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THE U.S. POST–TYPHOON RESPONSE IN

THE PHILIPPINES: HEALTH AND HUMAN

RIGHTS ISSUES

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, 

GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND 

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

DECEMBER 3, 2013

Serial No. 113–141

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

MATT SALMON, Arizona 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

PAUL COOK, California 

GEORGE HOLDING, North Carolina 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

TREY RADEL, Florida 

DOUG COLLINS, Georgia 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

LUKE MESSER, Indiana 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American 

Samoa 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

JUAN VARGAS, California 

BRADLEY S. SCHNEIDER, Illinois 

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY III, Massachusetts 

AMI BERA, California 

ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

KAREN BASS, California 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

AMI BERA, California 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Nancy Lindborg, Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance, U.S. Agency for International 

Development ......................................................................................................... 11

Mr. Sean Callahan, chief operating officer, Catholic Relief Services .................. 28

Mr. Chris Palusky, senior director, Humanitarian and Emergency Affairs, 

World Vision ......................................................................................................... 38

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

The Honorable Nancy Lindborg: Prepared statement .......................................... 15

Mr. Sean Callahan: Prepared statement ............................................................... 34

Mr. Chris Palusky: Prepared statement ................................................................ 41

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 58

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 59

(1)

THE U.S. POST–TYPHOON RESPONSE IN 

THE PHILIPPINES: HEALTH AND HUMAN 

RIGHTS ISSUES 

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2013

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH,

GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3 o’clock p.m., in 

room 2172 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. 

Smith (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. SMITH. The subcommittee will come to order. And I want to 

apologize for being a few minutes late. We did have a vote on the 

floor, and some of the members will be arriving as they finish their 

business on the floor. 

Nearly 1 month ago, the deadliest typhoon ever to hit East Asia 

devastated portions of the Philippines including the islands of 

Leyte, Samar, and Cebu. With sustained winds of 155 miles per 

hour, Typhoon Haiyan and Yolanda, because they call it Yolanda 

locally, reached as high as 270 miles per hour at one brief point. 

The storm surge reached a maximum height of 40 feet. It is the 

deadliest Philippine typhoon on record, killing more than 5,600 

people. Another 1,759 are listed as missing. Approximately 26,000 

were injured. Yolanda is also the strongest storm ever recorded at 

landfall, and unofficially the fourth strongest typhoon ever recorded 

in terms of wind speed. Philippine Foreign Secretary Alberto del 

Rosario told us that the storm was 31⁄2 times the size of Hurricane 

Katrina. 

Last week, I led a congressional delegation to the Philippines to 

witness the devastation unleashed by the typhoon and to gain a 

better understanding of the unmet needs going forward. Joined by 

my distinguished colleagues Trent Franks and Al Green, and staff 

director Greg Simpkins and counsel Piero Tozzi, we were unanimous in our deep respect and abiding gratitude for the accomplishments of the U.S. military, USAID leaders, and NGOs on the 

ground including Catholic Relief Services who alone have committed over $20 million to assist the victims. For their part, the 

Philippine military was also playing a vital role along with remnants of local governing bodies. 

In the immediate aftermath of the storm, right up until our arrival, highly motivated U.S. servicemembers brought desperately 

2

needed supplies including food, water, medicine, and housing materials by the planeload to the ruins of Tacloban, with homeless, destitute victims—over 19,000 and counting—hitching flights back to 

Manila for safety and shelter. As was the case after the 2004 tsunami, the United States deployed an aircraft carrier, this time the 

USS George Washington, and other major military assets to provide assistance. Smart, rapid response combined with unique airlift 

capability has made all the difference in the world. 

In the Philippines, I had the privilege of meeting Colonel Eric 

Mellinger, Chief of Staff of the 3rd Marine Expeditionary Force. I 

would note parenthetically that I nominated Eric to the Academy 

in 1982 in my first term, and it was clear watching him in action 

that he had earned extraordinary respect, from the top of the command, down to the lowest private. His leadership and that of Generals Kennedy and Wissler ensured that a desperate, shell-shocked 

population of victims got immediate, tangible aid. Every Marine I 

saw, every Marine we saw, including three from New Jersey—

Lance Corporal Anthony Pellegrini, Lance Corporal James 

Soccodato, and Lance Corporal Michael Nappa—was working 

around the clock to protect victims. ‘‘Sleep? What is that?’’ one Marine told me with a smile. ‘‘We are saving lives.’’

Al Dwyer, Principal Regional Advisor for East Asia and the Pacific at the USAID Office of Foreign Disaster Relief said that ‘‘when 

the U.S. hit the ground things got moving. This was a model response,’’ he said. ‘‘We saved lives here—I know that for a fact.’’ The 

cooperation and teamwork of our military and disaster assistance 

leaders from USAID, including Jeremy Konyndyk, Director of the 

Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance who traveled with us, 

the NGO community, and Philippine officials was a textbook example of how disaster assistance ought to be done. But of course the 

relief efforts are far from over. The emergency phase has no matriculated into the recovery phase and much more needs to be done. 

With Donal Reilly from Catholic Relief Services, and we were 

with him the entire day when we were in a devastated city, our 

delegation visited a sanitation kit distribution at a local parish and 

received a briefing from Mayor Petilla of Palo whose daughter Jessica Petilla, coincidentally, is a medical doctor in my own State of 

New Jersey. And we met with numerous survivors who told us 

heartbreaking stories, and yet somehow radiated a calm and inner 

peace. One man told us how his father had drowned only a few feet 

from we stood and how he had stoically carried many waterlogged 

dead bodies to a mass grave. He said he nearly collapsed emotionally however when he carried the lifeless body of a 3-year-old girl. 

