FEMA trailers are back in the spotlight

The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee asked the attorney general and the heads of the General Services Administration and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to investigate how excess FEMA travel trailers contaminated with formaldehyde came to be sold for use by cleanup workers responding to the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

"Many of these units have alarming levels of formaldehyde, mold and mildew festering inside, and now they are housing many of the workers that our nation is relying on to help us recover from the devastating effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill," wrote Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, GSA Administrator Martha Johnson and FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate on Thursday.

Thompson's ire was sparked by a New York Times story earlier this week reporting that hundreds of trailers FEMA originally purchased to house displaced residents on the Gulf Coast following Hurricane Katrina now are being resold to private contractors to house oil spill cleanup workers.

The workers were unaware that the trailers contained dangerous levels of formaldehyde and were deemed unfit for long-term habitation after some Katrina victims reported serious health problems believed to be associated with living in the units. Experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that formaldehyde levels in the trailers were excessive and federal officials eventually determined they were unsafe for long-term habitation.

"It is simply irresponsible for our federal government to allow this to continue," Thompson wrote.

FEMA began auctioning off excess trailers through the General Services Administration in 2007. "After learning about questionable formaldehyde levels, particularly with the travel trailers, GSA coordinated with FEMA to develop a certification statement to inform purchasers of the potential formaldehyde levels and other restrictions on the use of the units as housing and GSA's requirement that purchasers pass on these notices to any subsequent buyers or recipients," Steven Kempf, acting commissioner of GSA's Federal Acquisition Service, told a panel of the House Energy and Commerce Committee in April.

The certification statement is a binding legal document, Kempf said. When GSA becomes aware of violations, they are referred to the inspector general for investigation.

Thompson has long been a critic of the federal government's handling of the trailers and questioned whether they should ever be sold to the public, despite their popularity with recreational buyers who typically use them for camping. "As I predicted several years ago, certifications, warnings and pasted-on disclaimers are not enough to protect health and safety," Thompson said.

Thompson set a July 15 deadline for a response from the Justice Department, GSA and FEMA. He hasn't decided yet if the committee will convene a hearing on the issue, an aide said.