Did Ray Nagin Divert Funds From Levy Repair

A sometime vice president of Cox Communications, Ray Nagin was elected mayor of New Orleans in May 2002. In this interview, he details the chaos and devastation he confronted in the days following Katrina's landfall and answers questions about why the city appeared to be unprepared for the Category 4 hurricane, despite days of warning. He also talks virtually his frustrations in dealing with Gov. Blanco, the bureaucratic rules he encountered in getting help from FEMA and whether race might have been a factor in the regime'south slow response to New Orleans' plight. In discussing the efforts to coordinate and find leadership for the response try, he talks well-nigh a coming together that took place on Air Force One on day five of the catastrophe. There, Nagin tells FRONTLINE, a "dance" was going on between the president and the governor over who had ultimate authorization. "And finally I simply stopped and said: '… With all due respect, Mr. President, if yous and the governor don't get on the same page, this event is going to continue to spiral down ….'" This is the edited transcript and video of an interview conducted on Oct. 26, 2005.

What mistakes did yous brand?

… I haven't had a whole lot of time to actually remember about that. Simply most of the criticism I'm getting seems to center effectually a couple of areas. The first 1 is the charabanc situation: "Why, Mr. Mayor, didn't you utilise buses? Why were they flooded?" -- the whole nine yards.

Certain, we could accept washed some things meliorate, and I'one thousand going to take a look at that. But the realities were, we put our RTA [Regional Transit Dominance] buses, which are under the city'southward command, in an area that has never flooded before, and we were planning to use them if we needed them.

In add-on to that, at that place were other buses that are associated with the school board that are non under our direct command. So going forwards, I would similar to expect at a plan that basically says, OK, permit'due south accept every passenger vehicle that we have available and move them to some other expanse. Then hopefully nosotros'll take the drivers necessary. The large struggle nosotros had with this past result, most of the drivers evacuated. And even if nosotros did have those buses staged, nosotros probably couldn't have got them out.

Yous say you didn't take enough drivers. Why non use the National Guard to bulldoze the buses?

… They have to be activated by order of the governor. During our outcome, they were deadening coming besides. We had maybe 200 to 250 National Guardsmen that stayed with u.s.a. for the showtime iii or 4 days.

[Gov. Kathleen Blanco] had activated the National Guard on Saturday, I thought.

I heard that. All I can tell y'all is that the corporeality of guardsmen that were in the city of New Orleans was a group of about 200 to 250.

There were 400 National Guardsmen at Jackson Billet.

… Jackson Barracks is flooded.

How big of a loss was that?

Jackson Barracks hurt for a number of different reasons. That was the surface area where we staged our law boats, and nosotros were going to try and utilize the boats if we needed to go out and rescue people, which we did.

We had a fleet of 20 or xxx boats, and at the finish of the day, the storm blew away most of them. Then I don't know how many we started out with at Jackson Barracks. I had just had a briefing a couple of weeks earlier the tempest on what their capabilities were, and I was told that they could mobilize immediately two,500 National Guard members.

All I can tell you is that in the urban center of New Orleans, working with our police department, working with our fire department for the first couple days of the effect, we had peradventure 200 to 250 guardsmen that we could business relationship for.

Did you become on the phone? Did you have advice that you could call and ask for guardsmen?

When we could get through -- go on in listen, the hurricane … just decimated all the communications networks that were bachelor. Really, the merely reliable communications that I had was my Blackberry with PIN communications that would come through late at dark or start matter in the morning. For the most function, communications was very touch-and-go. …

Communications … [explain] how dramatic and how hard that was for you, how that affected really everything.

It was so frustrating. Cell phones were down; landlines were down. It was very difficult. We'd just found ane telephone that worked. Entergy, the power visitor, had a fix with a backup generator on the quaternary floor of the Hyatt. Nosotros would get in at that place and endeavour and brand calls. But even with that, the 504 surface area code was affected, and BellSouth communication organization was down. Then it was very spotty, very frustrating. You didn't exercise anything existent fourth dimension.

And what did you say to the governor when you lot got through to her? What were yous asking for?

