Political Quotes

“when troubles befall our Nation, whether it is a hurricane in Florida, a tornado in Oklahoma, or an earthquake in my State of Alaska, America turns to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, to help it recover. FEMA, in turn, relies upon some 4,000 part time, temporary employees called disaster assistance employees to help it meet the heightened workload demands. These disaster reservists, who live in all corners of our Nation, are organized into cadres and are pressed into service when their services are needed. The Federal Government transports these individuals from their home to the disaster site, houses them, pays a Federal civil service wage for their services and returns them home at Federal expense when their services are no longer needed. In the native villages of my home State and in native communities across the Nation, the level of unemployment is unacceptably high. Native people are often left with the choice of relocating to urban areas where jobs are in greater supply, leaving their native culture behind or remaining in their communities where jobs are scarce. I suspect that native people who live in the rural villages of Alaska will find the opportunity for intermittent employment with FEMA desirable. Employment such as that offered by FEMA in the Disaster Assistance Employee cadres allows my native people to participate in the cash economy without completely losing their ties with the traditional subsistence culture in their villages.”