He said he just broke down. He was overwhelmed, and he felt he 

could continue no more. Yet amazingly, a few days later there he 

was, determined to rebuild and overcome, and he was all full of 

faith. 

That resiliency was best summed up by Archbishop Jose Palma 

of Cebu who said and I quote, ‘‘The typhoon was the strongest in 

the world . . . but our faith in the Lord is even stronger . . . no 

calamity or natural devastation can quench the fire of our hope. 

The Filipino soul is stronger than Yolanda.’’

En route from Tacloban to Manila aboard a C–130 commanded 

by Major Jason Kauffman, our plane was diverted to seek the 

3

whereabouts and rescue of a helicopter that crashed into Manila 

Bay. After a flawless, just above the deck, systematic search for 

survivors, because the helicopter had long since sunk to the bottom 

and it was kind of like looking for a needle in a haystack, the pilot 

spotted two individuals who had no life jackets who were swimming frantically, opened the back of the C–130 and kicked out a 

yellow life raft to the two lifejacket-less swimmers. With night 

darkness fast approaching, it was clear that their lives had been 

saved. 

That was emblematic, a symbol of what everything that was 

going on on the ground in Taclaban and elsewhere was all about. 

Aboard, the crew was Colonel John Peck and a group of individuals 

who were just ecstatic that they saved two more lives, in addition 

to all the others they had a hand in saving. 

Back in Manila we had productive meetings with both the Health 

Minister Doctor Enrique Ona and Secretary of Foreign Affairs Albert del Rosario. We also met with people from the Millennium 

Challenge Corporation, one of whom was Matt Bohn who told us 

that roads constructed pursuant to a contract of some $435 million, 

a 5-year MCC grant, had been only minimally damaged and that 

the road actually paved the way for humanitarian supplies to make 

their way to the victims. We also met with a plethora of NGOs and 

U.N. agencies. Our interest was not only how effective our emergency aid coordination had been throughout it all, but going forward where our assistance ought to be directed in the medium and 

in the long term. 

We felt that two areas deserved very special attention, preventing and addressing potential epidemics and minimizing the 

scourge of human trafficking. It normally takes 2 or 3 weeks for 

a marked increase in disease prevalence after a natural disaster 

such as a typhoon, but international health experts on the scene 

told us that dengue fever was already endemic in the storm-ravaged areas and could increase four- to five-fold in the coming 

weeks. In addition to dengue fever, cholera, hepatitis A, typhoid 

fever, leptospirosis, pneumonia, and other diseases can proliferate 

in a post-storm environment. There are vaccines for cholera, hepatitis A, and typhoid, but there are no vaccines for dengue fever, leptospirosis, and other diseases that might manifest in huge numbers. 

Efforts to address the potential epidemic are complicated by several factors. First, the Philippines is undergoing a rainy season 

that will not only increase breeding grounds for mosquitos and 

other disease-bearing pests, but will also hamper relief efforts. Furthermore, many residents without shelter or with inadequate shelter will be more susceptible to the elements. The lack of electricity 

could mean no cold chain for medicines that must be refrigerated 

to remain usable including safe blood for women. There are some 

90,000, some estimates are higher, of women who are pregnant, 

who have lost their ability to go to a venue where safe delivery can 

occur. 

We know that some 200 health clinics have been destroyed in 

whole or in part, so a venue for them to give birth safely and with 

access to safe blood remains a very serious challenge going forward. 

Third, many roads remain uncleared or badly damaged, making 

4

transportation for health workers or patients more difficult. 

Fourth, many Filipino health workers have either left the affected 

areas or they died in the storm, and the continued presence of foreign health workers will depend on ongoing donor funding and the 

health needs demanded by subsequent crises elsewhere. 

Internationally funded protection efforts currently focus on family reunification, personal identification, and creation of safe spaces 

for women and children. USAID grantees are establishing womenfriendly and child-friendly spaces in strategic locations to address 

the needs of women and adolescent girls as well as male children. 

The lack of electricity and insecure housing raises their risk of falling prey to abusers and traffickers, especially at night. However, 

while there is acknowledgement of the increased risk of human 

trafficking in the wake of the storm, the lack of reports of increased 

trafficking has meant that this issue is not yet in full-focus for protection. Maybe it is a good news story, for we know traffickers are 

ready to prey on the vulnerable and we know the Philippines has 

a huge problem of women being trafficked and children as well. 

Also important will be providing shelter for the 1.2 million families whose homes have been damaged or destroyed. The Secretary 

of Foreign Affairs told us that $1.3 billion will be needed to repair 

and to erect homes that have been destroyed. The Philippines, as 

we all know, is a major American ally and a great trading partner. 

There are an estimated 350,000 Americans living in the Philippines and 4 million Filipinos living in the United States. We are 

bound by a common value system and a great deal of friendship 

that spans well over a century. We have an important stake in seeing that our friends and neighbors in the Philippines can recover 

from this devastating storm. 

The purpose of this hearing is, what do we do next? How do we 

proceed and go forward? I would like to yield to my good friend and 

colleague Ms. Bass for an opening statement. 

