Could the Mayor have done more?

[Quixote1818]

Don't flame me for not being up on some of these questions but I am just bringing up questions ABC news brought up tonight.

What was the explanation of why the busses were not used? It seems to me someone had checked into this.

Here is what ABC news reported tonight:

snip>

But experts say when natural disasters strike, it is the primary responsibility of state and local governments — not the federal government — to respond.

"Special arrangements will be made to evacuate persons unable to transport themselves," the plan states.

When Hurricane Katrina hit, however, that plan was not followed completely.

Instead of sending city buses to evacuate those who could not make it out on their own, people in New Orleans were told to go to the Super-dome and the Convention Center, where no one provided sufficient sustenance or security.


New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said "80 percent" of the city was evacuated before the storm hit, but Bob Williams says that's not good enough.

Williams dealt with emergency response issues as a state representative in Washington when his district was forced to deal with the eruption of Mount St. Helen's in 1980.

"If the plan were implemented, lives would have been saved," Williams said.


http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/HurricaneKatrina/story?id=1102467&page=1

First of all a couple dozen people died when Mount St. Helen's blew because they didn't want to leave the tiny town of Cougar, Washington. I would like to have seen this brilliant guy evacuate a city of One Million! Yeah, good luck!

FEMA should have stepped in and provided trucks and military people to get everyone out if they felt the Mayor was not doing enough. The Mayor may have some of the responsibility but ultimately FEMA has to step in if local Gov. is stumbling.

See here:

"If the city and the state are stumbling or in over their head, then it's FEMA's responsibility to show some leadership," said Jerry Hauer, director of public health preparedness at the Department of Health and Human Services.

[MSgt213]

1. Sure he could have did more and probably wishes he had, but there is

one draw back he was facing and that is limited resources and authority to make things happen outside his city.

[whistle]

2. Let's get the Senator Hillary Clinton independent investigation....

....underway ASAP and to coin a McClellan phrase "get to the bottom of all this".

[nyhuskyfan]

3. I always ask the same question...

Where can the mayor of New Orleans evacuate his citizens to? The entire city was in the path of a Category 5 Hurricane. What he can do is use shelters within his city limits and help people get there, which he did. Public buses were used on Sunday to get people to shelters.

If you want New Orleans residents to leave New Orleans in buses, they have to take the people somewhere. I have not heard one remotely feasible answer as to where that is.

[Gloria]

4. If you look at the plan, the one distribued by CD, it was "faith-based"

The CD went out to church and community leaders, indicating that there would be areas to go to, inc. the last resort Superdome. The drivers of the busses were VOLUNTEERS from these groups. When the shit hit the fan, it seems that they didn't show up, hence the busses stayed put.

The plan for the city is around here somewhere. I read it a few days ago.....I'll see if I can find it...

[Horse with no Name]

10. Here it is. Figured it would generate more interest.

:shrug:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4650979&mesg_id=4650979

[oasis]

20. Whoop. There it is.

[chalky]

37. Oh, it's generating interest now.

At least with me.

Damn this Level 3! Some of the best threads slip away without me gettng a chance to see them!

Can you create a new thread for this? I can kick it, but since it's over 24 hours old the powers that be won't let me recommend it.

And I want to recommend it.

[Horse with no Name]

54. Reposted.

Now keep it kicked,lol.

[Spazito]

52. Thank you for the link! I must have missed that thread somehow

Bookmarked now!

:toast:

[marshall]

62. Federal contingency plan

I agree that the best scenario would be for the city evacuation plan to have been followed through and people drive to the designated shelters throughout the state. But for reasons pointed out here and probably others that did not happen. There has to be a federal contingency plan for the president or head of FEMA to recognize that adequate plans are not being taken locally and then they MUST step in and take over.

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. No

He did everything humanly possible to save his city.

In the meantime why don't we talk about whether or not BUSH could have do more? It seems like there is some room for growth there?

