If you’re looking for an applause line in post-Katrina Louisiana, one has emerged as the most popular: “I pledge to cut bureaucratic red tape!” Politicians from conservative Governor-elect Bobby Jindal to liberal presidential candidate John Edwards have made the pledge, only to fail to offer concrete details about fixing the problem. They should look to two rebuilding blunders for advice.
The first one surfaces from the group of homeless living in Duncan Plaza, across from City Hall. A nonprofit agency, Unity for Greater New Orleans, planned to use Road Home funds earmarked for the homeless to house them. After months of being held up on a dispute over contract advertising, Unity finally decided to move the residents without the funding, hoping for reimbursement.
Less than a mile away, the aquarium used donations and fishing trips to replace the 3,000 fish killed during Hurricane Katrina. When the aquarium requested $99,766 from FEMA for fish, FEMA somehow denied them a request for $600,000 to purchase the fish commercially. The agency said that the method of purchasing fish that only took $99,766 failed to match their fundable categories. Their second appeal met success last week.
These baffling stories point to two sensible solutions for streamlining bureaucracy. In both instances, the federal government allocated money to the state. But the state had no role in choosing the funds recipients – the federal government had already done that. The state’s interposition of itself between Congress and the local groups slows down and decreases the funding. If the state hadn’t interposed itself, they would have housed the homeless more quickly, and the Riverwalk would have had its attraction earlier. Moreover, they wouldn’t have lost money to state procedures, risking taking a large amount of the fund anyway. The state should be cut out of certain funding procedures.
Similarly, state and regional officials slowed funding by showing an obsession with minutiae of rules. In trying to fit these projects into meticulous rules, these officials kept the homeless outside and Canal Street fishless for long periods of time. These bureaucrats need to work more closely with individual projects in order to push the money into the important areas, not the ones that fit best with archaic rules. Increased staffing and job training by FEMA and the state may ease this problem.
Eliminating the state’s interposition of funding and better bureaucratic training can help slice some red tape. But these reforms seem unlikely to happen anytime soon, considering federal and state support. For now, the city relies on the leadership of its institutions, like the heads of Unity and the aquarium, to make major projects happen. The community should applaud these civic leaders for their bold actions. Meanwhile, let’s keep demanding that our politicians follow up on their promises to cut the red tape.
