WASHINGTON – The Bush administration said Monday it needs specific lists of Louisiana’s shelters, immobile hospital patients and transportation pickup points before it can promise reliable evacuation help during a major hurricane.
In a letter to Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff made clear what responsibilities the federal government will shoulder the next time a huge storm strikes.
“You have informed DHS that for the 2006 hurricane season the state is unable, without federal support, to evacuate all those who cannot evacuate themselves,” Chertoff wrote in an undated nine-page letter to Blanco that aides said was sent Monday. “As such, we are prepared to provide that support. But we cannot do so effectively without your close cooperation and assistance.”
Chertoff gave the state a July 26 deadline to provide the needed information, according to the letter.
Misleading abortion info alleged
Federally funded “pregnancy resource centers” are incorrectly telling women that abortion results in an increased risk of breast cancer, infertility and deep psychological trauma, a minority congressional report charged Monday. The report said 20 of 23 federally funded centers contacted by staff investigators requesting information about an unintended pregnancy were told false or misleading information about the potential risks of an abortion.
N.Y.: Doctor in building blast dies
A doctor suspected of blowing up his Manhattan town house to avoid selling it in a divorce settlement died from his severe burns late Saturday, the medical examiner’s office said Monday in declaring his death a suicide. Dr. Nicholas Bartha, 66, had warned his wife in an e-mail shortly before the July 10 explosion: “I will leave the house only if I am dead.”
Massachusetts: Big Dig trouble
Gov. Mitt Romney on Monday dramatically raised the number of potential trouble spots identified by engineers and investigators in and near a Big Dig connector tunnel where the ceiling collapsed last week, killing a woman. Romney said tests show more than 1,100 bolt assemblies that used epoxy and more than 300 other areas in the tunnel are unreliable. All, he said, will have to be reinforced.
Wyoming: 3 students found dead
Three college students found dead in a home near the University of Wyoming campus in Laramie had been drinking that night and died violent deaths, police said Monday. Investigators were still trying to piece together what happened in the home early Sunday, but police said they believe everyone involved had been accounted for and were considering the possibility it was a murder-suicide.
Maine: Humpback whales freed
Two humpback whales that became entangled in marine gear off the coasts of Maine and Massachusetts were freed by whale rescue teams, officials said Monday. Entanglements are a leading cause of whale deaths.
Texas: Damning Yates testimony
Andrea Yates was so ashamed after drowning her five children in the bathtub that she avoided her distraught husband when he arrived home, just one of many signs that she knew the killings were wrong, a forensic psychiatrist testified at Yates’ trial in Houston on Monday. Dr. Michael Welner told jurors that Yates also said she called 911 because she wanted police to arrive before her mother-in-law did so the older woman wouldn’t see what she had done. Yates, whose 2002 conviction was overturned because erroneous testimony may have influenced jurors, has again pleaded innocent by reason of insanity. She faces life in prison if convicted.
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