Ms. BASS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. As usual, I want to 

thank you for your leadership in holding today’s hearing and also 

for making the trip to the Philippines. I want to extend the warm 

welcome to Assistant Administrator Lindborg and for her leadership and in agreeing to come before the subcommittee. And to our 

other witnesses, thank you for your participation and the important work each of your organizations is doing to provide relief and 

support to those in need. 

Los Angeles and my congressional district is home to a large Filipino population who has family that have been impacted by the typhoon, and I personally have friends who could not find their family members for many days. The U.S. response to this crisis has 

been nothing but immediate and swift, and I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge and thank the important work currently 

underway by USAID and DoD whose rapid response has undoubtedly saved lives and prevented death and injury. And also let me 

extend my deep appreciation to the many U.S. based NGOs that 

leaped into action and to those who continue to take on the long 

and arduous work of rebuilding and helping mend people’s lives. 

I want to yield the rest of my time to Representative Green, who 

I know—oh, okay, Mr. Chair. Go right ahead. 

5

Mr. SMITH. Before I go to Mr. Green, I do want to go to Chairman Royce. But I will yield to my friend and colleague Chairman 

Royce, chairman of the full committee. 

Mr. ROYCE. Well, I will yield to Mr. Al Green at this time if that 

is all right, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. 

Mr. GREEN. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and 

thank you to Mr. Royce. Mr. Royce, I want to thank you because 

you immediately started this process with a resolution and I know 

you will say more about it so I won’t step on your words, but I do 

want to thank you for moving as expeditiously as you did. 

Mr. Chairman, I sincerely thank you because you were not only 

a great leader, you were a great inspiration while we were there. 

I will tell you that your summary that you just accorded us is entirely accurate, and I would like to associate myself with each and 

every word that you articulated. I am very proud to say that the 

codel was bipartisan, and our effort was truly a sincere, nonpartisan effort. We went there to be of assistance, and I am proud 

to have been associated with the endeavor. To my ranking member, 

I thank you for allowing me to be a part of this as an interloper. 

I seem to find my way into places, and you have greeted me warmly, and I have great respect and admiration for you, and I thank 

you so much for allowing me to be a part of this august body today. 

I would like to extend my condolences to the people in the Philippines. They have suffered greatly. They are in a recovery phase, 

but there is still great work to be done. And I want to assure them 

that my visit has only strengthened and reinforced my belief that 

there is much that we can do to be of assistance. I would like to 

thank the witness. I did have an opportunity to read your testimony, Ms. Lindborg, and I found it quite compelling and very extensive, and it validated what I saw while I was there. So I thank 

you. 

I was inspired by the unity of the effort when I was there. There 

was a tripartite process that involved our Embassy which was right 

there at the forefront. The leadership was stellar and outstanding. 

We had USAID all over the place. Signs, people, it was remarkable 

to see how the organization managed to become almost ubiquitous. 

You were there and everywhere. And then of course we had DoD. 

I was very proud to be an American and to be there, because our 

Marines landed and people applauded. And the Marines didn’t just 

show up. In the parlance of many of my friends who live where I 

live, they showed up and they showed out. They really acquitted 

themselves well. 

The chairman talked about the rescue mission which was something that happened while we were en route to do something else, 

but they were efficacious and they did it with alacrity and I was 

proud of the way they handled themselves. The Marines that I met, 

about 15 from Texas, gave me phone numbers, and on Thanksgiving Day I received one of the greatest rewards you can receive 

when you call a family member and say I saw your son, I saw your 

daughter. I saw your husband or your wife, and they are doing well 

and serving our country well. And there were tears of joy that emanated from some of these relatives, and others were just gratified 

to know that we took the time to go. 

6

So Mr. Chairman, I think we did a good thing, and again thank 

you for your leadership. Mr. Franks isn’t here. I would like to mention him and say to him that I am proud to have been associated 

with his efforts. He has arrived now. Excuse me, Mr. Franks. Excuse me. My apologies. Mr. Franks from Arizona, he and I had an 

opportunity to spend a lot of time together, and I am gratified that 

we had that chance to see and understand many things about the 

Philippines. Mr. Chairman, I don’t know how much time you have 

given me, but if you would just allow me a couple more minutes 

I would greatly appreciate it. 

I do want to mention that our relationship with the Philippines 

is one that is solid, in my opinion, because the relationship is based 

in part upon business. We are their second largest trading partner. 

But it is more than a relationship, it is a partnership. We have a 

visiting force agreement with the Philippines. It is more than a 

partnership. It is also a kinship because we have many Americans 

who live in the Philippines, about 300,000, and we have Americans 

with children that are being born in the Philippines. And this relationship, this partnership, this friendship, this kinship, makes our 

association quite unique, and I am proud of it. 

I read the testimony, and in your testimony, ma’am, you mentioned that about 800,000 people were moved out of harm’s way. 

That answers a question that I had when I went over to Tacloban. 

When I saw the devastation, I immediately asked myself why 

weren’t more people killed? It was a miracle in my opinion that 

more people were not killed. But a part of the answer has to do 

with the way the government was able to evacuate 800,000 people 

in short order. That was a fantastic effort, and I am proud to say 

that I know we had a hand in it, but I am proud to say that that 

saved a lot of lives. I don’t know how many, only God knows how 

many, but a lot of lives were saved by this effort to evacuate people. 

