Bush Says Gulf Coast Isn't Forgotten

Marchers cross a bridge over the Industrial Canal in New Orleans during a remembrance Wednesday of the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. (By Alex Brandon -- Associated Press)

In an interview with reporters aboard Air Force One this week, the chief of the federal recovery efforts in the Gulf Coast, Don Powell, acknowledged "certain frustrations" about bureaucratic obstacles and the "pace of things." But he added: "I also see a tremendous amount of progress. . . . I see economic vitality in the area. I was down there this past week. It took me 28 minutes to get from the airport to downtown. That's called a traffic jam. You don't have a traffic jam unless there's activity."

Powell cited the billions that the administration and Congress are putting into repairing the levees. "It's dramatic about what kind of protection this will give the people of New Orleans," he said.

In Bush's less than 24 hours on the ground here, his focus also fell on spotlighting the conservative ideas he says will help alleviate poverty and revitalize the Gulf Coast. His visit to one of the many low-achieving public schools that have been reopened as charter schools was one example of this, and he also cited the poverty-stricken public housing units being rebuilt as mixed-income communities, a strategy that officials think will make once-crime-ridden neighborhoods more livable. But that same approach has left many low-income renters nowhere to call home.

As he helped welcome Gen White to her new home in River Garden, which replaced a public housing project, Bush told reporters that "these mixed-use housing projects have replaced old-style low-income housing projects that, frankly, didn't work."

Rep. James E. Clyburn (S.C.), the third-ranking House Democrat, criticized that emphasis this week. "I think the administration had some preconceived notions about using the rebuilding as a laboratory for a lot of their right-wing theories," he said.

For more than a year, the Bush administration resisted calls to drop a regulation that required cash-strapped local governments to match 10 percent of federal aid -- something that had been done after previous disasters, including the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Bush signed a bill that waived that requirement after congressional Democrats included the provision as part of a war spending bill.

While acknowledging the huge federal outlays devoted to the region, many Democrats continue to fault Bush for not using the bully pulpit of his presidency for making recovery from the storm a more visible and urgent national priority. Bush has also been criticized for not doing enough to cut through the red tape that local officials say has prevented them from tapping federal recovery money.

The administration's initial response to the storm and its rebuilding effort have been fodder for presidential candidates, even some in his own party.

"How do you calculate what it takes to rebuild confidence in a person who has essentially felt that they were abandoned by their own government?" former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee (R) asked at a forum in New Orleans on Monday.

"Part of the problem, I'll be honest with you, I just don't think there is a sense of urgency in the White House, where the president is cracking the whip, day in, day out, and saying, 'Why is it that we're not getting this done?' " Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) said during a visit to New Orleans on Sunday.

"I am frustrated with President Bush, his red tape, and his apparent low regard for the struggle of New Orleans," said Shelley Midura, a member of the City Council. "He has basically handed New Orleans a modest chest of recovery gold that is sealed shut under an elaborate system of locks that help keep his administration's promise of rebuilding from becoming reality."

Fletcher reported from Washington. Staff writer Perry Bacon Jr. in Washington contributed to this report.