We need help. We need troops. Nosotros demand resources. Nosotros need food. We demand water. There'south xv,000 people in the Superdome. It'south flooded in the streets of New Orleans. Every available police force officer and firefighter is rescuing people. We're swimming. We're confiscating boats. We're doing everything possible to save lives.

And what did she say to you?

She said she was going to aid.

Then?

Then time went on, and we were still struggling with resource.

And then you called her over again.

As many times as I possibly could.

How many times did y'all talk to the governor during that calendar week?

I would say if not every twenty-four hour period, every other mean solar day I would at least get a adventure to talk to her.

So Mon, Tuesday, Wednesday, you were talking to her all those days, ... and you're saying, "Nosotros need troops."

Nosotros need whatsoever we can get. Troops, water -- you name it, nosotros demand it. Nosotros had people who were swimming in the h2o. I was getting reports from our firefighters that they were rescuing lots of people still left on roofs that nosotros needed to get to. The … [Declension Baby-sit] had helicopters.

A few. They had a few.

Every bit soon as the winds died down, they got up, and they were helping us with rescues. Simply information technology was actually an understaffed strength that was trying to save an unabridged city.

And you only had 250 National Guardsmen for those beginning three or four days?

That'due south all that nosotros could business relationship for.

Were you dealing with [FEMA Managing director Michael] Brownish in those first few days?

Brown I did not run across the kickoff couple of days. The only person I saw from FEMA was basically this guy named Marty [Bahamonde]. … [He] came on site -- I think it was Monday after the effect -- and he had flown in a helicopter. And he was the first guy that told united states of america about the fact of the corporeality of devastation and [that] the levee breaches, as well as the twin spans, the bridges up New Orleans E, had been decimated.

I can remember sitting downwardly with him when he first came in, and he basically asked me, he said, "Mr. Mayor, what do yous need?" And I had a piece of paper that I however accept somewhere where I wrote downwardly like a v-point plan of the things that we needed to do, and I laid that out for him.

He basically said: "That's kind of refreshing. We don't usually become that from politicians." Then we started to kind of effigy out ways that we could coordinate. And and then he was gone after a while.

But he told you he would get the things going that were on your list.

He told me he was going to give me some aid. There were ii or three other FEMA people that arrived the next day, and they were supposedly assigned to us. And then they started to basically make promises on what they could deliver -- food, buses. At that place was supposedly 350 buses that were already staged and ready to go and would exist hither the next day. And none of that happened. …

When did it get evident to yous that aid actually wasn't on its way?

Well, every twenty-four hours I would accept meetings in the mornings, midday and in the afternoons, and I would talk to certain officials, the FEMA representatives, nigh what we needed, what needed to happen. And every day it seems as though things were falling through the cracks. …

Now, your lifeline out is to the land, is to the governor. You're not dealing with the federal government at this point, other than the local FEMA guys that have flown in?

I forget the exact day, just I started to try and reach out to federal officials. I started to brand calls. And somehow the president and I hooked up. It's all kind of a blur. I think it was Wednesday or Tuesday, late Tuesday.

I know Wednesday was the 24-hour interval that [Sen. Mary] Landrieu and the governor and Brown flew in, landed next to the Superdome, and I retrieve they had a meeting with yous that mean solar day. And then was information technology that solar day that you talked to the president?

I call back it was earlier that, yes.

Earlier that. And so you lot got to the president.

Right. Got to the president. Expressed my concerns, my frustration. ... He needed to really go us resources that nosotros needed to salvage people. Nosotros were still in rescue way and then considering I actually had all the police force, all the get-go [responders] in rescue manner, so the looting thing started to rear its head.

And then [his] visit that yous mentioned happened. … I said: "Here's my piece of paper. Here'due south the things I think nosotros need to focus on. I need some assistance. And we need to get these people out of the Superdome, because information technology'southward a shelter of last resort, and they only have a limited amount of resources."

Information technology was a printing event. And we met for well-nigh half an hour, 45 minutes. Information technology was documented. And the next thing I know, they were going on a helicopter tour, and they were gone.

So Chocolate-brown shows up on the ground with the mayor of New Orleans, and that'south it as far as you were concerned.

Nothing happened of whatsoever substance afterward that.

