? what do we tell those people? is the stafford act sufficient to respond to this disaster? mr. robinson: so congressman, i'd say the assistance and disasters is multifaceted. the small business administration assistance, they may provide insurance, whether it's flood insurance, homeowners insurance. all those things come together to make someone whole. mr. graves: small business is a loan, is that correct? mr. robinson: that's correct. mr. graves: ok. ou're going to take on another liability. these people -- you know, congressman richmond said it very well. they lost it all. it's not debris. it's their lives on the street. they lost everyone and they're going to take on another liability?

is this sufficient to respond to this disaster for this community to recover? mr. robinson: the continuum of assistance includes many things and it could be faith-based volunteer organizations or -- we implemented our national disaster recovery framework and what we can -- mr. graves: we'll donate in charity and volunteer our way out of the fourth most costliest flood disaster in the united states history, that's what you're saying? mr. robinson: what i'm saying it's a large event and it will take the whole community effort to help these citizens recover. mr. graves: i mention and this is a statistic coming from you from the fema program projecting this the fourth most costliest disaster. the others would be sand see, katrina and ike -- sandy, katrina and ike. in those other three instances, was anything -- were there supplemental appropriations requested? mr. robinson: i'd have to get back with you.

mr. graves: i can answer is it's yes. it's hell yes. you don't have a disaster like this and not step in and tailer the response. there is this unbelievable perception out there that the cost of inaction is free. mr. robinson, i'm going to say again. i'm very frustrated right now and i'm not -- not at you. i'm frustrated that administrator fugate is not here or someone higher to talk about the recovery here. i mean, this is absurd that we're trying to use something that was created for preschool to try and address a college situation. it's been blown off the stafford act. they've been blown off. this is an entirely insufficient situation. what are you going to tell that person that's sitting there that doesn't have the money in the bank and is facing a six-figure liability to get themselves back the day before the storm? what are you going to tell them? they got their lives and they got god. what are you going to tell

them? mr. robinson: sir, we're going to work together with the state, the whole community to try and help them on the road to recovery. mr. graves: the governor's testimony indicated he believed there was an $8.7 billion -- is that ballpark, gov? governor edwards: correct. not including public infrastructure damage. mr. graves: ok. so in excess of $8.7 billion. we'll depend upon volunteers and fill an tropic organizations. they have been unbelievable in what's happened so far. the value of their work, i'd know that folks in the state are looking at this but tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars in -- and if you value the work that's been done on the rescues and the recovery work so far, unbelievable what they've done. it is absolutely unacceptable to think that we're going to find a way to charity our way out of this thing. it's not happening.

i say the cost of inaction is not free. we have two choices. we can get in front of this and design a recovery package that's tailered to this disaster, to help provide a hand-up to a community that doesn't ever want a handout, or we can sit here and let mass foreclosures, bankruptcies. and we can talk about it. two of the mayors mentioned 90% of their communities flooded. mr. robinson, let me ask you another question. fema, as i recall, over in north shorewood where you have m.h.u.'s set up over there, staged over there, i think there's an adjacent area that appears to have some other trailers and mobile homes. an you tell me what that is? mr. robinson: r.v. units that you're talking about? mr. graves: yes, sir. mr. robinson: those could be mobile communication platforms and mobile units used for disaster recovery centers. mr. graves: are there fema personnel that live or stay on

that compound anywhere? mr. robinson: there is not. mr. graves: where are the fema personnel staying? mr. robinson: they stay throughout the impacted areas. mr. graves: in a tent? mr. robinson: most of them are in a hotel and most are staying in new orleans or lafayette. mr. graves: ok. where do their meals come from? where do the meals come from? mr. robinson: from the local community. mr. graves: who pays for that? mr. robinson: they receive a per diem. mr. graves: hotel rooms aren't available for the general public. fema personnel and get their meals covered and all their stuff is taken care of. that's not a worry they have. let me tell you about a conversation i had with

different parishes. their deputies are peeling off left and right because they don't have stability. these are the law enforcement communities that are foundational to the recovery of these communities and deputies are leaving because they don't have the stability that your employees have. they don't have that. we have asked if they could have a compound that will save significant dollars as opposed to other fema solutions. if they could set up trailers and housing opportunities for their deputies and fema has been all over the place, i think i talked to everybody from director of homeland security and nobody can give an answer. the law enforcement community needs the same stability. keep in mind. they lost everything. they don't have the stability. they are peeling off and trying

