$400M FEMA contracts now total $3.4B

[Robbien]

WASHINGTON - Four no-bid contracts awarded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to house Hurricane Katrina evacuees have ballooned in value from $400 million to about $3.4 billion, prompting renewed scrutiny from Congress and federal auditors about the disaster agency's management of the aftermath of the storm.

The Department of Homeland Security's inspector general is, for at least a second time, reviewing the contracts with construction and engineering firms Bechtel Corp., CH2M Hill Inc., Fluor Corp. and the Shaw Group Inc. to provide 150,000 trailers for hurricane victims, even as FEMA expects to competitively award at least $1 billion for similar work in future contingencies within days.

A review is under way into how the contracts were awarded, the parties involved and their documentary support, according to Marta Metelko, spokesman for Inspector General Richard Skinner.

The contracts, which were quickly awarded as Katrina approached and hit the Gulf Coast, repeatedly have been faulted by Skinner's office, congressional auditors and a Senate investigation for poor safeguards and high costs. FEMA valued the contracts at $2 billion last fall and winter, but the agency has raised the cap for each firm over the last several months.

http://www.hutchnews.com/news/regional/stories/fema080906.shtml

[fasttense]

1. That sucking sound you hear is our national treasury draining into

republic contractor's coffers.

[MissWaverly]

2. and into the kickback scheme to GOP coffers

[shanti]

8. and there won't be anything left in the treasury

when the pukes leave office :mad:

[Tight_rope]

3. Not surprised...Bush* used Katrina as a ways and means to steal more

money from the poor!

[Robb]

4. At what point between $400M and $3.4B did they start to worry?

:wtf:

[leesa]

7. And did they actually adequately house people at some point?

These people will just continue to loot the treasury until it's gone, or until they are forcibly stopped.

[Sinti]

5. It's a wealth redistribution program - anywhere where people are suffering

is a good place for these criminals to make a buck or a billion.

[UpInArms]

6. here's some background on the Fluor Corp

http://www.publicintegrity.org/wow/bio.aspx?act=pro&ddlC=21



excerpt:

In 2001, Fluor spent a total of $714,027 to lobby Congress, the White House, and various agencies, of which $374,027 was spent by the company's in-house lobbyists. In 2001, the company's lobbying disclosure report states that it lobbied on issues such as defense authorization, Terrorism insurance and appropriations for Energy and Water, Foreign Operations and Defense. In 2002, the company spent $672,899 on lobbying; $272,694 of that was spent in-house. In 2002, Fluor lobbied the same institutions and agencies on various Defense Department measures, Department of Energy and national security issues, and Commerce, Justice and State appropriations.

Iraq contracts

One of the leading U.S. government contractors, Fluor was one of the six companies invited to bid for the overall Iraqi reconstruction contract that the U.S. Agency for International Development eventually awarded to Bechtel. Although it lost out on that contract, Fluor, through its Greenville, S.C., branch Fluor Intercontinental, is present in Iraq as a subcontractor to the Air Force Augmentation Program, which provides support for existing U.S. Air Force contracts. AFCAP, under a $4 million initial contract, provides a broad range of logistical support such as warehousing, bottled water supply, trucking and customs clearance to USAID and its contractors working on the Iraqi reconstruction effort. The award can be increased to up to $26 million over 12 months.

With its deep roots in the region—Fluor provided engineering services when Saudi Arabia developed its oil industry half a century ago —the company announced a joint-venture with AMEC plc, one of Britain's leading engineering and construction firms, to join the bidding for two $500 million indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (ID/IQ) contracts that will replace the emergency oil management contract given to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root in March 2003. The bid deadline was Aug. 14, 2003. The two companies are no strangers to each other as they are currently working together in Angola, Canada, the Philippines, South Korea and the United States. Fluor will own 51 percent while AMEC will own 49 percent.

On April 4, 2003, the Army Corps of Engineers' Transatlantic Programs Center announced that it had awarded three contracts "to rapidly execute design and construction services as needed anywhere" in the area of operations for the U.S. military's Central Command. The one-year contracts, awarded to Fluor Intercontinental, Washington Group International and Perini Corporation, are indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (ID/IQ) contracts with initially a guaranteed minimum value of $500,000 and a maximum of $100 million per contract. However, in late September 2003, the Army Corps of Engineers issued additional task orders totaling $278 million for the three companies and the Corps decided to raise the individual contract ceiling from $100 million to $500 million. Washington Group International will repair electrical infrastructure in northern Iraq while Fluor and Perini will perform similar work in central and southern Iraq.

...more...

and

Meet the Disaster Profiteers: Fluor Corp.

http://southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2005/09/meet-disaster-profiteers-fluor-corp.asp

Newsweek has the latest on the "Katrina Goldrush" of contractors hoping to cash in on the disaster. It has a few new pieces of information, such as the fact that the Shaw Group, which recieved a $100 million no-bid contract, is now under investigation by the SEC for possible "accounting irregularities."

The primary qualification for Katrina contractors, it appears, is that they are companies that landed lucrative deals in Iraq's troubled "reconstruction." One of those is Fluor Corp., a construction company whose story leads off the Newsweek piece.

A California-based engineering firm, Fluor has been one of the government's biggest go-to contractors for overseas engineering work, accumulating contracts worth $8.5 billion from 1990 to 2002. Iraq was no exception, where they pointed to their long history in the region (mostly Saudi Arabia) to land over $1.6 billion in contacts for rebuilding Iraq. According to an August 2004 report in the Los Angeles Times, they also had the right political connections:

Suzanne H. Woolsey is a trustee of a little-known arms consulting group that had access to senior Pentagon leaders directing the Iraq war. In January, she joined the board of Fluor Corp. Soon afterward, Fluor and a joint-venture partner won about $1.6 billion in reconstruction contracts in Iraq.

Woolsey's husband, the former CIA director, R. James Woolsey, a leading advocate for the war, also serves as a government policy adviser. He, too, works for a company with war-related interests.

The Woolseys' overlapping affiliations are part of a pattern in Washington, in which individuals play key roles in organizations advising officials on major policy issues, whileinvolving themselves with businesses in related fields.

...more...

[donkeyotay]

9. When did "investigation" become a synonym for "cover-up"?

We're looking into an ongoing investigation about which we cannot comment until you forget about it. Is it just me or does justice appear to have become quaint?

"...renewed scrutiny from Congress..."

What a joke. Pretty soon they'll ask tough questions. Here, let me go first. "Why did you worthless lying bought scumbag weasels stand down and let the GOP crime family bankrupt the nation?"