Administrative costs at the Federal Emergency Management Agency doubled during the decade between 2004 and 2013, but agency officials have no plan for getting a handle on its spiraling disaster relief spending, according to the Government Accountability Office.
FEMA “obligated $12.7 billion from the Disaster Relief Fund for its administrative costs from fiscal years 2004 through 2013 and has taken some steps to reduce and better control these costs,” GAO said in a report made public Wednesday. “This $12.7 billion represents 13 percent of the $95.2 billion obligated from the DRF for the 650 major disasters declared during this time frame.”
Meanwhile, FEMA’s average annual administrative costs during the period “doubled the average during the 10 fiscal years 1989 to 1998,” GAO said.
Officials in charge of FEMA’s budgeting have established spending targets in some categories within the agency’s disaster relief programs, but things haven’t changed much as a result, according to the GAO report. “FEMA does not require these targets be met,” the report said, adding that the agency “lacks an integrated plan with time frames and milestones to hold senior officials accountable for achieving its goals to reduce and more effectively control costs.”
The disaster relief agency became infamous after it failed to respond effectively when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and Gulf Coast states in 2005. More recently, multiple reports by GAO and the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general have detailed billions of dollars in questionable spending and contracts, particularly in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy in New Jersey and New York in 2012.
The Washington Examiner reported Dec. 12, 2012, that FEMA had bought thousands of temporary trailers “despite repeated warnings from government and private industry inspectors that hundreds of the units were shoddily built.”
In an article published Jan. 22, 2013, the Examiner reported that FEMA had awarded “nearly half a billion dollars worth of contracts to three firms linked to a convicted tax fraud.”
Go here to read the full report.
Mark Tapscott is executive editor of the Washington Examiner.
