FEMA Response
I want everyone to understand that I am writing from my own point of view, this is the way I experienced things, not the way they were reported in the media or appeared in press releases.
In 1995 two hurricanes hit near my home on the Gulf Coast, the relatively mild Erin and the much nastier and more destructive Opal.
Erin was, in a way, a good thing because it cleared out the weak trees and utility poles and made people aware of hurricanes after a long period without a lot of activity. Erin started off the Atlantic Coast of Florida, crossed the peninsula and hit us with a glancing blow while moving west-northwest.
Opal was not a lady. She grew off the East coast of the Yucatan and move west into the Gulf of Campeche where she executed a figure-8 and then started north-northeast. She began strengthening but was a slow moving storm so people were waiting to see what she would do.
What she did was jump to Category 4 and start racing at us at 21 knots. We have few roads in our area and they quickly plugged up. The wing commander at Eglin had to launch aircraft when the first squall lines came on shore [he decided to retire soon afterwards]. There were dozens of tornadoes, horizontal rain - a nightmare at noon.
After the storm things were a mess: roads were cut, large boats were carried inland, the barrier island had channels cut through it, a brand new house was sitting in the middle of the sound between the barrier island and the mainland along with dumpsters, cars, and appliances. The power was out; streets were clogged with debris; we were in pretty sad shape.
The day after the storm help started arriving. The National Guard arrived to provide security, power crews from all over the country showed up. Trucks showed up in parking lots with water and ice. Other trucks drove around and passed out water and ice. People fired up their grills to cook the contents of their refrigerators for whoever was around, and they we started cooking what was in our freezers before it spoiled. The Red Cross and Salvation Army set up kitchens to feed people.
The clean up began in earnest with people hauling debris to the road and trucks coming by every few days to haul it out. Street sweeping was going on so that the storm sewers wouldn't clog with leaves and flood things when the rain came.
After a week, a young woman pulled up in a new compact car and clipboard. She was from FEMA and wanted to know if there was anything people needed. She noted the damage and explained the various forms of assistance available. She had a supply of forms in the car and displayed a willingness to help people fill them out. She had been hired locally and given a short training course before being sent into the field.
She marked all of the damage on the map of the area and left information even though no one needed anything at that point. We were bruised, but would recover.
That was my first encounter with FEMA and it made sense. Until power was restored and we could get more gas, the fuel we had was going into generators and chain saws. No there was no point in driving around wasting gas that you might not be able to get, so having FEMA hire local people who knew the area to conduct surveys while driving small cars that didn't use much gas made a lot of sense.
FEMA didn't disappear after the power came on. They funded the replacement of traffic signals on the major roadways with a new type designed to withstand hurricane force winds. They financed numerous small and large changes throughout the area that would lessen the impact of future storms. The changes have worked to reduce the problems.
Fast forward nine years to 2004. This time it was Ivan the Terrible that slammed into us.
Individually we were better prepared. There were more generators and battery powered lighting. People stocked up well before the storm struck. People evacuated much earlier remembering the mess that had occurred during Opal.
After the storm things were different. The water and ice wasn't from the government unless you could drive to their distribution points. I got water and ice from the Bank of America, not FEMA. Again the Red Cross and Salvation Army went into action, with the Army tending to help the smaller communities. There was no gas. The stations now had generators to pump, but no gasoline in their tanks.
If you needed help from FEMA you had to first register on-line or through their 1-800 number. As one individual said at the time: "... if I still had a computer connection or a working telephone, I probably wouldn't need FEMA's help." They had a new program, Operation Blue Roof, that would help you patch your roof by giving you a tarp or putting heavy-weight blue plastic on your roof if you couldn't do it yourself, but you had to call first.
I didn't see a single member of the National Guard; we had deputies from eastern Florida counties helping out.
The debris clean up was a total hemorrhoid, with county officials reporting the "new" rules on debris every other day, and in the end there was only one pick up, and only for limbs and trees that were cut to specified sizes.
Today there are still debris piles from Ivan in certain places and the local governments have not been reimbursed for several hurricane-related expenses that FEMA said it would cover. They made a big deal before the election about covering 90% of costs rather than the normal 75%, but real reimbursement appears to be less than 50%.
The only reason there was any FEMA presence for Dennis is because they still haven't finished with Ivan.
The problems in New Orleans is that those people can't make the effort to call the 1-800 number or register on line, and have failed to drive to the official distribution points that are so much more efficient than the old system under Clinton....