Top FEMA leaders short on experience
By Andrew Zajac and Andrew Martin
Washington Bureau
September 7, 2005
WASHINGTON --
Top officials of the Federal Emergency Management Agency have strong
political connections to President Bush, but they also share at least
one other trait: They had little or no experience in disaster
management before landing in top FEMA posts.
Michael Brown, who heads FEMA as undersecretary of homeland
security for emergency preparedness and response, already has endured
sharp criticism for comments he made last week that seemed to suggest
he did not understand that thousands of victims of Hurricane Katrina
had taken refuge at the New Orleans convention center.
Before joining FEMA in 2001, Brown, a protege of longtime Bush aide
Joseph Allbaugh, was commissioner of the International Arabian Horse
Association and had virtually no experience in disaster management.
An official biography of Brown's top aide, acting deputy director
Patrick Rhode, doesn't list disaster relief experience.
The department's No. 3 official, acting deputy chief of staff
Brooks Altshuler, also does not have emergency management experience,
according to FEMA spokeswoman Natalie Rule.
Rule said the absence of direct experience managing emergencies is
irrelevant because top managers need "the ability to keep the
organization running."
But Eric Holdeman, director of the King County Office of Emergency
Management in Seattle, said familiarity with the specifics of disaster
management is essential.
"Experience is not just general managerial experience, it's experience
in the field," he said.
Rhode and Altshuler worked in the White House's Office of National
Advance Operations, which arranges Bush's travel and scripts his
appearances.
The credentials of top FEMA managers stand in contrast to the
backgrounds of leaders of the agency during the last years of the
Clinton administration.
Clinton-era FEMA Director James Lee Witt headed the Arkansas
office of emergency services before he was tapped by Clinton in 1993 to
run the federal disaster relief agency.
Witt's top aides in 2000, Lynn Canton and Michael Armstrong, ran
regional FEMA offices for at least three years before assuming senior
positions in Washington.
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) said the lack of experience in
FEMA's top ranks was evident in the sluggish response to the hurricane.
"Disaster preparedness, whether it's in anticipation of potential
weather-related incidents or terrorist incidents requires a skill set
that in my mind someone has to be trained for," said Thompson, ranking
Democrat on the House Committee on Homeland Security.
Moreover, The Associated Press reported Tuesday that Brown waited
until hours after Katrina had struck the Gulf Coast before asking his
boss to dispatch 1,000 Homeland Security Department employees to the
region--and gave them two days to arrive, according to internal
documents.
Brown sought the approval from Homeland Security Secretary Michael
Chertoff roughly five hours after Katrina made landfall on Aug. 29, the
AP said.
Before then, FEMA had positioned smaller rescue and communications
teams across the Gulf Coast. But officials said Tuesday that the first
department-wide appeal for help came only as the storm raged.
Brown has stoutly defended FEMA's performance, saying the agency has
done the best it could under bad circumstances.
Last week, Bush, while saying that the initial federal response to
the hurricane was "not acceptable," nonetheless lauded Brown, telling
him, "Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job."
On Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan declined to
echo such praise.
"We've got to continue to do everything we can in support of those
who are involved in the operational aspects of this response effort,"
McClellan said.