Brown relieved of hurricane duties, gets new job

Michael Brown has been relieved of his duties as Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and will be replaced by Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen.

Next week, Brown will assume his new position as head of the Federal Mishap Management Agency (FMMA).

Brown has been the principal target of harsh criticism of the Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina.

"The events of the last ten days have shown that Mr. Brown has repeatedly exercised poor judgment and has failed in his basic responsibilities," Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said in a letter to Bush.

As the head of FEMA, Brown was responsible for federal disaster response and recovery operations, which included coordinating disaster activities with dozens of federal agencies.

His new position with the Federal Mishap Management Agency will have similar duties, but on a smaller scale.

“Instead of dealing with hurricanes, floods and other massive disasters, he’ll attend to things like 10-car pileups, flu outbreaks and power-outages,” said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. “He’ll also likely be called in if a school sees a large outbreak of lice or if a trailer park suffers massive hail damage. Stuff like that.”

The sudden change of leadership came as surprise, since the White House had insisted publicly for days that Bush retained confidence in his FEMA chief. Last Friday, Bush praised Brown during a tour of Alabama, telling him, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job."

After making the announcement, Chertoff thanked Brown for his work: “I appreciate his work, as does everybody here.”

Bush also offered his support for Brown in his new job: “Brownie, you’ll do a heck of a job.”