And finally, I want to just acknowledge that we have a bill, H.R. 

3602, and any bill that I file is one that I am amenable to changing. There is nothing in the bill that is sealed in any sort of permanent way. But what it does simply is accord Filipinos who live in 

the United States of America temporary protective status. We can 

change the name. We can find another way to do it. But here is 

why I think it is imperative that we do this in some way by some 

name. Because the people there in the Philippines, 42 percent approximately live off of less than $2 a day. To send people back into 

harm’s way, in a sense, I think that is a little bit, to be very kind, 

insensitive. There are many other adjectives. 

But I think we, as a great country, can allow them to stay for 

some period of time, all negotiable, and work and send remittances 

back to the Philippines. Last year, more than $10 billion in remittances were sent from the United States to the Philippines. More 

than $10 billion. We can help the people of the Philippines help 

themselves with something. Right now we are calling it temporary 

protective status. Call it anything you want. Anybody can sponsor 

it that can get it done. I just think we need to do something to 

allow people to help themselves, and this is a way that it can be 

accomplished. $2 a day, not a lot. We have people working here, 

their visas will expire. Let them continue to work and send those 

7

remittances back home. Those people who say I want to send 

money, I am not sure who I should send it to, well, this way the 

money will get to people who need it because these are family 

members and friends of people who are living in this country. 

Now to Major Angel Hooper. She was the commander of the C–

130 when I had an opportunity to go on the flight deck, and I just 

want to put in a good word for the women who serve in the Marines. They are doing an outstanding job as well, and I salute her. 

She is from Texas, yes, and she had her copilot in training. And 

I was so proud of the way she was training her copilot. And I salute all of our men and women who serve. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the time that I do not have. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Green, thank you very much, and it was a pleasure to join you and Trent Franks on the trip. I would like to now 

yield to the distinguished chairman of the full committee, Ed 

Royce. 

Mr. ROYCE. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to yourself, to Mr. Franks, to Al Green. Mr. Green, you are right. We have 

a kinship with the people of the Philippines and I think that our 

hearts really go out for the families and the victims, the 5,600 people who lost their lives. But the reason I want to commend the 

three of you is because your focus on this trip was what additional 

steps could the United States take to make certain that we did not 

have an epidemic that would follow those who lost their lives that 

day, that malnourishment wouldn’t add to that toll. 

And I just tell you as chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, 

I strongly support the U.S. effort here to help the Philippines recover and rebuild, and I think the U.S. Agency for International 

Development is playing a critical role in this effort along with the 

brave men and women of our armed forces. To date we have allocated $60 million to recovery efforts. The USS George Washington 

is stationed offshore to support relief efforts. And I think many in 

the Filipino-American community were directly affected. I know we 

hear from families about how this typhoon, the worst on record, 

took from them friends and family members that in many cases are 

still unaccounted for. 

So we applaud the community’s effort to come together, to raise 

funds, to donate humanitarian supplies. Filipino-Americans are 

rightly proud of their heritage, and they are committed to helping 

those affected by the typhoon. I wanted to just also thank Karen 

Bass and Randy Weber. We had a hearing not long ago, a field 

hearing, where we heard from a Filipino who had gone through 

this tragedy of being trafficked, labor trafficking in this case. And 

it is in the wake of disasters like this that there could be more exploitation, and jointly we are working to make certain that does not 

happen. So I want to thank Karen Bass and Randy for their work 

on that issue. 

And I want to say that I had the pleasure of meeting with Assistant Administrator Nancy Lindborg in the days immediately after 

the typhoon made landfall, and I wanted to say that it is quite extraordinary the work that USAID is doing there. We thank you. We 

thank your team for bringing comfort and compassion to those who 

need it most. 

8

And I do have one issue that I want to raise concerning our nation’s disaster relief efforts. We met with Bill Gates, the committee 

members met with Bill Gates several hours ago, and it is one of 

the issues in which he addressed the meeting was the unacceptably 

long transit times for supplies to reach those who need them most. 

The 60-year-old law that governs food aid prevents the timely delivery of assistance by requiring the commodities be sourced directly from the U.S. and then transported overseas. Sixty years ago 

this made sense, but today it has become an unnecessary barrier. 

In the case of the Philippines, USAID made a cash contribution directly to the World Food Programme so that commodities can be 

purchased locally. 

In comparison, the first shipment of U.S. rice to the Philippines 

is arriving now. It just arrived, 3 weeks after the typhoon made 

landfall. So surely we can do better than that, and it is time we 

updated our laws. And I did want to say that Mr. Engel and I have 

language that we believe, that we hope is going to be in the farm 

bill in order to make that reform. So Mr. Chairman, I am heartened by the outpouring of support that the international community has shown to the Philippines. I thank you again for your hard 

work on this issue, and 2 weeks ago this committee voted unanimously in support of a bipartisan resolution that I authored expressing our condolences for the people of the Philippines and in 

support of the recovery effort being waged now by USAID and by 

the Department of Defense. 

And earlier this year, I led a bipartisan delegation with my good 

friend, Ranking Member Eliot Engel to the Philippines to strengthen our bilateral relationship with that country. We are going to do 

that again in the wake of these issues, but in the interim I want 

to thank all the members of the committee and to say we are all 

Filipinos during this difficult time, and I look forward to hearing 

from our distinguished witness. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Chairman Royce, thank you very much for your leadership and for your comments today. I would like to now recognize 

Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for 

calling this hearing. And as we start to look at the issue, the personal firsthand testimony of you and others who have visited the 

region is certainly one that can’t help but touch your heart when 

you hear about people being displaced. Some 3.8 million people 

have been displaced. It is hard when we start talking in millions 

to really recognize the size, but it is the size of the State of Oregon. 

