Two news stories on FEMA in the past couple of days have caught my eye.
First, from the AP:
The government is squandering tens of millions of dollars in Hurricane Katrina disaster aid, in some cases doling out housing payments to people living rent-free, investigators said Wednesday.[...]
[Also among] the audit’s findings:
– Even though the GAO found at least $1 billion in disaster aid waste, FEMA has identified about $290 million in improper payments and recouped just $7 million.
“Absent effective fraud prevention, once money is improperly disbursed, the government can only hope to collect pennies on the dollar,” Kutz said in criticizing FEMA’s “shoot money out the door” approach.
– FEMA could not find dozens of laptops, printers and other items that employees purchased with government-issued credit cards for Katrina disaster work. In one case, FEMA purchased 20 flat-bottom boats, but could not find two of them and lacked the legal titles to any of them.
Whatever happened to the idea of cleaning up government and running the country much like a business. I can understand some inefficiencies arising in the chaos of a disaster, but this seems ridiculous.
It also seems like yet another reason why government entities need to do more in the way of disaster prep; if you have good disaster plans in place, presumably you can get them implemented without too much waste.
It seems that the State of Louisiana has some additional thoughts when it comes to the financial mess made by FEMA. From the New York Times:
Who should pay for the federal government’s mistakes in handing out disaster aid to the wrong people? Not Louisiana, say state officials, who have gone to court to try to prevent the Federal Emergency Management Agency from collecting about $60 million from the state.[...]
Louisiana was billed about $384 million and has paid about $320 million. It has deposited the disputed $60 million into a court account.
The disputed figure includes $45 million withheld because the state estimates that about 12 percent of FEMA’s other needs spending went to people who were probably not eligible for it.
Aggravating the waste — I can’t help but wonder how much taxpayer money is being spent to prosecute Louisiana’s case and to defend FEMA.