Administration Drawing Up Plan to Distribute Foreign Assistance During U.S. Disasters

1 May 2007 // The administration is close to completing an operations plan to address how to manage foreign assistance during domestic disasters. Recent revelations found that the federal government did not act on more than $800 million in foreign assistance offered to the U.S. after Hurricane Katrina.

The departments of Defense, Homeland Security and State drafted the International Assistance System Concept of Operations, which establishes policies for managing international assistance. The plan is in the final stages of completion and sets a standard operating procedure for requesting international assistance. It creates guidelines for reviewing offers and determining how the U.S. will accept or decline as well as addresses transportation logistics for receiving and distributing the donations, Federal Emergency Management Agency spokesman Aaron Walker said Monday.

FEMA is part of the Department of Homeland Security and was involved in drafting these policies. The State Department will be the focal point for receiving and responding to offers, Walker said.

The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington discovered the extent of wasted and unused foreign assistance through a Freedom of Information Act request in September of 2005. The organization has been posting its findings online.

However, the White House was well aware of the problems federal agencies faced with managing this type of foreign assistance and has taken measures to improve them.

In February of last year, the White House issued 125 recommendations in response to Hurricane Katrina — nine of which specifically dealt with foreign assistance and donations.

“Countries made generous offers of assistance that the Federal government had difficulty integrating into the ongoing response operations,” according to the White House report released Feb. 23, 2006. “Absent an implementation plan for the management of foreign material assistance, valuable resources often went unused.”

The departments of State and Homeland Security were the primary agencies charged with implementing the nine White House recommendations, many of which were to be completed by June 1, 2006. As of Aug. 17, 2006, none of those nine recommendations had been implemented, according to a White House progress report. But Monday the White House said all nine are either implemented or close to being complete.

Walker said the soon-to-be-released International Assistance System Concept of Operations encompasses all nine of those recommendations. He said as of June 1, 2006, FEMA had acted on the White House recommendations, but this upcoming concept of operations formalizes them.

In addition, White House spokeswoman Emily Lawrimore said the U.S. Agency for International Development produced a detailed manual setting forth procedures for accepting offers of material goods in January.

Sen. Mary L. Landrieu, D-La., is investigating where the administration stands in addressing the foreign assistance problems, said her spokesman, Adam Sharp.

In a press release April 29, Landrieu, chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Disaster Recovery Subcommittee, said, “Louisiana and the Gulf Coast deserve better. America deserves better. And while we did not seek handouts, a hand up was and remains sorely needed.”

Landrieu’s office reached out to staff at the State Department on Monday to see what progress has been made in addressing these issues. Landrieu’s subcommittee plans to hold a hearing in June to discuss how to integrate third parties into disaster response.

The U.S. government has the processes in place to handle large amounts of aid and get the money to communities in foreign countries, but the federal government was not able to direct that expertise and infrastructure in its own country after Katrina, Sharp said. “The moment it’s in our backyard, we’re completely lost,” he said.

Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, D-La., was “disappointed and frustrated” about how much money the federal government chose not to accept in foreign donations after Katrina. “As our people were fighting for survival, governments around the world tried to help us, but our own federal government turned them away,” she said in an April 30 press release.