If everybody in Oregon were displaced it would be just monumental 

in terms of the impact. 

And so I think that in a town where many times we can be very 

critical of agencies, their roles, and what has happened, the testimony that has been shared by my colleague Mr. Green and the 

chairman certainly is something that needs to be applauded, and 

we need to celebrate those successes and hopefully put a model 

going forward on how we can make sure that our response is not 

only rapid, but it is one that is sustainable. Because I think the 

difficulty we have as with so many tough situations throughout our 

world is being able to replicate that and make sure that the buVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:06 Jun 04, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131203\85788 SHIRL
9

reaucracy does not get in the way of providing good support, but 

yet at the same time where we just don’t throw money at it. 

And Chairman Royce just mentioned this particular issue on a 

60-year-old law that we need to address and look at that in a real 

way to make sure that in times of emergency people can work together. And I just want to thank the chairman and Ranking Member Bass for the continued bipartisan support. There is very little 

that is bipartisan in this town, and time and time and time again 

I find that on this committee and with the interest of the people, 

not only the United States citizens but in this particular case the 

Filipino people that are hurting and suffering, my heart, my prayers and my continued support to advance the cause to provide relief 

is unyielding. And with that I yield back. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. Weber? 

Mr. WEBER. Thank you for the meeting, Mr. Chairman. I have 

got lots of questions but I am short on time because I have a 4 

o’clock meeting. So I am going to be quiet and let it go. 

Mr. SMITH. Okay. Mr. Franks? 

Mr. FRANKS. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I want to 

thank, I guess Chairman Royce has gone on to another committee, 

but we appreciate his forbearance in all of this, and it has certainly 

been a precious honor to have been part of this delegation. It seems 

like Congressman Chris Smith is always at the forefront of doing 

anything he can to recognize the image of God in every person 

across the world or in our midst, and I have always seen him to 

be the first one to care about and love those that everybody else 

has forgotten about. And he is a hero to me, and I have just the 

greatest respect and appreciation for all he does and has done, and 

again it was one of the great memories of my life to be able to accompany him there. 

And Congressman Green was someone that I held to be a friend 

before we went, but now I hold to be a precious friend, and was 

so touched by the way as he put it so aptly that this was a truly 

bipartisan effort to making a nonpartisan goal to try to reach out 

to the Filipino people. And I appreciate Congressman Green very, 

very much. 

As it happens, I have the privilege—and I mean that—the privilege to have been married to a lady from the Philippines for 33 

years. And I don’t know how in the world that happened, but if she 

ever leaves me I am just going to go with her. It seems I can save 

a little trouble that way. But she has been the delight of my life 

and is representative of the noble nature of the Filipino people. 

This is a people that refused, as Congressman Smith said, to be 

brought down ultimately by the storm. They were stronger than 

the storm. And I couldn’t help but notice a banner that someone 

had taken a picture of out on a high hill there that had been devastated all around it. And the banner simply said, ‘‘Roofless, homeless, but not hopeless.’’ And I was deeply moved by that. 

The Filipino people are people of deep abiding faith and have a 

courage that sometimes belies their stature and their gentleness, 

and I just can’t express to you the warmth that I feel toward the 

Filipino people. And maybe I am a little biased, but I assure you 

it is well justified. And it is also I suppose of note to point out that 

10

they have been strong allies of the United States in times past, 

critical allies of the United States. One of the places where the 

storm actually came to shore was a place that marked General 

MacArthur coming to shore at Leyte decades ago, and I thought 

the symbolism was pretty profound. 

I would be really lax in not pointing out my agreement with both 

Congressman Green and Congressman Smith related to the exemplary coordination that occurred there among USAID and all the 

groups, all the NGOs, and I have to say especially the American 

military. I suppose there is no enemy on earth more to be feared 

than the American military, but there is no friend that can be more 

capable and more committed than this same group of men and 

women that I think exemplify everything that America is all about. 

And they provided the base of operation there and the muscle to 

make this all work. 

And I know that there are so many of the Filipino people that 

we didn’t get there in time to help, that this help didn’t get there 

in time, and I only hope that somehow they are not forgotten and 

that their memory is kind of a catalyst in our hearts to recognize 

that to be an American is a privilege and also one of those things 

that we sometimes forget how much easier we have it than just 

about anywhere in the world. And so it is everything about being 

appropriate to do what we can to extend the hand of freedom and 

hope to those that are in need and this is what this was about. And 

I think it not only exemplifies what America believes and stands 

for, but I think, Mr. Chairman, it can have the effect of seeing the 

light of freedom someday fall across every lonely place, every lonely 

face on this planet. 

And so let me just suggest to you that I am very honored to be 

an American and to have been part of this effort, and I am grateful 

to all the people like Ms. Lindborg that have given their lives to 

these kind of causes. And I am hoping, Mr. Chairman, that I can 

just ask her when she has the opportunity, because my challenge 

is I have to leave as well, but I am hoping that she can address 

the whole issue about what USAID’s plans and efforts are to protect trafficked children and abused children, and what are the best 

programs that they have to protect children from being abused in 

crises like this and how do we make sure these programs are in 

place. And I am going to go ahead and mention the whole epidemic 

situations that may follow whatever area they might be and what 

we need to do to be prepared for those kind of crises. 

