Watchdog called lax in FEMA trailer fiasco

William Eskridge stands on the front porch of his FEMA trailer in the FEMA Diamond travel trailer park, on 22 March 2008 in Port Sulphur, Louisiana.

7 October 2008
by Bruce Alpert

WASHINGTON-A federal watchdog agency issued a flawed report that underestimated potential health risks from formaldehyde fumes in FEMA trailers and, even after being warned its findings were flawed, did nothing to stop government officials from using the report to reassure the public, according to a congressional panel.

The report by the investigations subcommittee of the House Committee on Science and Technology criticized the performance of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry's handling of health complaints about FEMA trailers deployed after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. It accused the agency of demoting one of its veteran scientists because he pressed his supervisors to address the flaws in its February 2007 health assessment.

"The agency's incomplete and inadequate handling of their public health assessment, the failure to quickly and effectively correct their scientific mistakes and their reluctance to take appropriate corrective actions was all marked by notable inattention and inaction on the part of (the agency's) leadership," the report said. "As a result, tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina and Rita families living in trailers with elected levels of formaldehyde were kept in harm's way for at least one year longer than necessary."

Much of the information about the agency's testing of FEMA trailers already had come out during congressional hearings. But the report provides some additional details, and gives the next president a blueprint for wholesale changes at the agency.

In a statement, Glen Nowak, spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the parent agency for the Agency for Toxic Substances, said that the subcommittee concentrated on a single study, ignoring a follow-up review and other initiatives during the past two years to assess formaldehyde levels.

But the subcommittee, in a report distributed by its Democratic staff members, said that the initial report by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease, released in February 2007, considered as acceptable a level for formaldehyde exposure that might be OK for a few hours a day, but not for living space occupied, in some cases, for 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

It said only after a senior agency official, since demoted, complained that the report was flawed, did the agency's managers notify FEMA about possible problems with the report. But the FEMA official who received the written notification about the report's flaws put it inside his desk, without informing any other agency officials, according to the subcommittee.

The Agency for Toxic Substances waited eight months to include warnings about people living in trailers for long periods of time, and did nothing to the stop the Federal Emergency Management Agency from using its flawed initial report to tell people they were safe in the agency's trailers.