Obama sees light ahead for oil-damaged Gulf Coast
WASHINGTON
He declared Gulf seafood safe to eat and said his administration
is redoubling inspections and monitoring to make sure it stays that
way. And his White House said Monday it had wrested apparent
agreement from BP PLC to set up an independent, multibillion-dollar
compensation fund for people and businesses suffering from the
spill's effects.
He declared, "I am confident that we're going to be able to
leave the Gulf Coast in better shape than it was before."
That pledge was reminiscent of George W. Bush's promise to
rebuild the region "even better and stronger" than before
Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Bush could not make good on that
promise, and Obama did not spell out how he would fulfill his.
With Obama hoping to convince a frightened Gulf Coast and a
skeptical nation that he is in command, he is marshaling the tools
at a president's disposal: a two-day visit via Air Force One,
helicopter and boat in the region, a prime-time speech Tuesday
night from the symbolically important stage of the Oval Office and
a face-to-face White House showdown Wednesday with the executives
of the oil company that leased the rig that exploded April 20 and
led to the leak of millions of gallons of coast-devastating crude.
From an enormous waterside staging facility here, one of 17
where cleanup crews ready themselves and equipment to attack the
spill, Obama mixed his optimism about the ultimate result with
warnings that the recovery could take a while.
"I can't promise folks here in Theodore or across the Gulf
Coast that the oil will be cleaned up overnight. It will not be,"
he said, after encouraging hard-hatted workers as they hosed off
and repaired oil-blocking boom. "It's going to be painful for a
lot of folks."
In Washington, meanwhile, documents released by a congressional
committee indicated that BP took measures to cut costs in the weeks
before the well blowout as it dealt with problems that led a
company engineer to describe the doomed rig as a "nightmare
well."
The comment by BP engineer Brian Morel came in an e-mail April
14, six days before the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion that killed
11 people and began the nation's worst environmental disaster.
On the Gulf Coast on Monday, one focus of Obama's remarks was
the region's seafood, which faces growing doubts around the country
but which Obama pronounced safe. He noted he had some for lunch --
including mini crab cakes, fried shrimp and shrimp salad sandwiches
-- and found it "delicious."
To further allay fears, the president announced what he called a
"comprehensive, coordinated and multi-agency initiative" to
protect the seafood industry that is the pride and economic engine
of the region. The effort is to include increased facility
inspections and monitoring of fish caught just outside the
contaminated zone.
"This is important for consumers who need to know that their
food is safe, but it's also important for the fishermen and
processors who need to be able to sell their products with
confidence," Obama said. "So let me be clear: Seafood from the
Gulf today is safe to eat, but we need to make sure that it stays
that way."
Underscoring the problem, a council representing commercial and
recreational fishermen met Monday in nearby Gulfport, Miss., with
federal officials from the National Marine Fisheries Service and
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. They
complained the government has not taken enough samples of seafood.
Dangerous toxins have not been found by any of the federal
agencies taking fish and seafood samples. However, the Gulf of
Mexico Fishery Management Council said the agencies are slow to
publish their findings -- NOAA has yet to publish any -- and the lack
of information and transparency is raising concern with the wider
public. Already, the council said, restaurants are putting up signs
informing patrons they are not serving Gulf seafood. The council
expressed concern that this leaves the door open for competitors,
including international ones, to enter the market.
Obama portrayed his trip through Mississippi, Alabama and
Florida as vital preparation for his Tuesday night address and for
Wednesday's confrontation with BP executives, with the ruin brought
to Gulf businesses and lives giving him valuable evidence.
He found it on a vacant beach in Mississippi, where tourists
were scared off from the still-pristine stretch by the mere threat
of oil that has lapped the state's barrier islands. He found it in
neighboring Alabama, where the muck has come ashore and stuck. And
he found it over lunch, in the testimony of local hotel and
restaurant owners who are hurting badly from the loss of customers.
"We're gathering up facts, stories right now so that we have an
absolutely clear understanding about how we can best present to BP
the need to make sure that individuals and businesses are dealt
with in a fair manner and a prompt manner," the president said.
The Oval Office address, the first of Obama's presidency, is
intended to detail specific and potentially expensive new steps for
responding to the spill. That is expected to include an ambitious
plan to restore the fragile Gulf Coast ecosystem, already battered
before the leak.
The president also will argue for passage of comprehensive
energy and climate change legislation. It's a case the president
has been making repeatedly, doing so from the Oval Office will put
a much higher profile on one of his domestic priorities that has
fallen by the wayside due to the difficult politics of the issue.
On the victims' compensation fund, White House spokesman Bill
Burton said the administration and BP were "working out the
particulars," such as the amount to be placed in an escrow account
and how it would be administered. The account would be run by an
independent third-party entity, as Obama has demanded, Burton said.
And it would run into "the billions of dollars," although he
wouldn't give a specific amount.
"We're confident that this is a critical way in which we're
going to be able to help individuals and businesses in the Gulf
area become whole again," the spokesman said.
The administration had said Obama was ready to force BP, if
necessary, to set up the fund, and Burton said Obama aides are
"confident we have the legal authority" to do that.
BP's board was meeting Monday in London to discuss deferring its
second-quarter dividend and putting the money into escrow until the
company's liabilities from the spill are known.
Government estimates put the total amount of crude spilled into
the Gulf of Mexico at between 40.7 million and 114.5 million
gallons, far outstripping the Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska. A
containment cap has been placed over the damaged well, siphoning
off some of the oil spewing out from 5,000 feet below the ocean's
surface.
Asked how much oil is still being released daily despite the
containment efforts, Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen said it
remained unclear. "That's the $100,000 question," he said on Air
Force One.
Obama promised tough words -- and demands -- for Wednesday's
meeting with BP officials, his first. The company's much-criticized
CEO, Tony Hayward, was expected to be there, ahead of what is
likely to be an explosive appearance later in the week before
Congress.
The president particularly cited continuing problems with
payment of claims for damages.
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Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Seth Borenstein in
Washington and Ramit Masti in Gulfport, Miss., contributed to this
story.