to find it because they can't stay in these communities. they need the stability and continue to drag these guys around and not give them what they want when it is most cost effective, it's completely unacceptable. i'm going over time. i want to ask one other question , based on some of the calculations on the trailer units. you buy them, you transport them, you stage them and set them up and break them down and when you add up the costs, you are approaching $100,000. the governor's program settlered home, which as i said before, i love the concept of that program. it's complimentary to long-term recovery. under the governor's program,

they are capped at $15,000 per house. $15,000 per house to help helter a home. $100,000 in a manufactured housing unit. that's a lot of ocean. $85,000 in costs per household between those two. why would you not give the shelter at home program more flexibility to help get these homes in better shape towards the long-term recovery and give them $50,000, you save $50,000. it is a cost effective solution for taxpayers, why wouldn't more flexibility be provided there? why wouldn't you let people go to home depot or lowe's and say these products are approved products and let them do them. have cajun chefs and more

dollars and more flexibility. it complements the long-term recovery. mr. robinson: what we tried to do here is create the $15,000 in addition to the repair money so the governor -- and the repair money can make permanent repairs to their home. grave grave i yield to congressman richmond. mr. richmond: is there a prohibition from fema that prevents money from being spent on permanent repairs and permanent housing? mr. robinson: we have several authorities. one is for temporary sheltering which some of the programs are being done and the other is temporary program which allows a homeowner to make permanent

repairs. mr. richmond: we had to be very creative with the shelter in place program because there are strict guidelines that you can't spend resources towards a person's permanent housing needs. for example, why we use travel trailers and trailer communities because you couldn't spend money on them having a permanent trailer for the rest of their lives. does it come from congress and you all this rule that you can't spend money on permanent housing? mr. robinson: under the authorities for the governor's program, that is a sheltering program. it must be sheltering in nature. there are programs that allow housing for up to 18 months. mr. richmond: you are missing my question. is there a prohibition that prevents money towards going towards a permanent housing solution, not temporary,

permanent. shelter in place also meant putting back sheet rock and flooring, would that be prohibited because it goes towards permanent housing? mr. robinson: that would be allowed under the repair money we provide to the individuals. mr. richmond: under $ 3,000. looking at the damage we have, why is the average coming out around $8,000? tell me what qualifies, because what the constituents are saying is that you are saying we will only pay for essential need, which means pay for the master bedroom and if you have a kid, we will pay for that. we will pay for one bathroom. won't pay for the second bathroom. with all of the needs that are out there, how do we get to an average of $8,000 per structure

or per person? mr. robinson: under our programs, we are authorized to do emergency measures to make the home safe and secure and habitable. it's minimal repairs. mr. richmond: i'm talking about the need, the fema assistance. what costs can be included in that? what can you cover in there? mr. robinson: those are for the emergency repairs to make the home safe and secure and habitable. it's not for replacing everything in the home. mr. richmond: this is what i don't understand. if the governor has a shelter in place and make it safe and habitable and do all those things, that person does not qualify for any of the $33,000? what about clothing and the losses? what losses can be covered by the $33,000?

mr. robinson: the personal losses can be covered. we maximized under the 33 and make repairs under the sheet rock and make the home permanent. mr. richmond: why is the average $8,000. everyone lost clothing and tv's, how can we say we have an $8,000 average and going in and truly evaluating their home? at some point, i would like fema to adopt a commonsense test that the 1,000 inspectors we have on the ground that we are sending out to everybody's home, even state farm at some point during katrina said we are going to look at a picture, if we see water to the roof line, we will assume it is a total loss. why can't fema instead of spending the money on 1,000 inspectors make some very

commonsense conclusions that if you lost your house and the governor is going to gut it, you are going to need bedroom sets and clothing and that costs over $8,000. we are going to spend $30,000 to give someone $8,000. how do we get a commonsense test so you would have the flexibility -- if you tell me you have the flexibility and not doing it, that is a big problem for me. how do we get a commonsense test to quickly get money out to eople? let me make my question very clear. people? get $33,000 to how do you give it out faster? mr. robinson: we are looking at emergency repairs and inspectors look at the verified loss to do

