Acting FEMA chief backs suggestions for improved disaster response

The Federal Emergency Management Agency's acting director on Tuesday said he supports recent recommendations from the Homeland Security Department's inspector general on strengthening disaster response, but added that the agency is several years away from completing all the necessary changes.

After delivering a brief speech to attendees of the Maryland Emergency Management Agency's annual severe storms conference at Johns Hopkins University, R. David Paulison addressed reporters, speaking for the first time publicly about a report published by the IG last week. President Bush recently nominated Paulison to become the permanent director of FEMA.

"We're taking all reports with open arms," Paulison said, referring to the IG report and to other post-Hurricane Katrina reviews. He said he has flipped through the recommendations, and acknowledged the agency needs retooling.

"I'm not taking any offense" to the report, Paulison said. While some of the problems already are being corrected, he said, it will take "several years to get FEMA to where it needs to be."

The report, issued Friday, called for revamped and improved information sharing among FEMA workers, and between the agency and the rest of DHS, state emergency responders and the public. Thirty-five of 38 recommendations made by the IG addressed FEMA by name.

In his speech Tuesday, Paulison called for local leaders to ensure that the public is better prepared and informed when a large weather system is approaching, so chaos and panic do not prevail.

"People were standing in line for food, water and ice when they should not have been," Paulison said. "Obviously, we need to get the message out."

Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center's Tropical Prediction Center, echoed Paulison's calls for improved information sharing and coordination. When a storm is expected to strike, people must be prepared with up-to-date information, he said. The avoidable deaths of Katrina -- in some cases because people were reluctant to leave home -- should not be repeated, he said.

"One of the lessons learned [from Katrina] certainly involved the elderly," Mayfield said.

FEMA workers joining Paulison at the conference gave away stacks of thick books on citizen preparedness to attendees. And while he called for better coordination among federal, state and local authorities, Paulison reiterated that the agency is not seeking to tackle the work of first responders.

"We're not going to trample states' rights," he said. "We're not going to trample local rights. This is a partnership."