WH asks for $1.5 billion more for levees

[babylonsister]

IT's a start!

White House asks for $1.5B billion more for levees

Thursday, December 15, 2005; Posted: 1:37 p.m. EST (18:37 GMT)

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/12/15/bush.levees.ap/index.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush is requesting $1.5 billion more to help make the levee system in New Orleans, Louisiana, stronger than it was before Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast.

At a news briefing at the White House, officials dodged the question of whether the levees would be built to withstand a Category 5 hurricane, using broader language instead to promise that the city's citizens would be safe and the levees would be "stronger and better."

"The federal government is committed to building the best levee system known in the world," Donald Powell, the top U.S. official for reconstruction, told reporters. "It's a complicated issue."

The money the president is requesting is in addition to the $1.6 billion he has already committed to repair the breeches in the levees, correct the design and construction flaws and bring the levees to a height that was authorized before the hurricane, a Category 4 storm, hit on August 29, killing more than 1,300 people.

The additional $1.5 billion that the president is requesting would pay to armor the levee system with concrete and stone, close three interior canals and provide state-of-the art pumping systems so that the water would flow out of the canals into Lake Pontchartrain, Powell said.
more...

[Swamp Rat]

1. we need more than 1.5 billion

stop the goddamn war in iraq and help your own people bush

[babylonsister]

2. That's supposedly in addition to the $1.6 billion already

allocated, but I agree with your point, S R. All the wasted money going towards Iraq could be going to our citizens who really need it. :mad:

[EFerrari]

3. Why aren't the Democrats screaming about this?

"Baghdad? What about Biloxi?"

:nuke: