Replies to post #6751 on Liberal Free Chat Zone (NOLIB)

[NovoMira]

No, I hadn't seen it, Hap...but I can vouch for the truthfulness of the text. If I'm not mistaken I posted info on the storm right after it happened but I don't remember which board. I'll have to do a search because there's a very interesting story about survival that occurred during that storm...it's worth repeating, IMO.

I could tell stories handed down by my parents and their parents before them about the hardships endured by the people in the Upper Northern Plains during other blizzards that would put the survivors of Katrina and Rita to shame.

Not once have I ever heard of them asking for assistance from our Government...BUT if it would have happened I would bet my life that there wouldn't have been fraud and abuse on the massive scale recently reported by FEMA!

There's an article in today's Austin newspaper indicating $1 BILLION has been squandered on fraudulent assistance so far!

I'll find the article and post it...

BTW, I have a hunch if Jesse Jackson and/or Al Sharpton would have appeared wearing their phoney bleeding hearts on their sleeves, they would have been laughed out of N.D. (or run out on a rail). That also would apply for the likes of Streisand, Baldwin, Sheen, Clooney, Robbins, etc., etc., ad nauseam.

[NovoMira]

The auditors' findings, set to be released today, demonstrate how the agency has remained open to criticism from advocates for evacuees for simultaneously being too stingy with people who have real needs, and to criticism from auditors for being too willing to give taxpayer dollars to scam artists and cheats.

Last week, a federal judge ORDERED the agency to RESTORE housing assistance and pay back rent to thousands of Katrina evacuees who had been deemed ineligible for long-term housing aid.

Here's the complete article....

Auditors say FEMA is STILL being bilked

By Eric Lipton
The New York Times

Published: Wednesday, December 6, 2006

WASHINGTON - The Federal Emergency Management Agency has recouped less than 1 percent of an estimated $1 billion in fraudulent or unjustified payments it distributed after hurricanes Katrina and Rita, a new report by congressional investigators says.

At the same time, the agency continued to wrongly send out millions of dollars of new aid this year, including $17 million in rental assistance to families living rent-free in FEMA trailers, the Government Accountability Office report says.
The auditors' findings, set to be released today, demonstrate how the agency has remained open to criticism from advocates for evacuees for simultaneously being too stingy with people who have real needs, and to criticism from auditors for being too willing to give taxpayer dollars to scam artists and cheats.

Last week, a federal judge ordered the agency to restore housing assistance and pay back rent to thousands of Katrina evacuees who had been deemed ineligible for long-term housing aid.

Yet the new report by the congressional investigators said that, in addition to the rental aid given to more than 8,600 victims living in trailers rent-free, FEMA distributed $20 million to people who registered for both hurricanes, meaning they received double payments for rent and other aid.

Investigators also recently determined that FEMA gave at least $3 million to more than 500 foreign students or other foreigners in the United States on work visas even though federal law specifically prohibits such aid.

``FEMA has much work to do before we can be confident that it is providing assistance to those who are eligible and who need it, while denying it to those who do not,'' said Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut. He is the ranking Democrat on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which has scheduled a hearing for today on the agency's fraud and abuse.

The GAO report made clear that inappropriate payments continued into this year. For example, 10 residents of an apartment complex in Plano, Texas, collected $46,000 in rental assistance from FEMA through June, even though the city of Plano was paying their rent with money from FEMA.

FEMA estimates that of the $7 billion in emergency aid given out to individuals and families after Katrina and Rita, about $290 million was unjustified. But based on more than a year of spot-checking applications, auditors said they believed that FEMA was grossly underestimating the figure, and that a more accurate amount would be at least $1 billion.

That would include money that went to thousands of prison inmates and people who used falsified Social Security numbers or submitted applications for phantom homes.

http://www.registerguard.com/news/2006/12/06/a4.nat.fema.1206.p1.php?section=nation_world

[ONEBGG]

.<font color=#8a2be2>Welcome To Our Board Hap0206! I apologize for my tardiness.