Groups Call for Investigation of Relief Efforts' Failure to Comply With Civil Rights Protections
Feature Story by Tyler Lewis - 10/24/2005
Nearly 60 major civil rights and advocacy organizations, led by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR), have called on Congress to conduct an investigation into attempts to waive longstanding federal civil rights and worker protections contained in bills appropriating funding and resources to rebuilding the Gulf Coast.On September 8, the Bush administration indefinitely suspended the application of the Davis-Bacon Act, which requires that contractors pay workers the prevailing wage of the region, to all federal contracts in the areas affected by Hurricane Katrina. Just days later, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs granted three-month exemptions from requirements to create and implement Affirmative Action Plans for contracts handling Katrina relief.
The request for Congressional investigation came in a letter to relevant Senate and House committees stating that waiver of these, and other, longstanding protections will exacerbate the poverty and income disparities in the Gulf Coast.
In addition, the letter expressed concern that the Bush administration was, in the guise of Katrina relief, provoking a distracting battle over school vouchers, suspending environmental protections, enforcing immigration laws during search and rescue effort, and using the mounting costs of relief to justify its long-desired cuts to Medicaid.
The letter notes that such actions by the administration seem to confirm a recent report in the Wall Street Journal that congressional Republicans are attempting to use Katrina relief bills to "achieve a broad range of conservative economic and social policies."
"Whether or not by design, the administration has used the tragedies of hurricanes Katrina and Rita to waive, bend, and break federal laws that protect our civil rights, worker rights, public health and safety, while suspending rules that help small and minority-owned businesses," said Wade Henderson, executive director of LCCR.
"With hurricane Wilma threatening the Florida coast and hundreds of thousands of Gulf Coast residents still reeling from hurricanes Katrina and Rita, it is vital that Congress not only investigate the administration's immediate response to Katrina, but also subsequent actions that are doing additional harm to the very people who most need the help," Henderson said.
Given the far reaching effects of these policies, the letter states that, "It is an immediate imperative to investigate why the government's response to the current rebuilding is hurting so many small and minority-owned businesses, construction workers, and the tens of thousands of low-income and poor citizens desperately in need of jobs, housing, and health care."
The groups also sent a letter to President Bush , urging him to rescind the waivers and suspensions of longstanding civil rights protections.