Chocolate-brown says he couldn't go a unified control. Were you aware of this? He didn't know who was in charge. He was trying to deal with [Maj. Gen. Bennett C.] Landreneau, he was trying to deal with the land's emergency director; and he was trying to deal with Gov. Blanco. He says his biggest mistake was, equally you lot know, non realizing that the state of Louisiana's officials were dysfunctional.

Well, I don't know what he's saying. From my perspective, I was sitting here as the mayor of the city of New Orleans in crisis, and I didn't care who got the job washed, whether it was a state or whether information technology was the feds.

In my sense, there was a dance going on about who had ultimate authority, whether it was the federal regime or whether it was the country. And I retrieve that caused some of the initial conflicts. And I even mentioned that to the president when he came downward.

On that Fri on a plane.

Yes. So as far as I'chiliad concerned, I'm pond in it. I'm in the Superdome walking effectually, people trying to give me their babies that are ill, and senior citizens saying that they couldn't accept information technology anymore. So I'thou not involved in any ability struggles. I didn't really care about that. I just had my listing, and information technology wasn't getting washed. …

Knowing that this storm was hitting New Orleans, it was going to be a more powerful storm than you'd seen, why wasn't there whatever discussion about moving buses to a location where they wouldn't exist flooded?

Simply keep in mind how this happened. I call up the storm became a hurricane on maybe Th. On Saturday, it became a major hurricane that was not pointed directly toward New Orleans just was pointed more toward Mississippi.

And then I got a phone call I think Saturday afternoon, and I got a chance to talk to Max Mayfield, the [National] Hurricane [Center] director. And at that bespeak in time, he said definitively: "Mr. Mayor, the storm is headed right for you. I've never seen a hurricane like this in my 33-yr career. And you lot need to lodge mandatory evacuation. Go every bit many people out as possible."

At that time, I thought we had washed a pretty good chore, because our estimates were we had gotten eighty per centum of the people out of the city or better. That was the first time in history we had gotten that many people out. And so I immediately hung up the telephone, called my city attorney and said, "I don't care what you lot have to exercise" -- because they had always brash that you can't do mandatory evacuations -- "we're doing one in the morning time."

And you lot announced information technology around 9:30 the next morning --

Aye, sir.

Why not motility buses to high ground?

Everybody was evacuated at that time. We did not accept the drivers. We had the buses, but there were no drivers. Nosotros had to scrounge effectually to find enough buses --

And you lot had no National Guardsmen to bulldoze the buses.

National Guard was not on the ground, so we had to scrounge effectually and find plenty bus drivers that wanted to stay, considering most autobus drivers don't consider themselves to be central personnel. So [we] went effectually and brought people to the Superdome.

I asked Brown, "Why didn't you have buses pre-positioned, prepare to rescue people and evacuate people subsequently the fact?" And he says, "Well, that's the responsibility of the mayor."

All I can tell yous is that our hurricane evacuation plans deal with trying to get as many people out of the metropolis as possible, pre-event. Nosotros were doing that. When the result hits, our backup plan was to try and get people, if we had to, [to] utilize the Superdome equally a shelter of final resort.

And we advised people to bring enough food and water for at to the lowest degree iii days, because it's non really a shelter. There are no other shelters in the city of New Orleans that can handle a tempest higher up a Category 2.

Simply the city plan, which I've seen excerpts from, says that you were going to employ those buses, both the school buses and the city buses, to evacuate people after the fact.

Right.

That was role of the plan, right?

Right. That was role of the plan. Simply this was a different kind of issue.

If you had to practise it over once again, where would you put those buses?

I would put the buses in another location, but I would notwithstanding have the struggle of trying to mobilize bus drivers. And yous had a good proposition. I think we would look at the National Baby-sit to encounter if they could provide help.

But keep in mind, 80 percent of the city flooded. Everywhere around the Superdome flooded. And fifty-fifty with the Army here, we had a tough fourth dimension figuring out how to become buses nearly the Superdome.

So you demand buses, and you need high-water vehicles. You demand resources for this blazon of result that are well beyond the urban center'due south capability.

You lost some 15 or so high-water vehicles correct there with the Jackson Barracks in the outset hours.

