JACKSON — Now, two and a half years after Katrina, some Gulf Coast folks who previously gave Gov. Haley Barbour a pass on his handling of billions in federal relief funds are starting to lay blame for the slow progress of Coast recovery at Barbour’s doorstep.
A week or so ago, the Biloxi Sun-Herald editorially shifted from its past pro-Barbour stance and demanded more accountability from the governor, ranging from his switching of money intended for Katrina recovery to other purposes and backing other issues that could adversely affect the coastal counties.
The call sounded by the Gulf Coast newspaper seems to be resonating up at the state Capitol and is being reflected in growing dissension among South Mississippi Republican lawmakers who earlier rubber-stamped everything Barbour wanted.
Coast legislators — Republicans and Democrats alike — became disturbed a month ago after learning that Barbour was shifting $600 million in federal aid intended for low-income housing to repair the State Port at Gulfport. Then when he told Coast delegations he wanted $25 million out of another relief fund to use on roads to the proposed Toyota auto plant in Northeast Mississippi, the grumbling got louder.
“I thought it was a joke,” said Sen. Debbie Dawkins of Pass Christian, an outspoken Democrat, after Barbour called Coast senators together and told them about his $25 million Toyota road plan. “Already, his port of Gulfport plan was a bad idea, and I said so at the time we first heard of it,” she added.
“The emperor has no clothes and nobody will tell him,” Dawkins declared, adding: “I’d be really angry if I was a Coast Republican.”
Ever since Congress in December 2005 sent $23.5 billion in Katrina relief money to the state, including $5.4 billion for housing, Barbour has kept the money under his thumb, largely channeling it through the Mississippi Development Authority he controls.
As the housing crisis in the stricken Coastal-area counties persists — a recent FEMA report estimated 40,897 residents remained displaced by the storm — there has been increasing criticism of the MDA’s handling of relief programs.
Twice in 2006 the Mississippi House passed bills to give the Legislature some oversight of Katrina recovery programs, but Barbour blocked the measures in the Senate.
“We don’t get any accounting, or any information on how the money is being spent,” said Rep. Cecil Brown, D-Jackson, a certified public accountant and state fiscal officer during the early 1990s.
Now Barbour is trying to get his hands on a special fund of $282 million that wound up in the state treasury under legislative control when the feds, because of Katrina, forgave Mississippi from having to use it as a match for federal Medicaid money.
Besides giving him $25 million out of the special fund for roads around the new Toyota plant, he also wants to put $87 million of it into the state’s “rainy day” fund intended for fiscal emergencies. However, skeptical legislators believe he wants the rainy day padding to justify his tax cuts to come later.
There’s a major flaw also in Barbour’s Toyota road plan, say lawmakers who specialize in highway planning. Rather than $25 million, the road building around the new auto plant would cost some $385 million.
Skyrocketing homeowner insurance costs since Katrina have plagued those who have attempted to rebuild. Barbour’s role, or in reality non-role, to tackle the insurance industry and make coverage more accessible and reasonable was one of the Sun-Herald’s pertinent questions directed to Barbour. As the paper suggested, Barbour, the former Washington super-lobbyist, ought to be using his talent to lobby President Bush and senators to adopt the multiperil national policy already passed by the U.S. House.
Meantime, as the 2008 Mississippi Legislature plods along, the heat on Barbour’s post-Katrina management is about to become more intense this week when MDA officials are hauled before the House Appropriations Committee.
“I’m going to quiz them about a lot of things,” said Rep. Dianne Peranich, D-Pass Christian, who heads the appropriations subcommittee handling Katrina-related spending measures. One big item on Peranich’s agenda was to find out from the MDA people what’s holding up grant money for homeowners to elevate their new houses to post-Katrina standards.
Though she didn’t say so, you can guess that Barbour’s $25 million Toyota road grab is DOA in Peranich’s subcommittee.
