U.S. Rep. Jim Moran will be one of several Congressional Democrats to tour the Gulf Coast to mark the first anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.
Moran, of Virginia and a member of the House Appropriations Committee, will tour parts of New Orleans that weren’t previously accessible and will also participate in a public meeting in Missisippi.
“It’s important to see the destruction first-hand and to listen to those whose livelihoods were, and in many cases continue to be, upended,” Moran said in a news release.
Moran also said he wants to make sure the $110 billion set aside to help rebuild the Gulf Coast is being spent properly.
“We need to make sure the money Congress has allocated is going to help communities rebuild and not simply lining contractors’ pockets,” he said.
But Democrats did little to hide the political nature of the trip.
Moran’s announcement came on the same day that his party’s leaders released a report titled “Broken Promises,” lambasting the Bush administration for its response to Katrina.
The report claims that thousands of families are still waiting for help from the government and that as much as $2 billion has been lost to waste, fraud and abuse.
President Bush will make a Gulf tour of his own next week, starting with a luncheon in Mississippi on Monday. On Wednesday, the president met with Rocky Vaccarell, a Louisiana native who traveled to Washington to remind the government not “to forget about us.”
Speaking to reporters with Vaccarell at his side, Bush said it would take a long time before the Gulf would recover.
“It’s a time to remember that people suffered and it’s a time to recommit ourselves to helping them,” Bush said.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.