And finally, it was suggested while we were there that when people like Chris Smith and Congressman Green and others talk about 

this in the media that it keeps this issue in front of the public, 

which allows them to respond financially and otherwise, and it is 

a consequence that ends up protecting real lives. And I am hoping 

that you might express ways that as Members of Congress we can 

extend our efforts there to make sure that we are doing everything 

we can here in the safety of the Capitol to do what we can to see 

protection and help extended. 

And with that Mr. Chairman, I tell you it just exemplifies this 

morning, anything else just a sense of gratitude. Grateful to all of 

you and grateful to you, sir, especially. And God bless the Filipino 

people. 

11

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Franks, for your eloquence and your extraordinary compassion, and you too Mr. Green. 

It was a privilege to travel with both of you. 

I would like to now go to and introduce our first panel beginning 

with Nancy Lindborg who is the Assistant Administrator for the 

Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance at 

USAID. She has testified before our committee on several previous 

occasions including earlier this year on the crisis in the Sahel. 

Since being sworn into office in October 2010, Ms. Lindborg has led 

DCHA teams in response to the ongoing Syria crisis, the Sahel in 

2012, the Horn of Africa in 2011 droughts, the Arab Spring upheaval, and numerous other global crises. She has also been on the 

ground recently in the Philippines, actually briefed me and my 

staff before we left, having just come back herself from the typhoon. 

Prior to joining USAID she was president of Mercy Corps where 

she spent 14 years. She has held a number of leadership positions, 

including service as co-president of the board of directors of the 

U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, one of the founders and board 

members of the National Committee on North Korea, and chair of 

the Sphere Management Committee. She is also a member of the 

Council on Foreign Relations. She holds a BA and MA in English 

Literature from Stanford University, and an MA in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. 

Administrator, the floor is yours. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE NANCY LINDBORG, ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR, BUREAU FOR DEMOCRACY, CONFLICT AND HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE, U.S. AGENCY FOR 

INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT 

Ms. LINDBORG. Thank you very much. Chairman Smith, Ranking 

Member Bass, members of the subcommittee and others, thank you 

very much for inviting me to testify today. A special thanks to you, 

Congressman Smith, for leading the delegation and to all of you 

who went during this important time. And most of all, thanks to 

all of you for the ongoing support that enables us to do this kind 

of lifesaving work and really express who we are as Americans in 

these times of need. That is vitally important. 

This has been the worst year since 1993 for the Philippines, and 

the November 8th super typhoon was the worst of those storms the 

worst at an already bad year with 195 miles an hour winds, a 

storm surge that reached higher and went further inland than the 

Indian Ocean tsunami. To date we know that 5,600 people have 

died and nearly 11 million have been affected. As did many of you, 

I again express my deepest condolences to the people of the Philippines. These are life-changing losses that will take many years 

to fully regroup from. 

As you noted, I traveled to the Philippines 1 week after the 

storm made landfall and saw the staggering devastation. And you 

see the photographs, but when you are in it it is this eerie, twisted 

landscape of boats and cars tossed up in trees and people’s lives utterly destroyed. But you also see these signs of hope, the signs of 

humanity that surface even during these difficult moments. I met 

12

a brother and sister, and the sister was telling me about how her 

brother rescued 13 people at great personal sacrifice during the typhoon. These are the stories that are side by side with the devastation and the loss and the great resilience of the people as they 

begin to emerge from the worst of the storm. 

I also saw a massive relief effort already in full swing. I arrived 

on a U.S. military C–130 that was carrying lifesaving supplies that 

USAID had brought in from our regional depots. I also saw the rice 

that we had enabled the World Food Programme to buy locally 

being put into family packs and distributed so that it was in the 

hands of 2.7 million people within the first week, making a lifesaving difference. And I visited government, a Philippine-run incident command center that was mapping out the distribution, sending out supplies on pedicabs, buses, and trucks that they had recruited into the effort. This is the result of a 10-year partnership 

with USAID to increase preparedness and the ability to respond. 

U.S. military aircraft delivered more than 2,000 tons of relief 

supplies and evacuated 21,000 people out of the storm damaged 

areas once we got back in. To date, the U.S. Government has provided nearly $60 million in humanitarian assistance. All of that is 

already on the ground and has made a difference during those lifesaving days. So as we have noted, we are already looking ahead to 

recovery and reconstruction. I have submitted a full, detailed testimony, but let me just hit on a few highlights from the relief, the 

recovery, and the reconstruction aspects. 

The first is that we have applied some really key lessons from 

past mega-disasters that helped us improve the coordination and 

the response for this typhoon. USAID experts were tracking the typhoon for at least a week before it hit ground, so we were able to 

pre-position members of our disaster assistance response team in 

Manila to work with the military and the Embassy both to prepare 

and enable an immediate response. USAID worked hand-in-glove 

with DoD Pacific Command to set up that vital air bridge that at 

a time when communications were shut down, roads were inaccessible, that we were able to immediately do assessments and begin 

delivering lifesaving supplies into Tacloban which was one of the 

hardest hit cities. 