emergency repairs. our programs are supplemental in nature to homeowners and flood insurance. mr. richmond: if i don't have flood insurance -- and i know there are standard answers you have to give but just work with me here. if i know there's a home and i know they don't have flood insurance because they are not required to have it, then let's just agree the when in hell policy isn't going to cover everything, correct? so if they don't have flood insurance and eight feet of water, can we just gee that they have at least $33,000 in the damage? mr. robinson: each case is an individual case. we'll get back to you and walk through that process and get to the inspections and the amount. mr. richmond: and that's the problem that most people have because they lived through it. i lived through katrina and i

lived through hurricane issac and now we are dealing with baton rouge and the surrounding areas. the question just becomes, sit down and figure out a way to expedite the funding and maximize -- the frustration i think from people, the federal government is trying to figure out a way to give as little as possible. and through katrina and mayor ramsey, i have to differ with you, the exact same storms and damage. water in a house, eight feet water in a house is eight feet. my frustration is that we just -- we are assuming that people are trying to scam the system. these are homeowners, hardworking people who made the most responsible decision to

purchase a home and we are trying to figure out a way to give them the least amount as possible. they're not asking for an additional nugget at mcdonald's. they are asking to be made hold because they find themselves in a present dickment that was out of their control that they had no fault in finding themselves in this. and we have an obligation to help. so part of it if we have to go on a case-by-case basis that every house got $8,000, eight feet of water and they didn't have flood insurance and have $,000 worth of damage and sit down and say let's take appliances at $4,000. let's take per ped room -- bedroom, another $2,000, let's take flooring and mold remediation and at some point we

get to a number that is in excess of $33,000 and say at some point we ought to be able to look at the house, send an inspector out and say, no flood insurance, this one equal filings and move onto the next one. that is hampering recovery. and without knowing that people are in this limbo -- now we have work to do in congress. we have to get a supplemental done. without the supplemental, the governor wouldn't have the ability to set up a program. and that unmet need is what fema gives and insurance gives and what it costs to get back in your home. i have lived it and i still do case work from katrina and what i'm telling you we know there is going to be an unmet need and whether we get it through the $33,000, we will have to give it

to cdbg. it only reduces what we are going to give out when we do a supplemental. we have to work in a bipartisan fashion and get another $2 billion plus for louisiana. and the question is, we would like to partner with fema and figure out a way that we can work to get people the money they need. if state farm that is driven on a profit basis could devise a plan where they look at aerial photos and determine payouts or whether you have hit a maxed policies, i think that government our government is actually purpped, we should be able to do the same thing. and the last thing and i'll honest people decide

it's not worth my time. nd administrative few debate should be here. but this should be a full committee hearing and not a subcommittee with every member here, too. so as we talk about responses, i just want us to be fair and try to work in a way to just get people what we can give them right now and then we will take our task in working in a bipartisan fashion to get the state the money it needs and

make people whole. mr. graves: governor, let me ask you a question. given a magic wand and put funding on the side, if you could change three policy issues as you see being impedement issues to the recovery, what would be some of those things you would identify? governor edwards: i have had continuous communications between myself and fema whether it is the administrator or tony. i don't noel when there is an issue whether it's because the limitation imposed by the agency by law which they have no discretion to waive or a fema policy that they could waive. mr. graves: let's include laws then. what are some of the things you see? governor edwards: as i mentioned erltier, the manufactured housing unit program has been

too slow and hasn't been responsive as to where those units could be placed and i don't know whether that's a function of law or whether they have the discretion to place those in more locations. the shelter at home program -- and understand the chairman was talking about how long it took to stand it up. i will tell you it's the fastest that it's ever been done and by a long shot. you got an obligation to get it done as timely as you can and make it as responsive as you can make it. but we had serious discussions about what habitable means. and for example, at the end of the day because of a concern about duplication of benefits which i think is statutorily driven, i wasn't able to get a steve and refrigerator, so we settled on a mini refrigerator