[OhioChick]

6. I agree with you 100% n/t

[jaysunb]

12. Thank You

n/t

[Malikshah]

7. No

except anticipate that the MSM would bring this up to prop up the regime knowing that all that needs be done is to mention it for it to become a meme

And he and Blanco couldn't do thing one to stop *that*

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. One more thing, isnt't this like the 50th thread today

asking this same question over and over. It's getting old. Please read the other threads before starting a repeat of a repeat. My hands are hurting from typing the same thing over and over.

Thanks.

[Malikshah]

11. Happens quite a lot, alas.

Same with the semantic threads, and the "don't mean to be rude" type threads.

[BrklynLiberal]

19. The Governor asked for help from the Feds the day BEFORE Katrina hit.

[Quixote1818]

22. I have been on here several times today and saw none with these

specific questions other than the question's about the busses. Their was one thread on the Mayor last night but I was responding to the questions raised by ABC news which brought up the City's disaster plan which was new to me. As far as I know, no one has brought up the City plan and how it was not followed.

[Roland99]

9. "but experts say"....what experts?

[Malikshah]

15. the same experts that support conventional wisdom

more of the same mentalities and love to throw out blind quotes to support smear memes.

Those experts.

[Habibi]

68. That's the first question to ask.

[BrklynLiberal]

13. How much you want to bet if this was Florida, there would be no blaming

the Governor or local Mayors, no matter how bad it was?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

48. One quatrillion bijillion dollars.

[chalky]

51. Notice how Haley Barbour is skating by, even though

he ALSO had constituents starving, dehydrating, and dodging looters?

[MichiganVote]

14. The mayor provided an 800# for people to call for free rides

to go to the specified "safe" places like the Superdome. No one knew that the Superdome would fill up with 30,000+ people. The highway out of NO had already been shut down for safety so the question of the buses was moot. All of this will come out in due time.

[Skwmom]

25. Don't you think there are a lot of poor people who do not have phones?

[DoYouEverWonder]

28. What else do you suggest he do

Go door to door and tell each one individually?

[MichiganVote]

45. And with a 1600 police force. Yeah, that'd be effective.

[MichiganVote]

40. So what did you want them to do?

200 buses even with 200 drivers does not a hurricane evacuation make.
30,000 people showed up on their own to the Superdome. The buses will only hold about 70 small bodies. Do the math.

[DoYouEverWonder]

26. FEMA didn't even designate the Superdome has a shelter

until midday Sunday. Before that there was no designated shelter anywhere within New Orleans, because the Red Cross was unable to certify that any place in New Orleans would be safe. Nagin had the buses ready to go wherever FEMA told him to take them. He awaited their instructions.

Finally on Sunday around midday, FEMA overrode the advice from the Red Cross and went ahead and told Nagin that the Superdome would be a safe shelter.

[Igel]

32. He did not have buses.

He wanted X type of bus. They offered Y and Z. He had some of Y and Z. He didn't use the ones he had.

Unacceptable, he said.

Superdome, instead.

[DoYouEverWonder]

41. What are you referring to?

Got back up?

[Igel]

55. The reports for the last week have been

that Sunday morning he declared a mandatory evacuation, and requested buses.

The available buses were school and public transportation buses. Some of those he had; but every little podunk town and suburb had school buses that FEMA could latch onto.

But he required that they have bathrooms, i.e., be commercial buses: else they'd have to stop everywhere, or the people would piss themselves.

Those were in rather short supply: it's hard to get enough commercial buses in a couple of hours on a Sunday morning to haul 20k people. So the 'last resort' was the Superdome.

I could do a Lexus/Nexus search if you'd like (I'd have to learn how to do it, to be honest), but all the articles I've read on the matter have pretty much been linked to here, last Sunday-Tuesday.

[DoYouEverWonder]

59. That would be great if you have access

to Lexus Nexus, I am looking for all links for 08/28 and 08/29 that quote Nagin.

If you've got one for this info, I'd love to add it to my collection.