And then we invested and supported the capacity of the civilian 

side, both the government and the U.N., to set up land and sea 

bridges to help clear the roads so that we were able to wrap up the 

military engagement and bring forward the longer-term civilian 

ability to ensure that the deliveries were able to continue. 

So logistics were our number one, most urgent focus followed by 

three key priorities—emergency shelter, water sanitation, and food. 

There were about 1 million homes that were destroyed by the 

storm, so we airlifted, right away, heavy-duty plastic sheeting to 

the Philippines that helped more than 20,000 families construct 

temporary shelters. The water supplies were ravaged, the systems 

were down, so we focused both on provision of clean water with 

chlorine tablets and very quickly worked to get the municipal 

water system in Tacloban back up and running with support from 

UNICEF. And by the time I was there, that was already providing 

100 percent of the water for the municipal area in Tacloban. 

13

The Philippines Government and the international community 

continue to respond to the health concerns. There are nearly 200 

health teams on the ground now, and more than 2,000 children 

have been immunized against measles and polio. Perhaps because 

of the urgency you brought, Chairman Smith, there are fogging operations underway right now to address the potential for mosquitoborne diseases, especially dengue fever. And with standing water 

trapped in the debris, this is a particular concern, so there has 

been a big push for fogging operations. 

As Chairman Royce noted, we used the full spectrum of our food 

assistance tools. That local purchase of rice got food immediately 

into the hands of people who needed it then. We also were able to 

airlift very nutrient-dense food bars and nutritious paste from our 

regional warehouses, and when there were no cooking facilities 

available families were able to get their full caloric needs out of 

these U.S.-produced food bars. Finally, we rerouted a ship that was 

just loading up in our hub in Sri Lanka and brought that to the 

Philippines. That ship arrived yesterday afternoon, and although it 

wasn’t there for the lifesaving portion, it will be an important part 

of the ongoing response. So that is the importance of this very flexible, full suite of tools. 

Finally, we know the most vulnerable—the women, the children, 

the elderly and those with special needs—often fare the worst during disasters. We have a State-USAID initiative called Safe From 

the Start which reminds all of us that we need to do protection 

from the earliest days of a response. We are supporting programs 

that are working with identification, tracing and reunification of 

unaccompanied children, focusing on safe spaces for women and 

children, and really one of the most important protection approaches is making sure that aid gets to people who need it as 

quickly as possible. 

I wanted to say a note about the power of preparedness. We have 

been working with the Government of the Philippines, which is the 

second most disaster prone country in the region, to help prepare 

and mitigate the risk of natural disasters for almost a decade. This 

is critically important. This helped make this not as bad as it could 

have been. We have been training first responders on something 

called an Incident Command System that we brought forward from 

our own U.S. Forest Service that enables the government to set up 

these command centers and know what to do and how to bring forward the right kind of trained people. They evacuated nearly 

800,000 people in advance of the storm, and this saved countless 

lives. This is something that we will continue to do as we grapple 

with the new normal of increased storms that are battering an island nation like the Philippines. 

We have also learned from past response efforts that we have to 

move as quickly as possible into early recovery. This is vital so people can get on with their lives so they don’t get mired in hopelessness and they can start standing on their two feet again. We have 

already seen market activities spring up even in the hardest hit 

areas, so we are looking at how to provide lifesaving assistance 

that is also very aware of local coping mechanisms and local markets. We are moving forward with our strategies for provision of 

livelihood support, looking at transitional shelter, continued food 

14

security, water sanitation efforts, and continued protection of the 

most vulnerable populations including the human trafficking issues 

that are important and very much a part of our considerations. 

Looking ahead, the Government of the Philippines just released 

its first early draft of what they think they will need for the longerterm reconstruction, and they have identified about $2.6 billion. 

Each year the Philippines loses about $5 billion as a result of natural disasters. That is 2 percent of its GDP. So as we look ahead 

to the reconstruction, one of the areas that we will look closely at 

is continuing this preparedness, this risk reduction and how to 

build resilience at the household at the systems and the country 

level. This was already one of the three areas of focus for our 

USAID mission, and this will be critical looking ahead. We are 

prioritizing our efforts to support the critical areas that have been 

identified including some of the infrastructure, the livelihoods, and 

essential services that are necessary to get those communities back 

up on their feet. 

And then finally we know that the most vulnerable will continue 

to be important as we go forward. So just to conclude, a number 

of you have noted the important relationship between the United 

States and the Philippines. We have seen an extraordinary outpouring of generosity from Americans across the country and especially from the Philippines diaspora. I have had the pleasure of 

participating in several community events, and the way people mobilize to provide help to those in their hour of need is really heartening, and it just underscores the humanity that we all share. 

The United States has a deep commitment. We will stay with the 

people in the Government of the Philippine into the recovery and 

the reconstruction era. We are already seeing the cameras start to 

fade away, and this is becoming yesterday’s story. So the kind of 

hearings like we are having today, the continued commitment that 

we, the United States, will have to the Philippines will be absolutely vital, and I look forward to answering your questions, and 

I thank you very much for your support and consideration today. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Lindborg follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Ms. Lindborg, thank you very much for your testimony. Without objection, your full testimony will be made a part 

of the record. And I have read it, and it answers some of the questions that I would have posed, so thank you for the thoroughness 

and for your extraordinary leadership. I am going to ask you just 

a few questions and then yield to my colleagues. And I will ask 

them all and if you could just then respond to them. 

