FEMA, Remade Since Katrina, Faces Its First Big Test

BATON ROUGE, La. - Three years after its name became a synonym for failure, the Federal Emergency Management Agency confronted Hurricane Gustav with new leadership, new equipment and a simple goal: prove that Katrina can never happen again.

The contrast began days before landfall. FEMA pre-positioned 2.4 million meals, 4 million liters of water and hundreds of generators within striking distance of the Gulf Coast, and embedded its liaison officers in state emergency centers.

"This is a new FEMA," said R. David Paulison, who took over the agency after the 2005 debacle. "We've planned for the worst and staged everything outside the storm's path."

After Katrina, investigators found an agency hollowed out by budget cuts, led by political appointees and buried inside the sprawling Homeland Security Department. Congress ordered an overhaul in 2006, restoring FEMA's authority and requiring that its director have emergency-management experience.

The agency's reputation still stings. "Heck of a job, Brownie" entered the political lexicon, and trailers contaminated with formaldehyde became a second scandal that took years to resolve.

Louisiana officials, burned once, ran their own parallel operation this time and publicly demanded guarantees of federal help. Gov. Bobby Jindal, a Republican who made his name in health policy, spent the weekend commanding briefings that reporters described as rapid-fire and granular.

"The response will be judged by the people on the ground, not by press conferences," Paulison said. "We know that."

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Associated Press writers contributed to this report.

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