Yes, sir. Yes, sir. …

So on Friday, the president invites y'all to board the plane, right?

Yes.

And the governor's there.

Yeah.

What transpired at that coming together?

Well, first of all, they invited me to Air Force One, which, you lot know, I had never gotten close to this plane. And I'm involved in this catastrophe. I'yard not showering on a regular footing. I'm doing these military baths. I haven't shaved.

Then they invited me in and said, "Look, Mr. Mayor, we recall you ought to make clean upwards a petty bit." And so they permit me take a shower. And I take a shower and they endeavour and go me out of the shower, and I didn't actually desire to go out. Information technology was the first warm shower I had.

There's this lunch. In that location's senators there. In that location's armed forces people. [Secretary of Homeland Security Michael] Chertoff is there. And the president comes, and we have this meeting, and nosotros discuss this consequence, and everybody'due south giving their ideas and their thoughts.

Gov. Blanco is there.

Blanco is there. Her husband [Raymond Blanco] is at that place. [Congressman] Bobby Jindal is there, the senators Landrieu and [David] Vitter, and Congressman [William] Jefferson.

And so they'd gone effectually the room, and everybody's talking to the president and giving their opinions. And so finally I just stopped and said: "Excuse me, but time is of the essence. With all due respect, Mr. President, if you and the governor don't get on the same folio, this event is going to continue to spiral down, and it'southward going to be a black eye on everybody -- federal, country and local." And there seems to exist this dance about who has ultimate authority.

Were they going back and forth with each other?

No, they weren't. They were very civil and very cordial.

And so they were ignoring the discipline.

In that location wasn't a lot of talk about it. That's why I brought it upwards.

Then we're just eating sandwiches and making overnice while people are stranded on rooftops?

They were making suggestions almost we demand to practice this and that, and everybody was talking. And I wanted to cut to the chase because I knew what the real issue was. And in my stance, information technology was this whole "who has ultimate authority" and whether the federal government is going to come in and impinge upon the country'southward potency.

I said, "If yous guys don't get together and piece of work this out, this is going to get worse." And they both shook their heads and said, "Yes, you're right." And at that fourth dimension I took some liberties I probably shouldn't take. I said, "OK, slap-up." I said, "All of us are going to leave right now, and they're going to piece of work this out right now."

And the president was a little stunned, and he kind of stepped dorsum, and he recovered. And he said: "No, yous don't take to leave. The ii of united states of america are going to get out."

So they went into another department of the aeroplane, had a meeting. And then somebody came and called me and said, "The president would similar to meet you." Ms. Blanco, she left and walked out. And he said: "Mr. Mayor, nosotros had a good meeting. We talked nearly it. I gave the governor two options. We could either go with your proposition …" -- which, my suggestion was, if you lot don't give me the concluding authority give information technology to Gen. [Russel] Honoré. And I said [to the president], "Wait, we talked about that option, and and so we too talked nigh another option, that we would federalize, and the governor said she needed time to call up near it."

And nosotros left and had a press briefing. And that was that.

Brown was there for that coming together. Chertoff was there?

Chertoff was there.

When I hear you on the radio at that place on Thursday, it'due south a bit unsettling. You seem a little unglued.

I was. I was watching all this suffering at the Superdome and getting reports on a daily basis of people being rescued and not having plenty food and h2o.

I was also checking in with my police force and my firefighters. I knew the stress and the strain that they were under. I remember we may have had our first suicide at that point. And at that place was a lot of tension in the Superdome. …

Simply was this calculated on your part, or are y'all actually just losing information technology?

Well, I was listening to WWR radio. It'due south the only local radio station that stayed up. I was hearing the president practise a press briefing, I was hearing the governor do a press conference, and I was hearing senators and all these people doing press briefing[s]. And what they were maxim was not reality. And finally somebody was saying something about there were 40,000 National Baby-sit troops. ...

I said, "Uh-uh, I had enough of this." And then I chosen up and I said: "Look, here's what'south actually going on. This is a bunch of B.S. I've only had one visit [by] these officials, and nobody else has been downwardly here to run across what's actually going on." And the rest is history.

