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Wednesday, 07 July 2010 |
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July 6, 2010 Report:
(July 7, 2010)Report No. 6 The change of administrations brought a change in approach to the FEMA claims. That City claims process has gone through several stages since Katrina and there is some value in revisiting that here in order to place what is going on now in perspective. Within a short period after Katrina, FEMA went around West End, divided it up into eight sections an prepared a Project Worksheet (“PW”) for each. The next move in the process fell to the City – the preparation of a Comprehensive Damage Report (“CDR”) to respond to each of the eight PWs. For the first three years after Katrina the City did not have the money to pay the architects and engineers who would be needed to prepare the 600 or so CDRs. But, then they got money from the State. The City hired architects, who hired engineers to help them, and the architects then prepared the CDRs. Sizeler Thompson Brown Architects got the contract for seven of the eight West End claims (West End Park got forgotten until later). Ian Thompson is the lead on the project. In early 2009 the City turned over to FEMA a large wave of CDRs, including the seven for West End prepared by Sizeler Thompson. At that point the City had put in place a team from their own staff to manage the FEMA claims. It was housed in the Capital Projects Administration, part of the CAO’s office. They then brought in an outside person, Bill Chrisman, who hired additional staff. Up until this point in the story MYHMC was not invited to have any role in this process. In the spring and early summer of 2009 MYHMC was invited to a couple of meetings presided over by Mr. Chrisman and obtained some information as to what was going on. One of the things that happened was the commissioning of an engineering study of the concrete piers, including an underwater survey of the pilings on which they sit. That report revealed substantial damage that had not been included in the earlier CDR.During the summer of 2009 the City revised its internal approach and created a Project Delivery Unit (“PDU”) headed up by a Deputy CAO, with Mr. Chrisman’s group continuing to work up the individual claims. Then, toward then end of the summer of 2009, the City hired an outside consultant (Marty Altman) with significant FEMA claim experience – something the City’s team previously had not been strong in. Marty Altman hired several other experienced FEMA claim consultants, including Jim Tideman. In the fall of 2009, Jim was assigned to the West End claims.By this point in the story MYHMC did not even have its nose under the tent any longer. By about mid summer 2009 the information flow to MYHMC simply stopped. The City was proceeding on its own, without any input from MYHMC and, as it turned out, without much input being requested from its architects and engineers. Fortunately, along the way the City had picked up on the fact that they had not done a CDR for West End Park. They hired a consultant and prepared one. The West End Park claim began its life managed out of the Capital Projects Administration, not with the other seven West End claims, and there it remains today.In November of 2009 a significant letter writing campaign by area constituents to elected officials, with a focus on Senator Landrieu, yielded an opportunity for MYHMC. John Manard went to see Senator Landrieu in Washington and after returning got the MYHMC nose back under the tent. Jim Tideman was in place as the lead consultant and that nose under the tent rapidly became the whole body in the tent. Unfortunately, what we found was not encouraging. The claims directly related to the harbor (three of the claims) had been poorly developed, included errors and needed some meaningful additional evidence. Issues included dredging, debris, pier repair/replacement cost and mooring pile damage. Additionally, it became apparent that they were only moving forward on smaller perimeter claims (administration building, boathouses etc.) and not on the far larger harbor claims. That was not because the harbor claims needed work, but because the fund from which the restoration money would have to come had been drained to such a degree that the harbor was going to be in competition with such things as police stations, libraries, schools, community centers and other worthy projects. The approach seemed to be: Why push the harbor claims when there probably will not be any money to pay for that for quite some time, even if one could get FEMA to agree as to scope. We got going on the harbor claims anyway.In the first few months of 2010 a combination of Jim Tideman, Ian Thompson, MYHMC, engineers retained by Sizeler Thompson and Lee Richardson (State Marine Debris Coordinator) began to make progress. With the change of administrations, things, rightly, were brought to a halt while the new team sorted out where they were and what to do. Susan Guidry, the Council Member from District “A”, made it clear from the outset that she viewed getting the revenue stream at West End – slip rentals – back on line as a high priority. Unfortunately, one early finding of the new administration was that the contracts for the FEMA claim consultants – Altman, Tideman and the rest – cost too much and they were let go. Not surprisingly, the City then changed its claim management structure again. Under Deputy Mayor Cedric Grant is Alexandra Norton, who now heads up the Project Management Office (“PMO”). They will do the core work with specific claims, utilizing staff and consultants. In setting strategy on a given claim and in dealing with FEMA they are to coordinate with David Becnel, an architect and the head of the Capital Projects Administration, as well as GOSHEP (Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness). The role of GOSHEP is to make sure that things that are claimed can be recovered from FEMA (so that the fund is not further eroded) and to bring FEMA expertise to the wording