Disaster Aid Package Gets Boost

The White House agreed to tack on another $887 million in hurricane aid for Florida and the Southeast as Congress worked Friday to put the final touches on a multibillion-dollar storm and drought disaster package.

With the new money, the package would include $11.9 billion for hurricane relief and $2.9 billion to assist farmers in the drought-plagued Plains. Congress previously approved $2 billion to help Florida and neighboring states recover from a series of four devastating hurricanes.

The House was possibly taking up the aid package, if a deal was reached, on Friday before its scheduled recess, and the Senate possibly on Saturday.

The additional $887 million would go part way toward satisfying Florida lawmakers who have stressed that the level of federal aid is still not enough to cope with one of the worst natural disasters to hit the state in decades.

White House Office of Management and Budget Director Joshua Bolten, in a letter to congressional leaders, said the new money included $348 million for Agriculture Department forestry and watershed protection programs, $402 million for highway repairs and $117 million for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers projects to restore navigation channels and rehabilitate beaches.

The $11 billion in the original package is divided among the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Federal Highway Administration, the Small Business Administration and others involved in recovery efforts in Florida and other Southeast states. It also includes $100 million to help Grenada, Jamaica, Haiti and other Caribbean nations that suffered heavy damage from the storms.

Finally, there's $2.9 billion for farmers, primarily in the Great Plains, who are enduring a prolonged drought. Lawmakers from those states argued disaster relief should not go primarily to Florida, a key battleground state in the November election. But unlike the hurricane money, which will add to the federal deficit, House leaders insisted that the drought money be paid for, in this case by cuts in a conservation program.

To better the odds that the emergency package would pass before lawmakers go home to campaign, it was attached to a must-pass, $32 billion spending bill for the Homeland Security Department.

But even then, there were several complications Thursday.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, a strong supporter of the conservation program, threatened to filibuster the final bill if he did not get a vote on the cutbacks, a move that could force the Senate to reconvene next week.

Also left undecided Thursday was an amendment by Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis., accepted by the Senate side in the negotiations, that would extend a milk support program for two years.

Kohl's chances of keeping his provision in the final bill increased Thursday when President Bush, campaigning in Wisconsin, expressed support for the Milk Income Lost Contract program and said he would work with Congress to extend it.

The House and Senate conferees also agreed to restore language in the homeland security bill, defying a White House veto threat, that would bar the Homeland Security Department from privatizing immigration personnel.

Democrats unsuccessfully tried to increase the $32 billion budget for homeland security, which includes $4 billion for first responder programs and $5.1 billion for the Transportation Security Administration. The TSA is required to triple in the next year the amount of cargo inspected on passenger airliners.

Rep. David Obey, D-Wis., and Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., the top Democrats on their respective appropriations committees, sought an extra $2 billion for airport explosive screening equipment, ports and other non-aviation targets and border security, saying this was the amount needed to comply with the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission on how to enhance domestic security.

Their amendment was rejected on a party-line vote.