and microwave. it's not what i wanted, but it will be habitable. but we were able to get there because we were talking and meeting. and so i appreciate the effort that they made. i thought the result could have been a little bit better. and thirdly, you know, i will tell you what i'm going to have to work on, because quite frankly -- and i'm not here to defend fema. i'm not here for any other purpose, but some of the concerns that have been directed to fema by the mayors at the table, if there were problems should have been directed at me and your parish directors, because i can't imagine a system where fema delivers water to a mayor. i don't think that can work that way. they brought the water and the food to the state when we asked for and in the quapts and it's my job using the national guard and the request format to make that happen. and if it didn't happen, that

really is on me. but i would suspect it's a coordination and communication problem because again there wasn't a single request that came to us from the parish that we didn't fulfill in a timely way. but we have work to do to make sure we know how to get those resources. mr. graves: i want to make a personal note in regard to the framework. on saturday night, just one quick personal story, saturday night, i was out helping rescue folks who had been out there probably about 16 hours straight doing rescues and we had a guy that i'm fairly certain wasn't old enough to have a driver's license driving a school bus and probably didn't have the school bus. d i told him 1,000 times and you and we were shuttling people

out. but he zreaped. i don't know where he came from. and he stopped running the shuttle. we had 30 people up on the road. the road was flooded to the east and started flooding to our west. we didn't have anything. i'm calling folks and i said i need a bus. but we need something to get these people out of here because the water is starting to flood on the other side of us as well. and they said you have to go on the web. i was about to choke it about as far as i could. and these guys are in the same boat. they don't want to hear it. and look, i have been in that situation before where i wanted to take e.o.c. and shove it somewhere, but we need to talk about a more adaptable framework for people who are on the ground in waist-deep water and have needs. i just wanted to make that note.

governor edwards: you are exactly right. the stafford act is gin sufficient. mr. graves: he can say it. governor edwards: that's why i'm in washington this week. i'm asking for additional help and we need to do the river diversion program and release the backlog of emergency dollars through the department of transportation. we need the social services block grant for the mental illness problems that we are talking about so we can get those addressed and need that $2 billion community development block grant program so we can go in and convince these people that the right thing to do is to stay in their communities and stay in their homes and leaving their employers without employees and leaving businesses without customers and schools without students. we have to do that and the quicker we can give them the

peace of mind that help is on the way, even if the help doesn't arrive for several months, the sooner we can do that, they will make the decisions that they want to make and want them to make. that's why i'm here asking for all the assistance and i appreciate your help and the help of congressman richmond and congressman scalise. mr. graves: mayor shelton, we talked about ad va lore em communities. you have levee districts and drainage districts that have rare revenue stream based on that tax. can you describe the situation that the flood has caused in heir revenue stream? mayor shelton: they will have to reassess the properties and heard numbers from 75% to 50%

reductions and will be devastating to these agencies, school boards, fire, police. any agency that depends on those taxes. as a city, we are fortunate that we do not rely upon those taxes but other cities do. and when you start taking that money out of those systems, we have problems for years, because it's going to take a while for the values to rise back up to an acceptable level before the storm. it's not an issue of a one-time assessment but last for years. mr. graves: compounding the .roblems that these folks mayor, let me ask you going back to what i mentioned before.

and the question of the governor with the magic wand. you and i talked about a lot of problems and going to spoon feed you one issue. these manufactured housing units are larger units and not the katrina units. you represent a city and these units, it wouldn't fit in my hard. nowhere to put it. you have that magic wand, and i would like you to address that issue and compatibility with your city.

and i was told by one of our fema partners there are several hundred of those trailers out. they could be hauled up here without a permit or any escort service down the interstates and back them into someone's driveway. but that was a week ago. that was a week ago and i called her yesterday and i said where are all the travel trailers. this is what she said. if you listen to the graves 10:00 mayor's show that we participate in every week, we'll have some answers for you. that was 10 minutes before the meeting and still have no answers and still no travel trailers and no place for our folks to live. one of my fema friends showed up, i need a block of 10 rooms and a hotel to bring some fema folks. i wish i had 10 rooms to give you or a hotel.

i had nine. all of them are under water. where have you been? did you not pay attention and want a block of 10 rooms. that's how broken the city system is. no compassion and no common sense. mayor, i need a place, i need 15,000 square feet of air conditioned space. i wish i had 15,000 feet of air conditioned space that i would give you. set up in the parking lot and find you a spot. no, mayor, it's too hot outside. yes, sir, it is. but there is one young guy, mark wilson, him and i got together last week and in a matter of 48 hours made the right contact got a d.r.c. and made one call to the storm manager and one phone

call to headquarters, done. you do have some good people. but the system is positively broken. no sense, no common sense and very little compassion when you have been on the street. >> they had days, weeks, months for some of the response to the homes in new orleans.