Brown was proverb that he was asking Landreneau, asking Blanco for lists of what they needed and that they didn't become back to him.

I don't know annihilation. I wasn't privy to it. I tin can tell you this: that the Monday when Marty came down, he said, "Tell us what your needs are." I had my little listing. I called a meeting of all my staff. Nosotros put together an incredible list of our needs.

Were y'all ever told you didn't ask in the correct way?

No. I mean, at some point in time they started to bring all this hierarchy, and y'all need to [do] project worksheets. …

They started bringing bureaucracy into it? What do yous mean?

Well, nosotros started to find out that the information that we had accumulated wasn't in the proper form. The state has a computer-based system where you put your needs in, based upon certain criteria. And we started to find out that there was a very rigorous procedure to how you lot did that, and if you didn't do it exactly perfectly, information technology would kick it out. And we weren't going back to encounter if it was still in the organisation.

This is you making requests for what?

For equipment, for debris removal, for h2o, for ice -- you proper noun it.

And y'all're being told that you have to fill out the course --

For lights. Superdome at nighttime, pitch-night. Superdome is total of 20,000 people. They're getting antsy, and police are trying to control them. We need a lite. We had i spotlight. I'd been asking for lights for I don't know how many days.

And hither's the other thing, and I don't know if everyone else has picked [this] upwards. But Chertoff came downwards -- God, information technology must have been the weekend, Sabbatum or something. You can probably check the records. I got this call saying, "Secretary needs to see you."

… And then I drib everything and fly out there. I took a helicopter out in that location and go see, and I ran into a firefighter from California. I said: "Human being, it's great for y'all to be here. Thank you for being here. You just got here." He said, "No." He said: "I've been here since Tuesday. Nosotros drove overnight all night to get hither, and nosotros're just sitting here."

And I told my staff, I said: "Wait effectually. Let's merely pay attention." And nosotros started to wait around. And they had Port-O-Lets [portable toilets] stacked all over this place. Nosotros didn't have i Port-O-Let in the city of New [Orleans]. … We saw lights with generators, the kind that nosotros desperately needed --

But whose responsibility is it to get all this stuff together and coordinate information technology and piece of work information technology, in your view?

I don't know.

Well, you're overwhelmed.

I am downward in the trenches request for assist, and information technology'south not being delivered. And and then I go out to this place, and I see all the resource sitting there staged and not moving. Now, whether that's FEMA or whether it's the land, I don't know, man.

Withal?

I don't know. Somebody had a responsibility. If I'chiliad talking to FEMA, if I'grand talking to the state, if I'm talking to the president, somebody [has] the responsibleness to get that equipment to u.s.a.. And information technology didn't happen.

What did they tell you when you said, "How come this stuff isn't getting to usa?"

They said they couldn't get it to us. …

They say because the city was flooded, then they didn't have routes into the metropolis.

This was about the time when the flooding level started to subside a little bit. You know, this is way by --

Well, I'm questioning whether it's a valid argument to say even on Tuesday or Midweek that you tin can't get in. The journalists were getting in; the fireman from California got in.

It could have got in. I hateful, you could have got in with those big helicopters that were flying all over the city. They could have gotten in with the high-water vehicles. So I don't necessarily buy that argument. I'grand merely wondering why the stuff did not go hither. Was it incompetence, or was it something else? And I don't know.

You made very strong statements nearly race, that race was a factor in all of this. Y'all stand past that?

… I basically said that if this was in Orange Canton [in Southern California] or South Embankment in Miami that there would accept been a different response. And there probably would accept been. And it'south a doggone shame. This was Americans that were being impacted, and we didn't go the aforementioned response that other Americans were getting.

Well, how do you know that they would take been able to go a better response in Orange County?

I'grand seeing it right now. Look what'south happening in Florida right now. Anytime in that location's an earthquake in California, my God, we've got every resource available to man.

You think that's fair? We haven't had an outcome like Katrina in a long time. You believe that it was race.

I don't know what other reason could exist at play when we have the The states, and we have a state that has $eighteen billion in revenue per year, that there's not enough juice to become to the city of New Orleans when you have a Category 5 that striking, and you lot have flooding and have people dying. …

Y'all tin can have $18 billion in the banking concern, … but if you don't have leadership, yous're non going to have results.

