Ex-Director Says FEMA Cramped by New Home

Placing the Federal Emergency Management Agency under the Department of Homeland Security has hampered its ability to deal with disasters, a former agency director said Friday.

The arrangement “has minimized their effectiveness in responding, in planning and training, the national hurricane program, everything,” said James Lee Witt, who served as FEMA director under President Clinton from 1993 to 2001.

Speaking to officials at the National Hurricane Conference, Witt said placing the agency under another department had reduced direct communication between FEMA officials and top government leaders and had created problems sending funding where it was needed.

In Washington, FEMA spokeswoman Natalie Rule said Friday that there were no plans to remove the agency from Homeland Security’s structure. She said being included had let FEMA respond more quickly to disasters using Homeland Security resources such as ships, planes and helicopters.

Rule said that in 2002, the year before FEMA merged with 21 other agencies to create the Homeland Security Department, the agency responded to 49 disasters and provided assistance to three declared emergencies. After the merger, FEMA responded to 68 disasters and seven emergencies in 2004 -- the most in any single year in nearly a decade, Rule said.

FEMA has come under fire for distributing about $30 million to about 13,000 residents of Miami-Dade County, which the National Hurricane Center said was not hit by hurricane-force winds.

Officials in Florida, which had four hurricanes last year, have also complained about delays in getting millions of dollars in reimbursement for debris removal and other cleanup.

Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.) has threatened to introduce legislation to separate FEMA.

Witt is CEO of the International Code Council in Falls Church, Va., a nonprofit group of building and code officials that develops construction codes used by other agencies.