Thanks

[DoYouEverWonder]

65. Maybe this was why they didn't want to continue to use school buses?

UPDATED: 9:26 am CDT August 29, 2005


3 Die While Fleeing Storm

An official with the East Baton Rouge Parish Coroner's Office said three residents of a New Orleans nursing home fleeing Hurricane Katrina aboard a school bus died Sunday during an evacuation to a Baton Rouge church.

The names, ages and sexes of the dead were not available.

Don Moreau, chief of operations, said the coroner's office responded to a call from emergency medical technicians to a Baptist church, which was the destination for the bus of nursing home patients. Once there, Moreau said one person was dead inside the church and another was found dead inside the bus.

He said the person in the bus appeared to have been dead for some time.

Moreau said the others on the bus, 21 people, were transported to Earl K. Long Hospital, where a third nursing home resident later died.

The coroner's office has not determined a cause of death for any of the three. However, Moreau said many people on the bus were suffering from dehydration.

It is not known how long the bus was on the road, but many other travelers reported drive times from the New Orleans area to Baton Rouge of several hours.

http://www.wdsu.com/news/4909184/detail.html

[William769]

16. Well there was those 200 school busses just sitting there.

That he had the authority to commandeer.

[BrklynLiberal]

21. Who was going to drive them, and where were they going to go?

[William769]

24. Who drives them when they are in use.

If I needed a way out I would have driven one myself.

[MichiganVote]

42. They're school buses. Who do you think drives them?

[Quixote1818]

27. If a bus crashed the City would have been liable without a legal driver

Then again, perhaps that should have been thought of before hand and they should have had designated drivers. But hindsight is always 20/20.

[MichiganVote]

23. The buses were available to take people to the staging areas per

an 800#. The highway had already been closed for safety. Look, school buses carry about 70 kids. So figure about 50 adults/children per bus. There were 30,000+ that showed up at the Superdome alone. NO has 30-40% of the people living in poverty.

Do the math.

[Quixote1818]

30. How many school busses were their? nt

[MichiganVote]

36. Well how many people can drive one?

[Quixote1818]

60. Well, their could have been designated drivers for emergency's

or they could have called the bus drivers to come in on the phone or radio. I am sure they could have got hold of their phone number one way or another.

These are just questions. Think about it, we have come up with several ideas just in the past 20 minutes on this thread.

I have a feeling the Mayor has a good reason why they didn't use the busses though. We will have to see what he says.

[MichiganVote]

67. What drug are you on? Driving a school bus in the best of times

is a job for a person with Herculean mental stamina. Call them in during a Category 4-5 hurricane? Yeah right. Like the predominantly female drivers who run these things would come running.

The school buses were not the solution, then or now. The shelters were the answer and FEMA absolutely blew it by not having enough supplies in place there. If those people who did make it there had had enough support in the staging areas, we would be mourning the death of a city and some of its very unfortunate inhabitants. Instead we're all bitching about the Bush admin.---Again! Like that's something new. The next time there is a disaster what are people going to think of? They are going to think, 'No, I don't want to go to that shelter cuz' tha's where people get killed, raped, beat up and they don't give you food', THAT'S what people took away from this not whether they should have had a ride on a schoolbus.

School buses only hold about 70 small bodies that are healthy enough to climb in, take a seat without a seatbelt and there is no room for walkers, wheelchairs or other large items.

You're funny.

[aikoaiko]

73. The kid who stole one and drove it to TX didn't even havea a license

Buses are very easy to drive -- not much more difficult than a station wagon. They're all automatic.

[Quixote1818]

77. Yah, you just have to watch those curves. No big deal. nt

[MichiganVote]

78. So we should have turned out national disaster plan over to the kids?

[aikoaiko]

84. where did you get that...

My point was that driving a bus is not that difficult. I think state LEO should have been order to staff the buses.

[stillcool]

85. before, during or after the hurricane?

and if before....when? According to the weather forecast? A week, a day, what? Are there laws that support evacuation for a not yet determined storm track? Should every city be evacuated when a storm forecast is suggesting a possibility?