they don't have that in livingston parish, because people are gutting their homes two days after the water went down. and it was not a reflection of the people of new orleans versus the people of livingston but the omment made to me by fema. i want to make sure the statement is straight. and yes, part of it is, in the heat of the moment that aren't taken directly in context. i will confirm. mark landry has been frustrated. i didn't get an assist center until i read on facebook they were putting one in livingston. how many homes did livingston flood? maybe three or four. i went to the assist ant center and i walked in the room, there were 10 fema people helping one

person. i said what are you doing here? i know you can't get to denham. why aren't you at walker? right now. at noon they were there and helped 300 people in the next two days and backed up until 7:00, 8:00 at night. now three weeks ago or 2 1/2 weeks ago they asked if we wanted a d.r.c. i found all of the space and i didn't hear back from them a week. a week later i called and said mark what happened to my d.r.c.? they were trying to figure out if these are usable. we reviewed each place and rejected all of them and set up our d.r.c. on an asphalt lot with portable air conditioners and it is three, four miles away

from where the disaster is and hard for people to get out there. that's been my issue. location is convenient for fema. mr. graves: i want to recognize, we have been joined by senator landrieu and worked tirelessly on the recovery of hurricane katrina. thank you for being here and i want toll yield to our distinguished majority whip, congressman scalise. we appreciate what you are doing and recognize the gentleman from louisiana.

mr. scalise: our jobs ought to be finding are what the problems are in breaking through the red tape and some red tape identified that we have to keep breaking through and we have been meeting as a delegation on a number of issues with the governor and our main objective is going to be making sure that the response that has to come from washington especially, any congressional action that's required is something we come together on and focus it on focusing on getting people back in their homes and as we have been having our conversations both going out in the field and every time i have been out there, you learn new things and find out other things we need to break through the red tape and we have to make sure our response from washington is

targeted on responding to this storm in a most effective way, learning from other mistakes, which obviously over decades of disasters including what we have experienced firsthand in louisiana that we don't make those mistakes again. i appreciate what you are doing and let us know how we can help you resolve those problems because the problems are real. many of these problems are solveable and if agencies aren't operating in the most effective way to help you get the relief you need, we are going to be united in making sure that's got en fixed. this isn't a case where someone waited two, three weeks. people have already been gutting their houses trying to get back in. so the response has to be targeted to this disaster in a different way and direct way. so i appreciate what you all are doing and continue to work with us and let us know what we can

do to help. we will be meeting together in the next few days and will continue to be talking to our colleagues. the good news is, when you see a disaster that shows the worst of mother nature, it also shows the best of people. and we have seen an incredible response and i in the last few days, we have been back up here and heard from so many members of congress from all across the country from both parties that want to help us and they sincerely understand what is happening and want to help. they don't understand the gravity, but they understand that there was major devastation and want to offer any help that they can and we have been making a list, but this is going to be something that we have to continue to work on and make sure that we get it right. thanks for what you are doing and we will continue to work with you and all work together to get it done the right way. yield back.

mr. graves: yield to the gentleman from louisiana, mr. richmond for questions. mr. richmond: let me try to summarize where we are and it would be helpful if we could go. the three problems in areas that i see are the most frustrating. one is the speed and speed in which things are getting done. two, people having decision-making authority being in the places they need to be. and three, deference to our local officials that they actually know what they're talking about. we aren't part of the problem, we are part of the solution. when a mayor says you could have my courtroom or this spot would be very good for a d.r.c., he knows it's accessible and can go there and get it up and standing tomorrow. and i have seen the way that

fema has worked with our governor. and it has been very good. but you can't run everything through the governor. i think that that's unfair to him. and i think that's unfair to our local mayors who are the closest to the people on the ground. and even the parish presidents. some are overwhelmed. some parish presidents are unable to do it. but the mayors are closest to the people in those communities and if they have somebody who has the decision making authority that when they make a call like a location for a d.r.c., what's wrong with defering to them? if they make a mistake, let's give them the ability and don't talk about where the d.r.c. is going to be. that at least those little problems can be resolved. mr. ther thing is,

