Avoiding Another Katrina

Starting at 8 a.m. Monday, Schwarzenegger, accompanied by his chief-of-staff Susan Kennedy, his state disaster chief and other aides, helicoptered from one fire-fighting base to the next, convening spontaneous meetings with local officials, relaying requests to the Bush administration, directing National Guard troops and coordinating with the Pentagon. At the Del Mar race track, Schwarzenegger stayed for more than two hours before he was satisfied that enough ambulances were available to move 288 patients. He slept briefly, from 1 am to 5 am on Tuesday, then continued his rounds, making sure that pledges of assistance were delivered. That follow-through, say his aides, was a critical lesson of Katrina, where there was no clear chain of command, leading to disastrous lapses such as the elderly evacuees dumped at the airport, and streams of people hiking along freeways in search of nonexistent transportation.

As evacuees began to fill the Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego, Schwarzenegger, determined to avoid echoes of the Superdome disaster, had an aide call the chief of the California Grocers' Association to make sure adequate supplies of water and provisions were en route. At times he sounded like a quartermaster—rattling off quantities of baby formula, diapers and even toilet paper needed for the growing, but surprisingly calm crowd (the volunteer masseuses ministering to evacuees may have helped on that front). At others, he sounded oddly boosterish, boasting of California as "the most beautiful state" and talking about how "terrific" the emergency response had been, but the message was clear. "I will be relentless," Schwarzenegger promised evacuees. "No matter what, all the way through to the end, we want to make sure that people are happy, that we are helping in every step of the way."

Success if far from assured. The nearly flawless performance of dozens of government agencies in recent days will be hard—if not impossible to sustain. Partisan sniping could flare at the first misstep as easily as the dry brush. And for all his encouraging talk, Schwarzenegger has also acknowledged his state is perhaps only at the beginning of "a tragedy." His optimism is sure to be tested in the days and months ahead as the colossal damages are totaled, tempers wear thin and tens of thousands of Californians begin the long slog with their insurance companies and with FEMA. But for now—at least—victims of the fire can take some comfort in knowing that they have apparently been spared a most painful reprise of Katrina.

© 2007