[Tyranny_R_US]

17. No

[Tatiana]

18. That question is irrelevant, really. We had a National Response Plan.

The question should be "How mmuch did our goverment fail us?"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4668155

[Skwmom]

29. It really looks that way.

Why were so many people left behind? Why weren't local businesses contacted and asked to donate water and food to the super-dome in preparation for the storm? The evacuation of the city was pathetic.

FYI for people who want to jump to his defense because he is a Democrat, on another thread someone said he was a former Republican who became a Democrat because he wanted to run for mayor.

[Quixote1818]

33. I agree, I think he probably could have done more

and he may take some of the blame. Their is probably enough blame to go around. Al Franken and Josh Marshall did not jump to his defense 100% today and admitted he probably made some mistakes. Those guys are honest people who call it like they see it. Sometimes people on DU are not 100% truthful with themselves and just because someone is a Democrat doesn't mean they are perfect. Democrats make mistakes too.

Then again, FEMA screwed up big time and I think they will take most of the blame.

[MichiganVote]

53. Like what? What more could one guy with 500,000 people in his

city do with a 1600 police force and a 30-40% impoverished population?
I really want to know what 'he could do more'means.

[MichiganVote]

57. This is a city of 500,000 people. 30,000+ were at the Superdome

thousands more were around the city at other locations. How many of the sick or infirm could you move? School buses were not going to move that many people. Furthermore, FEMA turned those that attemtped to leave the area back. Free rides to the staging areas were available for community members. It was FEMA who agreed they had to go to the Superdome but then they did not supply that area. The scant supplies that were there was the responsibility of FEMA who failed to anticipate the size of the crowds at ANY of the staging areas.

People were going to die in this hurricane. And they did. The key question is how many died in the hurricane and how many died as a result of the aftermath.

[Habibi]

71. Why weren't local businesses contacted and asked to donate

water?

Some did. God bless them. However, that wasn't part of the plan. Perhaps local businesses didn't sign onto the plan ahead of time, and beat it the hell out of town while they could. Do we know at this point? The mayor can't compel them to help.

In any case, that's not the issue. The issue is: complete evacuation was beyond the means of the local authorities. At which point, FEMA should have stepped in. They didn't.

[walldude]

31. Sure.. all the blame isn't with the administration

But what if this had been a terrorist attack? No advanced warning. The Feds couldn't handle the aftermath as it was, what if nobody had gotten out?

[Quixote1818]

39. You basically summed it up perfectly and I can't believe Jeb evacuated

more than 80% of the people in major city's in Florida that were hit by Hurricanes. It's possible the Mayor did as good as could be expected but he certainly was not perfect.

[tedzbear]

34. Of course he could have done more to evacuate, but...

...his crime pales by comparison with the chimp's inadequate disaster response.

Hurricanes are beyond the capacity of local governments to address.

[MichiganVote]

50. Look you don't just evacuate an entire city with school buses and

a few grayhounds. Get a grip people, there were 30,000+ people at the Superdome alone, let alone all the other places people went. Not to mention all the elderly who would have required special help or carriers. They mayor did not have the vehicles to remove all these people from their homes.

Regardless of the vehicles the mayor had- people were going to die in this hurricane. They didn't have to die because our National Response Plan was not followed by Bush, FEMA and the DOD.

[Quixote1818]

56. I am not faulting the Mayor but even if not all 30,000 could have

been evacuated with the Buses perhaps a few thousand could have been saving a few lives.

Just trying to be a devils advocate and be honest with myself. Personally I think the Mayor did fine but I worry they are going to come after him hard and we better be ready for it.

[MichiganVote]

61. Ok let's suppose that a 'few thousand' could have been "saved"

Who do you take and where do you take them to? Going to take the old people and leave the infants? Maybe you should take the men over the women so that they can help clean up later. How about the hospital patients, nah, they're too fragile. Tourists? Locals? Officials? Government employees?

I hear people saying 'gee the mayor should have called corporations, city buses, school buses, everything but the donkey and cart.