robinson. modular units could be effective in this particular storm. and i snow that fema has approved modular units before. i think you have called them cannotages and other things. can fema approve modular units for this disaster? mr. robinson: you are speaking about the manufactured housing units we are bringing in? mr. richmond: yes. modular units can be there faster and part of a solution sometimes and make a lot more sense when they're all done and we offer the homeowner the ability to purchase them because then all of a sudden in a back yard, they become man or women caves or deer stands or whatever we can do. we can get them quickly and be

part of a long-term recovery. the second thing is, i'm told and our research tells us that fema has utilized the practice that i talked about that state farm utilized and it was called -- you use g.p.s. and flood estimates to come up with a damage estimate. why can't we do this in this case in the areas that we know people didn't have flood insurance and we can tell by g.p.s. and estimates and pictures about how much water they received? mr. robinson: we have to use that to expedite some of the assistance. based on looking at some of that information. mr. richmond: but not the homeowner's damage -- i guess i'm getting back to the same thing. i would love to be able to have

this conversation in private so we can really delve into all of the things that we know houses that received that water and how do we get that money to them quickly and then congress working with our governor to do it. one other thing i want to make clear because our mayor has talked about raising homes which come under mitigation. what we are saying is we want to mitigate in a smart way, which is if we do our project and other things, we will manage the water that we receive so that even 1,000-year storm, we can survive. but that makes a lot more sense floodage water and create management areas better than just coming in saying the simple

raze your ate is house. congress appropriated the money with a lot of the help. they came in and built in a flood protection system and that worked. so what i'm saying is, we're not afraid of mitigating and not asking you to treat us differently and not mitigate. we have some of the best engineers and we know if we co-mingle some other things, we will mitigate from this happening again. don't put the own us on the homeowners. with that, i yield back. but i'm interested in having a long discussion about the average payout and how we can expedite some of that. mr. graves: we are going to do one more brief round.

requees unanimous consent for representative sca list's comments to be entered the record. we all heard about this elevation of home issue that may be required for folks that are in the flood plain that suffered significant damage. what happens when we elevate homes and businesses when we have a flood. >> islands. mayor shelton: going to lose the cars. mr. graves: what happens to the grocery store or jobs? mayor shelton: can't get there. mr. graves: do you have an lternative solution. mayor shelton: it's sad.

it's sad. they built the homes according to the plan at the time. and one storm that is going to change everything that may never happen. it's not the right thing to do. mr. graves: and so i assume build back where they are and build the project -- mayor shelton: i didn't realize we were going to get into the diversion river canal. i have stated time and time again that i lay this flood and what has happened to it and the damage if the feet of the people that are dragging their feet to get that canal built. mr. graves: thank you. two more questions, mr. robinson i want to go back to the sheriff housing. can you tell me when it will be resolved and approved? mr. robinson: i'm working with homeland security and -- mr. graves: let's be clear and i

don't want to pull the governor in and his staff. this decision is fema's decision ? can you -- is the state holding up anything here? mr. robinson: it is not. mr. graves: could you answer. mr. robinson: we will identify the need and right now we have a contract for those deputies to stay in a hotel that is paid for by the state which fema is reimbursing and that is december 30, 201 and working for a resolution on this. mr. graves: if you can save money, if you can save money and provide a more stable preferable environment for the law enforcement community, why would you not do that? why would you not honor the request of the sheriffs? mr. robinson: one of the needs -- mr. graves: they have identified a plan. they have identified the plan and proffered that to you and we have been talking about that for

over a week. mr. robinson: the individuals that go in there would be eligible to receive our assistance and don't end up with a recruitment issue that may come back later. mr. graves: we will have deputies leaving the law enforcement community and continuing to have instability in their lives while you continue to plow through this. you don't think the sheriff is in touch of their deputies and aware of the situation? mr. robinson: we will work with the sheriff and state and we will update you. mr. graves: when is an answer going to be made? mr. robinson: i have to get back to you on that. mr. graves: i think it's ridiculous. i do. i think this is ridiculous and why people get so frustrated and why there are t-shirts that use another acronym on bourbon street. i want to make mention this rotating of fema officials and

