Times the 1st resort for insurable property that was not insured and those losses again it is a decision that we have to look at how to best ensure communities are able to rebuild but at the same time dont support or continue growing the risk. We have to understand there is a a certain amount of risk out there. The exposure for just south florida for a repeat a repeat of the great Miami Hurricane would be in the hundreds of billions of dollars with federal cost exceeding both sandy and katrina. It is, i think something we need to look at. We have to make sure as we go in after a disaster they are setting the stage for the future. We continue to see new disaster aid programs emerge ad hoc in reaction to disasters. They all seem to have different rules and requirements and do not seem well coordinated all we are focused on obtaining the best outcomes. Is this Something Congress should take a look at so that we can streamline programs and ensure that they are Cost Effective . Mr. Chairman
Billed. The staffford act however is limited to oftentimes only those Natural Hazards with limited flexibility. I think the delegate brings up an important point. When you look at growing hazards, such as cyber and others, what is the role of the Disaster Relief fund in the consequence world. And if it is not in rebuilding in the Emergency Response cost and the ability to use Emergency Declaration to bring resource to bear is it worthwhile looking at such things its kind of a question. What is the role in a pandemic . Its not specifically excluded in the Emergency Declarations but its not mentioned. Cyber. Again, we dont look to have the role in the prevention or the Law Enforcement or even the response to the technical aspects of it. But states and locals will be dealing with consequences of it, many of which will follow similar patterns of cyber hazards. Again the coast guard is the lead agency for that had many tools to deal with the response. But much of the coordination with the l
President obama, fema, the rest of the administrations team working hand in glove with their state team. In this case there was really a team. As i like to say there is no i in the word team. I should have the army corps of engineers has been particular in responding to Hurricane Sandy. Over the years, funded by a series of storm protection projects in maryland are polite, robust and strong, healthy systems. These types of projects criticized at the time by some on my opinion because they performed exceptionally well during sandy black hundreds of millions, maybe billions of dollars in damage. Ashur protection withstand storm surge in better then baked circe wells while also enhancing the environment. Although the project on our coast of their job, they were weakened or in the storm not require repairs so were not for mobility future storms. Unfortunately the northeast midatlantic received more frequent and larger storms like standing in the future. The 70 to find costeffective ways to
Health and other issues facing veterans is Tom Tarantino, a former army captain and current chief. Announcement last weekend a good sign for veterans waiting for their benefits claims to be processed . Guest it was an expected announcement. The backlog has been reduced by about 1 3, which is outstanding news. There is some light at the end of the tunnel. We have about 400,000 claims still in the inventory. They were going to halt the mandatory overtime. We expect it to resume after the holidays in february. We have 400,000 claims. If they want to make their goal, it is going to require overtime and other initiatives that have put into gear that have started this trend downward. Host 400,000 claims that is down from 600,000 claims in march. Talk about the impact of the government shutdown. How did that affect the claims . Guest it slowed it down. We averted a potential disaster. The processors were technically protected. The v. A. Could not accept any new claims but they could continue
We went down to southwest florida for the second day in a row. We were able to do a little bit more extensive touring of some of the damage that we saw. And you have places like Fort Myers Beach, santa bell, some of those areas really where the front line got the massive storm surge and an extensive damage throughout there. You also have Charlotte County had damaged north north part of naples and collier county. The one of the things that were working on and is having staged all the power and everything is the restoration of services right now statewide, 85 of customers have power and the main outages are of course in lee and charlotte counties have the most as well as hardy. But then you also have about half out in collier, you have about half out in sarasota and then it really gets better in many other parts of the state until you get seminoles, about a third out of 40 out. Evolution is about 50 out, flagler is probably about 40 to 50 out, but then it gets much better as you get to s