He called the one agency that not only should but is mandated to protect citizens--he called the Fed's. AND they did not remove the few thousand you speak of. Instead, they completely ignored the National Response Plan and relied on one or two Coast Guard helicoptors to pluck people off roofs AFTER the storm. They didn't even plan to save a few thousand after the storm, resulting in the cherry picking of a few hundred.

Our government did not do its job. It ran a disaster recovery on the cheap.

[Quixote1818]

66. You just take anyone and everyone who you can get and take them

to a place designated by the state outside the city. The important thing would be to just get them out. But like I said, I might have made the same mistakes and I don't blame him. The Mayor does not deal with Natural Disasters all the time like FEMA does. He is bound to make some mistakes in such a frenzy. FEMA on the other hand is designed to ONLY handle natural disasters and they most certainly dropped the ball.

Things can always be improved upon in any situation but faulting the Mayor is difficult to do under such extreme and rare circumstances. We should not be afraid to ask the question though.

[MichiganVote]

72. Faulting the mayor is fine if the fault is his. The responsibility for

evacuation was the same before the flood as it was after the flood. It was everyone's responsibility, including those citizens in the area who had cars and could have offered rides to others. As far as moving them outside the city, who knew this was a blast that would go so far as to spawn tornadoes in Georgia. That's a proposition that falls into the 'we'll never know' end.

Remember, there are hundreds who were not evacuated, who did not go to the shelters and did make it.

FEMA is a joke. They'll have to change the name if they ever expect people to trust it again. Homeland Security is an even bigger joke.

[LSK]

35. he could have posted a "No Hurricanes" sign

Not much else I can think of thou.

Makes perfect sense to get everyone to the strongest building in the city and then I would assume the feds would be there the next day to take over from there. Because THATS THEIR JOB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Spazito]

38. This is the KEY part, imo

"If the city and the state are stumbling or in over their head, then it's FEMA's responsibility to show some leadership," said Jerry Hauer, director of public health preparedness at the Department of Health and Human Services.

NOTE that this was said by the head of a federal agency that is under Homeland Security and also failed in their responsibility.




Blame Game anyone!

[Quixote1818]

46. Yep! Thats how the responsibility is listed on paper and under the law

nt

[Spazito]

49. You are misreading my post, it is not supporting the statement he

made, that was a crock, my point was the person quoted is simply playing the blame game to save his and his bosses sorry ass. The facts, themselves, are inaccurate.

[B Calm]

43. He could have cussed Bush out on National TV!

[bpilgrim]

44. *********** SCOPE ***********

that 1 word answers the responsibility question and even the reTHUGs like to remind everyone of the size of the DISASTER which any 6 yo can tell you completely overwhelmed state & local assets & capability but BESIDES that, they not ONLY formally ASKED for help before katrina hit but BEGGED for it on live teeVee days afterward while the neoCONs were on vayKay.

all you need to say...

and if they need proof send them here...
Katrina Media Archive

and here...
Formal Request for EMERGENCY Aid

psst... pass the word :bounce:

peace

[Malikshah]

58. But, but, it's so much fun to backdoor blame the mayor of NO

with reports from the MSM. Afterall they have *all* the information.

No fair, coming up with facts like that.

[Quixote1818]

63. To be fare, Blanco never asks for the Federal Gov. to help with

the evacuations in that letter. It says that she has taken appropriate action in this area.

But FEMA most certainly dropped the ball with the aid that was supposed to follow.

[MichiganVote]

70. She didn't have to. The National Response Plan requires the Fed's

to do the responding once an area is declared an emergency which Bush did do on Friday.

[Quixote1818]

74. I think you are right. I just read it over again and it did say that

this was too big for the state to handle alone which basically was a call for FEMA to jump in where ever needed.

[MichiganVote]

75. That's what whitey boy Bush and Rove are running away from

[aikoaiko]

80. I think the mayor and gov could have done more to

get the poor, elderly, and infirmed out of the city before the hurricane hit. Their faithbased bus plan failed. They hoped the levees would hold. Hoping sucks.