that is used in documents and the approach that is taken in meetings – translating everything into FEMA terms. One of the consultants working in the PMO is MWH – hired by the City previously as project managers. One of their project managers, Courtney Ordone, is assigned to the seven West End claims we have. She came to our attention originally as a the intermediary with the contractor for the administration building. She has done a good job with that and is easy to work with. But, she is not an architect, engineer or professional FEMA claims consultant.In the meantime, Sizeler Thompson, the source of expertise and substantive claim supports, was told to stand down from any work until notified further. That has not stopped them from being helpful, it being my impression that they were not always being paid even before that. But, it does tell us who needs to hire the expertise to help the City make sure our claims do not fail simply because they were not handled correctly as a consequence of inadequate resources being dedicated to them.To cure those problems MYHMC is hiring its own professionals, namely: (i) Jim Tideman as its FEMA claim consultant; and (ii) an engineer with marina and pier experience. The plan, of course, is to put back in place the sort of team that was working on this previously, but with Tideman and the engineer working for MYHMC, in order to help the City draw together and properly present a claim for the harbor that will yield positive results. That team is being drawn together now.Can anyone predict with any certainty when the harbor will reopen? Of course not, but here is the best working guess at this point: FEMA agreement in 2010, design and contracting first half of 2011, construction completed by mid 2012.So, what about those other smaller claims? Are they still in motion? The contract for the restoration of the administration building was in City Hall for signature at the time of the change of administrations. A problem with the contract became evident and that process stopped. Then it became apparent that a meaningful amount of the likely cost was not yet covered by a FEMA agreement and that there was no clear source for that shortfall if FEMA did not pay. The confluence of those two events has that project stopped for the moment.MYHMC has two boathouses (93 for the fireboat and 31, which is empty). FEMA reportedly agreed to pay for these and the next step was to be the architect (Sizeler Thompson) doing the designs so that bid packages can be prepared. With the change of administrations, that was put on hold. We are not entirely sure how long they will remain on hold but are hopeful that it will not be too long and that Sizeler Thompson will be released to do design work soon.The other claims (boat launch, fishing pier, Breakwater Drive, West End Park) remain in limbo for the moment. Once we get the harbor claims straightened out, we can turn our team to those.It is always good to do some myth busting, when possible: (a) Harbor restoration is not being held up because MYHMC and the City cannot decide on a design for the harbor. Until the FEMA claims are concluded, there is no way to know what to design or build. (b) Harbor restoration is not being held up because MYHMC or the City is being unreasonable with FEMA or greedy. The rumor that FEMA has already offered enough to repair the harbor is simply falseDredging enjoys some position in the harbor mythology. If the cost of repairing the harbor facilities exceeds 50% of the cost of replacing the harbor facilities, then FEMA is obligated to replace. While dredging is an important matter to the harbor in either scenario -- repair or replacement -- what is decided about how much FEMA will pay as to dredging will not be a factor that drives the 50% issue. Other factors are far more important to that decision. The concept that resolution of the harbor claims is somehow hung up on a debate of some sort as to dredging is simply wrong. One theme is common to all three myths that I have addressed -- something worth addressing head on. As to each myth the fundamental underlying assumption is that the City has taken some foolish position, FEMA has been reasonable and the reason the harbor is not restored is because of City intransigence. While there are improvements that can and will be made in some aspects of the City's claims, that fundamental concept is sheer nonsense. Dredging enjoys some position in the harbor mythology. If the cost of repairing the harbor facilities exceeds 50% of the cost of replacing the harbor facilities, then FEMA is obligated to replace. While dredging is an important matter to the harbor in either scenario -- repair or replacement -- what is decided about how much FEMA will pay as to dredging will not be a factor that drives the 50% issue. Other factors are far more important to that decision. The concept that resolution of the harbor claims is somehow hung up on a debate of some sort as to dredging is simply wrong. One theme is common to all three myths that I have addressed -- something worth addressing head on. As to each myth the fundamental underlying assumption is that the City has taken some foolish position, FEMA has been reasonable and the reason the harbor is not restored is because of City intransigence. While there are improvements that can and will be made in some aspects of the City's claims, that fundamental concept is sheer nonsense. Dredging enjoys some position in the harbor mythology. If the cost of repairing the harbor facilities exceeds 50% of the cost of replacing the harbor facilities, then FEMA is obligated to replace. While dredging is an important matter to the harbor in either scenario -- repair or replacement -- what is decided about how much FEMA will pay as to dredging will not be a factor that drives the 50% issue. Other factors are far more important to that decision. The concept that resolution of the harbor claims is somehow hung up on a debate of some sort as to dredging is simply wrong.
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