James Sensenbrenner, June 20, 2006

$300 worth of "Girls Gone Wild" videos; $1,000 to pay a Houston divorce lawyer; $600 spent in a strip club.

Would these qualify as necessary expenditures to satisfy legitimate hurricane disaster needs? Would you want your tax dollars spent like this? A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on Hurricane Katrina and Rita relief efforts released last week found additional incidents of fraud -- worse than previously reported. The report tells of prison inmates repeatedly bilking the system for relief checks and of aid-recipients using their money to buy frivolous items like a Caribbean vacation, or a $200 bottle of champagne from a Hooters restaurant. Regrettably, the results come as no surprise.

The GAO report estimates that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) misspent more than $1 billion in victim assistance after hurricanes Katrina and Rita. With today’s tight budget constraints, we simply cannot afford this level of irresponsibility. A billion dollars represents about 16% of FEMA’s overall hurricane assistance, but the report states the final tab could be as high as $1.4 billion. That money sure could feed and house a lot of Gulf State residents who are in dire straits.

Apparently FEMA had few, if any, safeguards to prevent dishonest citizens from cheating the system. As a result, individuals came from all across the country to pilfer rental assistance money, hotel vouchers, debit cards, and aid checks by providing false names, Social Security numbers, or addresses, often repeating the fraud over and over again. The GAO investigators were surprised that FEMA did not even conduct simple address verification checks. An address confirmation process could have prevented con artists from cashing-in by using post office boxes, vacant lots and cemeteries as their home address. In light of this, you could almost say that the Sisters of St. Boniface in Goldendale incorporate more fraud-prevention measures during their annual church raffle than FEMA performed in the Gulf States.

This behavior is not what you should expect from a "steward" of the taxpayers’ money. Interestingly enough, just as the GAO report was making its way around Capitol Hill, the House of Representatives saw fit to pass a $94.5 billion emergency spending bill, including additional hurricane assistance. One reason I voted against the bill, even before I knew of the GAO report, was due to previous reports of hurricane aid waste, fraud, and abuse, by people purchasing diamond rings, condoms, and massage sessions, when that money could have helped families in need.

Recognizing that current laws aren’t stiff enough to deter this kind of crime, I introduced HR 4356, the Emergency and Disaster Assistance Fraud Penalty Enhancement Act, which further cracks down on scam artists who improperly attempt to obtain emergency and disaster benefits. My bill passed the House earlier today, and is on its way to the Senate for consideration.

At this point, any form of accountability or fraud prevention would be better than what FEMA has in place. Perhaps the agency should employ the good Sisters of St. Boniface to administer its aid programs -- there is nothing like a sharp rap on the knuckles to deter bad behavior. Until Congress sobers up from its spending binge, and realizes the need for some common sense responsibility, I’m afraid we’re going to hear more reports of champagne wishes and caviar dreams, charged to the tab of U.S. taxpayers.

Congressman James Sensenbrenner, a Republican, represents the Fifth Congressional District of Wisconsin. He serves as chairman of the House Committee on the Judiciary. The Fifth District of Wisconsin forms an arc surrounding Milwaukee to the North and West, and includes parts of Jefferson, Milwaukee and Waukesha counties, and all of Ozaukee and Washington counties.