Its true the Fed should bear the brunt of the responsibiltiy.

[MichiganVote]

81. So how would you get them out? What would you include in the

city evacuation plan that was not in there? The area has 30-40% poverty. Entire cities in the US are now being commandered for evacuee relief. You honeslty think one mayor has the wherewithall to handle that? Get a grip and while you're at it, why don't you hold the mayors in all of the other areas in Mississippi and Alabama as accountable?

The mayor has no control over the levees. And anyway, it wasn't the levess that failed; the sea walls failed.

[aikoaiko]

83. pretty simple, ask the gov to have state LEO drive buses to NOLA

and evac before the hurrican hit. Also, he could have the gov to ask nearby states to do the same.

If you want to limit it to NOLA resource, then yes, he could have had LEO commandeer school and municpal buses.

It would have been a bold thing to do, but better than telling the poor, infirmed, elderly to weather the storm.

Listen, I'm not saying that Nagin is the sole perosn to blame. I think very little blame actually goes to him, but I can't say he couldn't have done anything differnt.

[Igel]

47. Everybody could have done a better job.

Levees could have been built to withstand a category 5 hurricane.

Evacuation plans could have been structured better. (Notice that they're *state* plans with a city component, and Blanco activated the state plan, so the "Nagin had no authority outside of NOLA" misses the point.)

Mandatory evacuation could have been declared earlier.

NG in LA could have been called up and in place sooner.

FEMA could have prepositioned supplies and anticipated requests.

Specific requests (like Witt would have provided, no doubt) should have been in place Monday afternoon, both to FEMA and other states for their NGs.

Scouts should have been scattered about NOLA by 10 am to examine levees and monitor them.

FEMA should have fulfilled requests promptly.

It should have been realized that NG would have to do police work/law enforcement duty, and the appropriate agreements worked out.

So many errors, in so many places, and so little evidence to pin down where in the chain of events blame should reside. Not to mention the idea that responsibility cascades: Late evacuation order --> difficulty securing buses for evacuation --> more people in NOLA after storm --> more supplies needed --> more overcrowding in Superdome --> harder to maintain order ... the proper action at any point would prevent the later problems.

[MichiganVote]

69. The mayor and the Governor DID their jobs. The Fed's DID NOT

[cynatnite]

64. The entire city was working overtime as it was before the hurricane hit

Some buses were used and pickup points were stated. Not nearly enough. Could he have done more...yeah, I think to a certain extent he could have...it's one of those horrid 20/20 hindsight moments.

But I also think, the city was stretched for resources as it was.

I also think enough people were scared for their lives to the point they were trying to get themselves and their families out which lead to the shortage of people.

[onenote]

76. and where would the mayor have sent these buses?

Let's imagine 1000 buses of 50 people each: that's 50,000 people. Where do you take them. You can't just bus them somewhere, stop the buses and tell everyone to get off and take care of themselves. You'll overwhelm the infrastructure of wherever you take them. There are only six cities in Louisiana that are more than 100,000 people, and two of them, New Orleans and Metairie, were both flooded by Katrina. So that leaves Shreveport (around 200,000), Baton Rouge (228,000) and Lafayette (110,000). Baton Rouge already was absorbing large quantities of the voluntary evacuees. So basically, you'd be swamping anywhere you took them. Its not as if the mayor of New Orleans could unilaterally comandeer the Astrodome or hotels/shelters in Texas.

That's why a federal plan and coordination was needed and why all of this second guessing of the mayor and governor of Louisiana is BS.

onenote

[Quixote1818]

79. Well, their were only 200 buses anyway

200 times say 50 people is only 10,000 people. That still would have left 20,000 at the Super-dome. It would have been the responsibility of the State or FEMA to designate a place for the buses to go.

[TorchTheWitch]

82. Of COURSE the Mayor could have done more!

He could have thrown his own self into the breached levee and held back the water with his own bare hands!

Christ, but I'm getting really tired of this question.