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Arkansans react to hurricane relief efforts Wednesday, Sep 7, 2005 By Alison Vekshin Stephens Washington Bureau WASHINGTON -- Asa Hutchinson, a former government homeland security leader before he returned to Arkansas earlier this year, said Tuesday federal relief efforts fell short following Hurricane Katrina. "Anyone who watched the initial efforts had to be frustrated," Hutchinson said. "We have to do better." Hutchinson said the National Guard should have been brought in faster, the government should have communicated better with state and local officials about their needs, and the Homeland Security and Defense departments should have better coordinated their response. Hutchinson served as Undersecretary for Border and Transportation Security at the Department of Homeland Security until March. His job did not involve the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which has borne the brunt of criticism for its response to the hurricane. But Hutchinson said it would be a mistake to remove FEMA from the Department of Homeland Security as some are urging. The disaster preparedness agency formerly was a separate Cabinet-level entity. "The response capability is a critical part of the Homeland Security Department whether it's a natural disaster or a terrorist incident," Hutchinson said. "We also recognize that this was a devastation of such a magnitude that we have rarely seen in our nation," Hutchinson said. The hurricane devastated parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama when it struck last Monday. It inflicted the greatest damage in New Orleans, breaching its levees, flooding much of the historic city and displacing thousands of residents. About 60,000 evacuees have arrived in Arkansas and were processed through Fort Chaffee in Fort Smith before being transported to church camps around the state, according to Jim Harris, a spokesman for Gov. Mike Huckabee. "Everyone is simply trying to concentrate on how to get the job done, improve the response and also recognize that there is going to be ample time down the road to see how we can improve our capability in the future," Hutchinson said. Hutchinson, a former Republican congressman from Fort Smith, left the Homeland Security Department in March after a two-year tenure to launch a campaign for Arkansas governor in 2006. Meanwhile, two Arkansas congressman pointed to Hurricane Katrina failures at FEMA and the Homeland Security Department. "I'm not happy at all with FEMA's response," said Rep. John Boozman, R-Rogers. "We need to see where the problems were and there is going to be time for that. Right now there is still a lot of human misery that is going on." Rep. Marion Berry, D-Gillett, said the Bush administration is to blame. "I'm under the impression that the people running the Department of Homeland Security not only do they not know what to do, they don't know where to go to find out what to do," said Berry, a member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security. Rep. Vic Snyder, D-Little Rock, said the focus should be on what the nation can do better to improve its response to emergencies. "I don't know anyone in America who has found the response to be adequate," he said. The three lawmakers agreed that helping evacuees should be the immediate concern. They said they would look to the federal government to reimburse Arkansas for the state resources used to care for evacuees. Meanwhile, retired Army Gen. Wesley Clark of Little Rock said state and local governments in states hit by the hurricane expected that federal resources would be coming but did not arrive. "Then it just got difficult," Clark said on Tuesday at a Washington conference on global terrorism where he was a guest speaker. "We need to go back and take all of this apart in postmortem," Clark said of the government's response. Clark, a former presidential candidate, is a vice chairman and senior adviser at James Lee Witt Associates, a Washington-based crisis and emergency management consulting firm. Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, a Democrat, has hired Witt, an Arkansan and former FEMA director, to advise her on hurricane recovery. -- 30 -- |
