FEMA Accountability Act of 2007

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of S. 2382, as amended, to require the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (``FEMA'') to quickly and fairly address the abundance of surplus manufactured housing units stored by the Federal Government around the country.

S. 2382, as amended, addresses a number of critical disaster recovery issues related to FEMA. I thank the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross), the sponsor of H.R. 4830, the House companion measure to S. 2382, for his critical support for this legislation.

S. 2382 addresses an ongoing consequence of the response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. As a result of stockpiling trailers in the aftermath of these devastating storms, FEMA owns a large number of trailers and other temporary housing units that the agency is not using and may never need. Some of these units have never been used.

S. 2382 requires FEMA to assess the number of temporary housing units necessary to meet requirements for major disasters and emergencies under the Stafford Act. FEMA is also required to establish a plan for storing the units that the agency needs, and disposing of those trailers that it does not need. S. 2382 provides FEMA with the flexibility to provide these excess trailers to state and local governments to house victims of incidents caused by hazards that do not result in a Federally-declared major disaster or emergency, provided that the Governor of an affected State certifies that there is an urgent need for the housing.

S. 2382, as amended, also includes some common-sense provisions from H.R. 3247, the ``Hurricanes Katrina and Rita Recovery Facilitation Act of 2007'', which passed by the House on October 29, 2007, and provides specific relief for problems associated with recovery efforts from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The bill authorizes changes made to the public assistance program under the Stafford Act that only apply retroactively to the recovery efforts from those devastating storms. These provisions include an increase in the Federal contribution for alternate projects from the current level of 75 percent to 90 percent, thereby allowing communities to rebuild their facilities in the most efficient manner possible. The bill also allows state and local governments to use alternate dispute resolution to solve some of the most difficult and lingering issues in the recovery from these storms. To help expedite the recovery, S. 2382 also allows FEMA to use a simplified procedure

under which small projects are permitted to proceed based on estimates. The bill increases the ceiling for small projects to $100,000, an increase from the current level of $55,000. Finally, S. 2382 requires FEMA to expeditiously report back to Congress on the status of its recovery efforts from these storms.

S. 2382, as amended, also includes a provision from H.R. 3247, as reported by the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, that authorizes FEMA to provide case management services to citizens impacted by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. It is unfortunate that some citizens still require these services as they struggle to recover three years after these storms.

The bill further requires FEMA to review, update, and revise, through rulemaking, the factors considered in making recommendations for the assistance to individuals and families under the Stafford Act as provided in 44 CFR 206.48. State and local governments have expressed concerns about the lack of clarity in these regulations, which they use to gauge when to seek assistance from the Federal Government.

I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica), Ranking Member of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, for working with me on this bipartisan amendment to S. 2382, and I strongly support its passage.

The Senate bill was ordered to be read a third time, was read the third time, and passed, and a motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of S. 2382, the FEMA Accountability Act of 2008, which would enable the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to better manage the thousands of excess trailers in its inventory since Hurricane Katrina.

First, I would like to thank Chairman Oberstar and Subcommittee Chairwoman Norton for working with me in a bipartisan manner to make an important revision to this bill.

I would also like to thank Congressman Mike Ross from Arkansas who has been working with me to cleanup FEMA's trailer mess for several years now.

In 2006 and 2007, several neighborhoods in our districts were devastated by tornados, and numerous families were left homeless.

After the Christmas Day 2006 tornados in my district it took almost 2 months to receive a federal disaster declaration and authorization for housing assistance. In the meantime my constituents had no place to turn for help after the temporary shelters closed.

At one point I had half a dozen of my congressional committee lawyers and FEMA lawyers on the telephone trying to figure out how FEMA could take a few of the hundreds of excess trailers it had stored near Orlando and use them to house these homeless tornado victims.

Ultimately we received a federal disaster declaration and several trailers before FEMA could figure out how to make some of its excess trailers available without a federal disaster declaration.

In Congressman Ross's case, his district was never declared a federal disaster area after several tornados struck his district, and it took months for FEMA to come up with a way to transfer excess trailers to the State and help his homeless tornado victims.

The ridiculous part of this story is that FEMA had over 60,000 excess trailers at the time and it was spending over $3 million a year to store them in 17 storage areas across the country.

In typical government fashion, the taxpayer spent almost a billion dollars on trailers after Hurricane Katrina. Tens of thousands of them were never used. And FEMA was unable to provide them to states to house homeless tornado victims.

In response to this mess, Congressman Ross and I introduced legislation to provide FEMA authority to transfer excess trailers to state and local governments and voluntary disaster relief organizations to house disaster victims even if a federal disaster has not been declared.

These are trailers that FEMA does not need for its own purposes and that FEMA is spending millions of dollars a year to store and maintain.

I am pleased we were able to include language addressing this problem in the bill we are approving today.

Again let me thank Chairman Oberstar and Subcommittee Chairwoman Norton for working with me in a bipartisan manner, and I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to express my support for the passage of the House amendment to S. 2382, the FEMA Accountability Act of 2008.

I want to thank Chairman Oberstar and Ranking Member Mica of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for all of their hard work on this bill. I also want to thank Senator Mark Pryor, who introduced the Senate version of this bill and whom I have worked tirelessly with to ensure that this critical legislation becomes law.

Last year, I introduced H.R. 4830, the House version of this legislation which would require FEMA to quickly and fairly address the abundance of surplus temporary housing units stored by the Federal Government across the Nation at taxpayer expense. My bill would require FEMA to devise a plan to distribute the excess temporary housing units being stored around the country that have been deemed safe and ready to be used.

The legislation specifically gives the agency 3 months to determine the number of housing it needs on hand to shelter future disaster victims; 6 months to provide a plan to permanently store the units it plans to keep, sell usable surplus units and dispose the rest; 9 months to implement its plan, and one year to report the status to Congress.

Families all over the Nation are in desperate need of housing. However, as many of you know many of the manufactured homes and travel trailers purchased by FEMA for use in Hurricane Katrina are still sitting unused in FEMA staging areas around the country. In my congressional district alone, FEMA is storing over 7,000 brand new, fully furnished, never before used manufactured homes in Hope, Arkansas.

These manufactured homes were originally purchased for Hurricane Katrina victims, but never made it to them. Instead, they have been sitting idly by in Hope since 2005. Since that time, many other natural disasters have occurred where temporary housing units were desperately needed by those who lost their homes.

However, it is my hope that the passage of this bill today will make FEMA recognize the continuing need to change this and deliver these homes to families all over the nation that desperately need them.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure be discharged from further consideration of the Senate bill (S. 2382) to require the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to quickly and fairly address the abundance of surplus manufactured housing units stored by the Federal Government around the country at taxpayer expense, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

Madam Speaker, I have an amendment at the desk.