rotating answers from fema officials is unacceptable. the mayor told me that he is on his 70th fema official that is his contact since hurricane gustav. 70. it's ridiculous what goes on and the inconsistency of answers and treatment of folks that are already in a crisis-type situation. and i recognize mr. richmond for closing remarks. mr. richmond: congressman, i might be able to help you with the last one and give some of our federal workers a raise, we might be able to keep them around a little bit longer. let me add just a couple of things and part of what we find to do fema is terrified

things because they are worried about what the i.g. is going to come back later and say. we need to figure out a way to rein the i.g. in terms of decisions that are made by fema in an emergency. and senator landrieu will know this, but we have to give fema the benefit of the doubt that the decisions they make during a storm are right and proper and that way when our sheriffs are asking for a trailer park or any other things that they can put their first responders, we don't need the i.g. saying we looked at this officer and his damage didn't meet the criteria so we need you to go recoupe the money. so, mr. robinson, those types of things -- you are the person

that can tell us that. you are the only person that can really tell us where your red tape is based on reluctance to take a chance because you may get spanked by the i.g. three or fours years later. senator landrieu and i had to pass legislation so that the i.g. and fema didn't come back ive years later to recoupe money from louisiana citizens o didn't answer any question incorrectly. the i.g. asked fema to go back and recoupe all of that money from louisiana citizens. and those -- we cannot be paralyzed by the fear of the i.g. coming back a couple years later. and if there is something we can do to help with that, please let us know because i'm willing to take it on.

it's not about fraud or abuse. it's about fema to make decisions without fear, because fear is holding up this process. governor, let me give you a chance to close and is there anything we talked about today that you need that you didn't get a chance to more fully go social ides the cdby, service block grants, co-mingle river funding and the transportation backlog and let's be clear about the $740 million. we aren't asking that for louisiana. that is a backlog all around the country and we are now at the end of that train. by helping us, you are going to help all the other states that are ahead of us in order to get to us. governor edwards: correct. and i appreciate the opportunity to say this again. we want the assistance that we need through the community

development block grant program to recover and also give to the people the peace of mind to make decisions now, knowing that help is on the way and the longer we pro contrast tin ate in moving a supplemental appropriation for this community development block grant program, the more people unfortunately who are going to make decisions that isn't worth their while to stay in their communities and houses and we will see a much longer, harder road to recovery than we should have. so i appreciate the opportunity. mr. richmond: for all of the mayors because i think that i'm right when i say you're the closest to the people. you live in the communities and eat in the communities and go to church with them. do you agree with the governor's assessment that inaction by congress or slow determination

of a supplemental or cdbg is going to damage the long-term recovery of denham springs, central and walker? >> absolutely. we need things sped up. >> people need hope that there is a future and need it now. mr. richmond: i'm glad the chairman is back because i want to thank him for not only having this hearing but thank him for coming down to view the damage while unfortunately when this storm happened the world was paying attention to the olympics and a contested presidential debate and you took the time to come down and your visit highlighted it and this committee hearing will also highlight it to the country that this was the fourth largest event and there are over 100 thureks people that are truly affected by this incident who

but for 1,000-year storm would not find themselves in that place. so thank you again, mr. chairman. mr. mica: i thank you and mr. graves for your leadership on the ground. i can't imagine as a member of congress having this level of devastation in my district. again, what i saw was people not whining, people who stepped up to the plate. it was the local citizens, the local leaders to put this together. and they had learned some from katrina and went in and gutted their houses. they lost their possessions and their dreams and hopes and everything that you work your fe for and they are so stoic and joined together. they saved the shell of those homes, but we have no program in

place to help them really with housing. that's still a huge deficit. we saw the federal response was just unacceptable with housing. we have to learn from the staging of water. i can't believe that went south n us in this instance. we have -- the other thing -- let me just say this, too. mr. robinson, i talked to the administrator about this. there are 143,000 claims that people cannot find out where they stand. now in this day of electronics, most of them have mobile phones. they survive. some of them don't have access to computers but can get to one but can't find the status of their claims or talk to anybody. you dial the numbers that are given and you find someone and