Well, leadership is i thing, but the will to practise the chore is a totally different deal.

You lot talked to the president. Was he non willing [to do the job]?

I talked to the president. I will tell you this: that later talking to the president, things started to motility.

Well, you talked to him on Wednesday, … merely it wasn't until --

Gen. Honoré showed up. And things started to happen.

Wednesday -- you've nevertheless got two more than days of sheer hell on Thursday and Fri. The evacuations don't really start until belatedly Friday into Sabbatum, do they?

I know. Simply everything started to make it motion, and I started to get consistency of answers when the general showed up.

You knew you were going to accept 100,000 people that weren't going to be able to go out of the city, and you knew you were going to have people in nursing homes, y'all knew y'all were going to take people in hospitals. What was the plan?

Nosotros communicated with all of the people in the city, particularly the churches, to say, "Look, this matter is coming." We faxed out to every 1. We had talked most the buddying organisation. And for the most part, a lot of churches participated and got people out. Every bit far as the nursing homes are concerned, they all are required by state law to have their own evacuation plans. And every bit soon equally we ordered a mandatory evacuation, they were supposed to become people out of the metropolis.

And many of them didn't.

Well, most of them did, but there were a few that didn't. …

But you lot knew yous were going to have 100,000 people or roughly that number staying on in the city.

… Our strategy was to get as many evacuated every bit possible, and then get the special-needs people that had medical needs so deal with anybody else who was hither and to get them to the Superdome, and hopefully in two or three days --

But y'all were going to get the special-needs people to the Superdome, but not the rest of that grouping.

Yeah, special-needs first. Evacuate as many people as possible, and then whosoever [was] left to evacuate them to the Superdome.

Before the storm?

Correct before the storm hits.

Merely y'all didn't become them out.

Nosotros got them to the Superdome. We got most of them out, and the ones that were remaining, nosotros chosen for a mandatory evacuation, and then nosotros had buses to go around the city to selection them upwardly.

But we saw all these pictures on goggle box all week of people streaming out of those neighborhoods, and those people on those overpasses. …

But keep in listen, the terminal time a hurricane event has happened is 1965. [Editor'southward Note: Hurricane Betsy partially flooded New Orleans in 1965.] Near people ride out these storms -- they're Category 2s or whatever, and it's no big deal. The storm earlier Katrina a couple of weeks earlier -- some other parish official fabricated this huge declaration to mandatorily evacuate in spite of what everyone else was maxim. So public confidence was a piffling low at the fourth dimension.

In addition to that, on the Saturday when the tempest was heading for Mississippi or Florida, the sun was beautiful, and nobody was actually paying attention to this effect. So to get anybody out was probably virtually impossible.

Practice you lot think in the futurity you could get this city entirely evacuated? Is that realistic?

I think regardless of what we do in this boondocks, some people volition stay. I retrieve nosotros tin can become more people out, particularly considering this event, than always before. I think now people will definitely heed the warning to get out.

Is at that place anything that the city can do improve to get people out?

Well, I call up we tin continue to escalate our communications every bit it relates to threats that are coming. I call up the whole bus situation -- we're going to rethink that. And if nosotros have to stage buses in a different location, we will. I'm also asking the federal government for some other evacuation [programme] to brainstorm a calorie-free rail organisation to take people from downtown New Orleans to Baton Rouge. That would be tremendous if nosotros had that. So nosotros're going to endeavor all sorts of new things.

I wanted to option up ane affair. You lot come out of that meeting on Air Force 1 on that Friday, and you talk to CNN. You're angry with the governor.

Yeah, I was, because I was hopeful, and I was praying that the governor and the president would come up together and solve this kind of dance that was happening as far as who had final authority, and nosotros could get about the business of taking intendance of what nosotros needed to do.

Only your ire is focused on the governor, not on the federal government. You're specifically focused on Blanco. Why?

Because I had saw a movement with the federal authorities. I saw Gen. Honoré [come] downwards -- I saw things happening; I saw resources coming. I didn't see the same coordination from the country at that time. …

Hither we are, four years afterward ix/eleven, and we don't have a resilient communication systems that can withstand a natural disaster, let solitary a terrorist set on.

