Thursday, December 28, 2006

Toward an 8/29 Commission

Key Democrats are considering creating a parallel to the 9/11 Commission to investigate what went wrong in New Orleans:
On the eve of taking control of Congress, Democrats are interested in forming an investigative panel similar to the 9-11 Commission to investigate who was responsible for the levees that broke during Hurricane Katrina and to probe the government's efforts to repatriate and rebuild this devastated city.

Advocates say the commission is needed to truly understand what went wrong to cause the flooding of New Orleans and the deaths of more than 1,300 people. They also say a commission would be a forum to discuss broad changes to the way the Army Corps of Engineers and other federal agencies do business and handle disasters.

The commission is being referred to as the 8-29 commission, after the date Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005.
More details here.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

If you agree there should be an 8-29 commission, sign petition here: http://www.levees.org/campaigns/

The original federally-led levee investigation begun in late 2005 was biased. That investigation was managed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Since the Corps is the sole agency responsible for the design and construction of Greater New Orleans' flood protection, such an investigation represents a conflict of interest. The Corps of Engineers investigated itself.

Additionally, when the Corps' findings were released in June 2006, three independent levee investigation teams criticized the Corps' report as incomplete and technically inaccurate. Despite unanimous criticism, the Corps' potentially flawed findings are being used to repair and fortify the south Louisiana flood protection system which protects the lives and property of 1.5 million people.

12/30/2006 5:18 PM  

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