Project Katrina

This news story from Friday’s New Orleans Times-Picayune caught my attention:

Months after Congress passed legislation to speed the delivery of federal money to Louisiana’s storm-ravaged health-care system, local hospitals are still waiting for the first payments, while their costs climb into the hundreds of millions of dollars, hospital administrators told a congressional subcommittee Thursday in New Orleans. The Times-Picayune reports that stunned subcommittee members said officials with the Federal Emergency Management Agency had assured them that the agency had sent $400 million to Louisiana to pay for storm-related health-care services. The members also said they thought Congress had removed the main policy barriers that were blocking funding from flowing through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services immediately after the storm.