It makes no sense. And hopefully this event, in all its tragedy, volition strength this country to really exercise the things that are necessary to make sure that nobody else in America goes through this. And that's what I'm hoping for. …

The consequence hither is one of, as I empathize information technology from talking to [former Homeland Security Secretary] Tom Ridge and other people at the Department of Homeland Security, that they don't want to fix standards. They don't want to tell y'all what yous have to exercise.

I don't buy it. This is national security. … If y'all set the standards, everybody else is going to fall behind because the federal government has the money. Cities can't beget this, and for the most function, states won't invest in information technology. So he [who] has the gold has the rules, and they should gear up the standards. And in a catastrophe like this that's multi-country, the federal government should come up in and have control for a brusk period of time, for 20 or 30 days where there is clear say-so, and no more dancing about whether you lot [are] impinging on states' rights. …

Sometime Deputy Secretary Adm. James Loy told me it borders on Orwellian to start imposing standards from Washington on localities … for communication systems, telling y'all, for case, "OK, you lot have to go down to Radio Shack and buy this radio and not this radio."

That's not what I'one thousand talking about. I'one thousand talking about technical standards every bit far equally how the radio systems should communicate. Y'all take that, and then you go practise biz with Motorola and Radio Shack and whomever, and then you buy from who gives you the best price. But I retrieve the government should have the authority to say this is a national standard. They practice information technology with telecommunications; they practice it with broadcasting. I don't see what's the trouble.

But you're sitting here, and you know that y'all don't take an interoperable, resilient, redundant communication system.

Right.

So what have y'all washed to gear up information technology?

And I'm saying assistance us. We are basically under, what is it, a federal Homeland Security grant to endeavour and figure this out, and we've been working on information technology. And it looks like we've got it solved, but just.

And information technology's been four years since nine/11.

And I recollect we're moving fashion too slow nigh some of these very critical issues. And I only hope that this issue is going to spark the states to take care of business.

You went on the radio and television, and you talked about 10,000 expressionless. Where did you lot get the number?

Well, I was basically assigned that number. And if y'all go back and look at all the tapes, you'll see where anytime they asked me virtually people, I'd said I thought it would be in the thousands. LSU [Louisiana Country Academy] or UNO [Academy of New Orleans] came out with a reckoner model and said they projected it to be 10,000. And in responding to the questions, I said I wouldn't be surprised if information technology was that high. And so I was assigned that 10,000 number.

And how practice y'all recollect the media performed during this?

On the front end I call back the media did pretty expert. I think that they were very factual. Then I think equally the story got bigger, it started to become a competition on who could go the most sensational story. Then I call up the media started to change and started to portray all the negatives that were going on and non anything good that was happening.

And you recall information technology was correct that Brown became the autumn guy for the operation of FEMA?

I call up Mr. Brown, based upon his last testimony, I really don't feel whatsoever sorrow at that place. I think that the leadership skills that are necessary to run a major expanse like that obviously weren't there, number ane. Number two, I retrieve in fairness to him, I call up he took over an underfunded and undermanned agency.

Yes, what about that?

I don't think that whatsoever person can fix FEMA. I think FEMA needs a total restructuring. I retrieve it needs to be taken from scratch and redone. The regulations are outdated; the rules are outdated. Everything they practice is not mod enough for this type of ending.

You were able to have a chat with Chertoff about this?

Yep. I've told Chertoff; I've told the president. Everybody wants to hear information technology. Just irresolute out Michael Brown is non fixing FEMA.

What did Chertoff tell you lot?

He was going to look into it. He didn't make any firm commitments, but he said he was going to look into it. I think he knows. I actually do.

Just, yous know, Washington is an interesting place, every bit I'm sure yous know. In that location'due south lots of pressures up in Washington right now. I just hope at some point in fourth dimension, in that location's an contained evaluation of all of this and that we come up with some specific action steps and then nosotros brand sure this don't happen once again.

Did Ray Nagin Divert Funds From Levy Repair,

Source: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/storm/interviews/nagin.html

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