David Price: “I rise today in favor of the motion to instruct conferees to reject Secretary Chertoff's plan to further weaken and gut…”

“I rise today in favor of the motion to instruct conferees to reject Secretary Chertoff's plan to further weaken and gut FEMA. I and many of my colleagues have been raising these concerns about the systematic deconstruction of FEMA and about reduced funding for our first responders for many years now. Current and former FEMA officials told me months ago that FEMA had become a hollowed-out agency and that it was one major disaster short of collapse. Unfortunately, Katrina was the disaster that substantiated that claim. We should not be satisfied in laying the blame solely on the former FEMA director. Two years ago, FEMA put out a warning that two-thirds of our fire departments operate with staffing levels that do not meet the minimum safe levels required by OSHA and the National Fire Protection Association. What was the administration's response to that? It proposed zeroing out the SAFER hiring program for firefighters and proposed massive cuts to fire equipment grants. FEMA officials had publicly called these grants one of the ``best bangs for the buck the taxpayer gets.'' Overall, we are providing less funding for our first responders now through FEMA and the Department of Justice than we did prior to 9/11.…”