IEM Team to Develop Catastrophic Hurricane Disaster Plan for New Orleans & SE Louisiana

IEM Team to Develop Catastrophic Hurricane Disaster Plan for New Orleans & Southeast Louisiana June 3, 2004

IEM, Inc., the Baton Rouge-based emergency management and homeland security consultant, will lead the development of a catastrophic hurricane disaster plan for Southeast Louisiana and the City of New Orleans under a more than half a million dollar contract with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security/Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

In making the announcement today on behalf of teaming partners Dewberry, URS Corporation and James Lee Witt Associates, IEM Director of Homeland Security Wayne Thomas explained that the development of a base catastrophic hurricane disaster plan has urgency due to the recent start of the annual hurricane season which runs through November. National weather experts are predicting an above normal Atlantic hurricane season with six to eight hurricanes, of which three could be categorized as major.

The IEM team will complete a functional exercise on a catastrophic hurricane strike in Southeast Louisiana and use results to develop a response and recovery plan. A catastrophic event is one that can overwhelm State, local and private capabilities so quickly that communities could be devastated without Federal assistance and multi-agency planning and preparedness.

Thomas said that the greater New Orleans area is one of the nation’s most vulnerable locations for hurricane landfall.

“Given this area’s vulnerability, unique geographic location and elevation, and troubled escape routes, a plan that facilitates a rapid and effective hurricane response and recovery is critical,” he said. “The IEM team’s approach to catastrophic planning meets the challenges associated with integrating multi-jurisdictional needs and capabilities into an effective plan for addressing catastrophic hurricane strikes, as well as man-made catastrophic events.”

IEM President and CEO Madhu Beriwal is the recipient of a s pecial merit award from the Louisiana Emergency Preparedness Association ( LEPA ) for her work in New Orleans hurricane emergency preparedness.

Here is an excerpt from GOVERNOR BLANCO STATEMENT on JLWA's web site -

I want to introduce you to James Lee Witt. Mr. Witt ran the Federal Emergency Management Agency for eight years from 1993 to 2001. He has more than 25 years of disaster management experience.
I have asked Mr. Witt to advise and assist me and Gen. Landreneau on the recovery effort.
As FEMA director, Mr. Witt turned was credited with turning that agency around. His leadership is proven, his experience is extensive and he is an asset to this recovery effort.

I'm sure he doesn't give away his "services".

check this out from the enviromentals

http://www.saveourwetlands.org/let-jamesleewitt1.htm

November 17, 1998
CERTIFIED MAIL RETURN RECIEPT REQUESTED

Mr. James Lee Witt
Director of FEMA
Federal Center Plaza
500 “C” Street, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20472
RE: Approximately 2,600 flood plain acres schedules for development on North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain, St. Tammany Parish, Slidell, Louisiana, East of I-10, T10S, R14E, titles Oak Harbor East and Lakeshore Estates

Dear Mr. Witt:

Unfortunately, this once vast coastal estuary was permitted to be drained illegally and possibly criminally, by various government agencies. In regard to the historic background and documentation drainage of this area, enclosed is a letter from SOWL attorney Arthur Lemann IV to Col. Frank Ellis and Lt. Gen. Joe Ballard dated March 26, 1998.

In line with the New Orleans Corps’ policy of permitting large scale developments on the North Shore of St. Tammany Parish in wetland-flood plains, without requiring an EIS under NEPA, the New Orleans District of the Corps of Engineers recently granted permits to St. Tammany Holding Corporation to develop a mega residential-commercial development in this area, extremely susceptible to hurricane tidal surges.

The devastation to lives and property from the coming flood to this area will be a disaster to all tax payers, and to our federal treasury, subsidizing federal flood insurance. It will, of course, result in increased insurance rates to all Louisiana taxpayers. And there might even come a time, when the federal government might have to buy out the homeowners in this vast flood plain. The resulting loss to all of us could be in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

SOWL is attempting to stop development in this flood basin and on September 21, 1998, filed suit in Baton Rouge (Time Picayune press clipping enclosed).

SOWL has also drafted a lawsuit hopefully to be filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana in New Orleans against the New Orleans District of the Corps of Engineers for violations of the National Environmental Policy Act, Clean Water Act, and Administrative Procedure Act.

SOWL is also requesting a United States Congressional and Senate investigation, relating to the destruction of Louisiana wetlands acting as barriers to flood surges, and the resulting economic chaos to our federal subsidized flood insurance program.

In the meantime, SOWL requests your agency to survey this area, to insure all height and FEMA building requirements are mandated upon the present and future builders. It’s our understanding that a Holiday Inn is presently being constructed. Also, Slidell based O’Neil Theaters plan to build a movie megaplex in this flood plain (See Times Picayune press clipping enclosed dated November 14, 1998).

SOWL requests your agency to immediately contact St. Tammany Holding Corporation, Holiday Inn, and O’Neil Company’s President Mr. Tim O’Neil, the City of Slidell, the St. Tammany Parish Police Jury and any and all other to insure all FEMA requirements are mandated.

SOWL is not only concerned about the environment, but also about the economic well- being of SOWL’s over 1,200 tax paying Louisiana citizens being forced to subsidize corporate buildings in our Louisiana flood plain coastal-estuary-wetland areas.

Please advise.

Sincerely yours,
SAVE OUR WETLANDS, INC.

LF/kcm
Enclosures
cc: Louisiana State Attorney General
Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana
Louisiana Insurance Commissioner, Jim Brown
Arthur Lemann, IV, Esq.
Melinda Leonard, Esq.
Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation
Earth Justice
Tulane Environmental Law Clinic

The plan they wrote is a joke.

I posted this on another thread:

I just skimmed that plan.
Good Lord!
It looks to me like one of those generic plans you find in a textbook somewhere, or crib from some disaster recovery seminar.
One quick example: the plan goes from discussing mandatory evacuation directly to discussing return of the population, without any recognition that it might take weeks to pump the water out of the New Orleans basin.
It reads like a South Park episode: 1. Steal underpants. 2. ??? 3. Profit.
Sheesh.

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