they are manned by people who don't have a clue of where their case is. for them to get their home and their act together and their lives back together, they have to know the status and get an answer and not getting those answers, ok. and i don't know why we can't have an app that tells exactly the status of their case, the information that is being inputted. we have the case descriptions. i see mr. matthews out there, the staff director of the economic development public lledbsh public buildings and emergency see on transportation. but we need a requirement almost for the agency to have some means of people finding out where they stand. they can't go to a bank. they can't re-mortgage. should they put the money in the house under the plan that's

being provided. they just don't know. and we don't communicate. getting those disaster relief centers also to the shelters. they finally, i think, some of them came. but we were transporting people, trying to transport them to some locations and got no decisions there back and forth. it is a three-ring sirk cuss trying to get answers and no one had answers. in this age of electronics, we could get some of that data up to a better management of their cases. and then the flexibility. i don't know if a waiver will work, mr. robinson, to assist these people on this unique basis. will a waiver work? i mean do you have the capability of waiving some of he requirements mr. richmond

talked about. changing the stafford act -- and i discussed with ms. duckworth and send you a letter saying we would request waivers on this. do you have the ability under the law? mr. robinson: so we have made some unique changes to our government program. we have expedited assistance under the flood insurance program. mr. mica: i want by mopped a list of any changes you see that the law does not allow you to deal with this unique type of disaster, ok? by monday, close of business. i want to see from fema what's missing. do you know and doesn't appear that you have the information, but do you know that under the reserves that we have for fema for disasters that this sized disaster can be handled with the programs that you have under --

with existing reserves? mr. robinson: based on information today, we have the funding that we need. mr. mica: that's what the dministrator fugate told me. that doesn't include cdbg which is under h.u.d. our subcommittee has authority under h.u.d. and our direct staff to look at the cdbg, the reserves that they have and the cdbgty to shift funds into to meet that on an immediate need. we are struggling to fund the new fiscal year which starts october 1. it will be a couple of weeks before we get into place a c.r. mr. graves and mr. richmond and the louisiana delegation need to immediately address the leadership -- i know they're

working on this and the appropriators to make certain that those funds are made available immediately, either from a transfer in existing accounts. i don't know what their reserves are. but that would help with the grants which is probably the fastest thing. and these local leaders can get that out into place. but we do need to look at all the things that went wrong. the modular units. mr. matthews, the staff director, we need to have a round table as soon as possible and find out how it could go so wrong to end up a thousand or which is -- units it's nothing to deal with the size and scope of this problem and then the cost inapplicability of the location of these units and then the

staging, what do we have five, 17 units up. it's absolutely pitiful. those are issues that have been raised. while we may seem critical -- yes, we are critical, because we are interested with the people o need our help in time of a natural disaster. we have to work to get it right. and finally, mr. graves and i , $123 er the canal million -- million dollar project which would probably prevent this from happening again if we spent the money and decades that the project has set. it is the corps of engineer project. mr. graves, mr. richmond, i

think that needs to be addressed to transportation, appropriations and which underneath that is the corp. of engineers, mr. shuster, mr. gibbs and others, but we also have to go to the appropriators and have to authorize to make certain the funds are available so that this natural disaster doesn't occur in the future and that might be beneficial. so there are a host of issues that have been raised today. this is again one of the greatest human disasters to befall the united states in a generation or more. we need a better response. we still have people without homes. we still have people in need. we still have a huge challenge before us. i can't thank the mayors enough for their leadership.

hat you did on the ground on before the federal government was there and working with your citizens and your communities. thank the governor for coming today and being part of this. and i challenge fema that we've got to do a better job in meeting our federal responsibility. mr. richmond, any comment? mr. graves? again, i thank everyone for being with us today for your testimony. and again, your participation. i just saw our vice chairman came in. we apologize also. the remembrance ceremony for the victims of 9/11 took place on the capitol steps a few minutes ago. so we have had a disruption in the regular order of business. so we will not be here on 9/11. and that's part of the reason

that members have gone. mr. vice chairman, do you have any closing comment? >> i would like to thank the witnesses for appearing here and certainly very helpful. mr. mica: again, i thank ms. duckworth and the minority for working with us. this isn't a partisan issue in any way. this is an issue that has affected hundreds of thousands of great americans. i thank you again for being with us and coming. we've got some work ahead of us. we will all pledge to work together. there being no further business before the subcommittee, this hearing is adjourned. thank you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by .ational captioning institute]