Kind Words for ‘New’ FEMA

Opinion USToday

The financial crisis has so dominated the news since Hurricane Ike slammed into the Gulf Coast nearly three weeks ago that most of the nation knows little of the lingering effects. They are plentiful. The utility serving the hard-hit states, which estimates a repair bill as high as $1.2 billion, only recently finished restoring power to customers capable of receiving it. Galveston, which took a direct hit, remains under a boil-water notice with hundreds of residents still in shelters. And disruptions in oil production, which produced gas shortages in Southeast cities, are just starting to ease.

Amid the destruction, it would be easy to overlook heartening reports about the performance of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which botched the response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

"Had it not been for FEMA, the city wouldn't have recovered as well as it has," Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas said last week on Capitol Hill. "It's a new FEMA," added Houston Mayor Bill White.

FEMA and praise, two words not usually found in the same sentence, have popped up unexpectedly as Galveston and Houston rebound from the roundhouse blow Ike delivered early Sept. 13. Reviews have also been favorable for the agency's response to Hurricane Gustav and the Midwest flooding earlier this year.

It helped that today's FEMA is run by acrisis management veteran, former firefighter David Paulison. That's a contrast to the director when Katrina struck, Michael Brown, who before his appointment was working as a commissioner at an Arabian horse society. Experience matters.

Not everything, of course, has gone smoothly. Points of Distribution, or PODs, often were late getting set up or lacked what survivors needed, especially ice. And FEMA's ability to provide emergency housing is still limited by trailers laden with formaldehyde.

For the most part, though, many of the complaints aimed at FEMA during the height of Ike should have been directed at state and local authorities, who were responsible for determining where to set up those PODs and what was needed at those locations.

As the Ike-battered areas recover, these authorities bear primary responsibility for ensuring that lessons are learned and rebuilding consists of more than recreating what once was. After the deadly hurricane of 1900, Galveston didn't wait for Washington. It built the seawall that allowed the city to renew itself. This time, why not change zoning in the most vulnerable areas? Why not bury utilities that lie in perennial storm paths?

To the extent that federal aid is involved, it should be contingent on rebuilding smartly. That way, FEMA will be less needed when the next storm blows in.