One of the biggest takeaways we had from our trip was debris. 

There was debris everywhere. It was a story to two stories high. 

It looked like there was a lack of capacity or capability to remove 

it. And I know that there are some cash for work programs that 

Catholic Relief Services and others are doing, and I am wondering 

if that might be one job that they might undertake. Because there 

are dogs and rodents which will proliferate diseases including leptospirosis which could easily erupt as a major health hazard. 

When we got hit by Superstorm Sandy in New Jersey, and a lot 

of the shore towns were unbelievably negatively affected, we had 

debris everywhere, but thankfully we had functioning mayors and 

town councils, the ability of the sheriff who was the Office of Emergency Management leader in Monmouth and Ocean Counties, and 

they did wonderful jobs in coordinating the debris removal and environmentally safe depositing of that debris. Our takeaway, I think, 

collectively was what are they going to do with all this stuff? It is 

everywhere. And I am wondering if you might want to speak to 

that. 

Secondly, on the issue of trafficking, as you know I am the prime 

sponsor of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and work on combating human trafficking every day. Something we are all concerned about now that the recovery efforts, now that the roads are 

all open, or most of them, is that the traffickers, may look to prey 

upon vulnerable people including the women and children who 

have made their way to Manila, who over a longer period of time 

may have lost some hope or may be very gullible for an offer to go 

to Saudi Arabia or to Korea or somewhere else in the Philippines 

for what looks like a real job, but turns out to be an engraved invitation to a hell on earth which would be a trafficking situation. 

I understand there is one protection person on the response 

team. Is that enough? Has the TIP office been brought into this in 

a robust way to apply every best practice they know to mitigate 

human trafficking? Third, we learned, and this is a minimum estimate, I think, of 90,000 pregnant women. My understanding is that 

there are some estimates that put that even higher in the affected 

areas. I know that the availability of safe blood and a venue where 

a woman can give birth who may need a C-section is a very real, 

compelling need and most, as I said in my opening, of the health 

clinics have been destroyed or very seriously damaged. And I am 

wondering what the plans are to ensure that as these women, especially in the final 3 months of pregnancy, get close to birth of their 

children, will there be an effort to ensure that there is safe blood 

and a skilled birth attendant to save her life if she needs a C-section or some other help for mother and baby. 

I would note parenthetically that my own daughter-in-law—my 

wife and I are grandparents of three grandchildren—just in July in 

a Princeton hospital had an emergency C-section, and lost over 2 

22

liters of blood, and they had to send out for some of it, because they 

didn’t have her blood type. They had some, but not enough. And 

in a ravaged area that we visited, and you visited as well, with no 

health clinics that are working, that could mean death to a woman 

whereas availability of safe blood could mean life. So if you could 

address that. 

And finally, the issue of best practices learned from the earthquake in Haiti and the tsunami in the Indian Ocean. I actually was 

on the USS Abraham Lincoln briefly with a group of members. We 

went to Banda Aceh during the tsunami. And again, the deployment of the aircraft carrier was like a pivot, an anchor for relief 

efforts, particularly during the emergency phase. What other best 

practices have been learned and are being applied now as a result 

of the typhoon? 

Ms. LINDBORG. You have raised a lot of the critical issues. So 

first on debris, it is amazing. I mean it reminds me of the 

snowbanks of my growing up in Minnesota where they tower over 

you. The Government of Philippines has a salvage-first policy, and 

so you may have seen as well people are already starting to pick 

through what is reusable versus what needs to be put into a landfill. We are taking this into account in designing our transitional 

shelter programs, and also incorporating what we call cash for 

work as a part of our programs working with our U.N. and our 

NGO partners who have a lot of skill and experience in doing programs that basically provide a day’s wage in return for clearing debris away. 

This will be a huge challenge, an important challenge. Unfortunately, or fortunately, the Philippines actually has a fair amount 

of experience in dealing with debris. It is a scale issue in this instance, and it will be an area of immediate focus as we look ahead. 

You have raised some of the other associated concerns about disease with the debris, and for that reason, the fogging is a very important approach because there is standing water. The other issue 

of course is that they are still pulling bodies out from underneath 

these mountains of debris, which will likely remain an ongoing effort as they work their way through the recovery. 

On trafficking, this has been an area of concern in the Philippines for some time, and in fact, the United States has put about 

$11 million into counter-trafficking programming in the Philippines. And we work very closely with something called the Philippines Inter-Agency Council for counter-trafficking. There is a 

need to remain very vigilant about the possibility of increased trafficking. Whenever you have a major disaster like this and people 

are newly vulnerable, there is the potential for increased trafficking. So for that reason, we are watching this very closely, working with the local partners who we work with all the time, and 

looking to see where and if and how we need to increase the programming that we already have in the Philippines. And we are 

talking very closely working with our CTIP partners. So thank you 

for your support on that. 

On the pregnant women, the whole issue of the cold chain is critical, not just for pregnant women but for the immunizations that 

have to go forward. So that is a priority between WHO, the Government of the Philippines, and UNICEF. We have provided supVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:06 Jun 04, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00026 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131203\85788 SHIRL
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port to get the cold chain back up and running so that you are able 

to bring forward critical medicines, including blood. There are right 

now 184 medical teams on the ground. There has been a fairly robust international response to try to fill the devastating gap that 

the storm created, and they are now operating in the affected 

areas, working to reestablish those critical facilities. Also important 

was the early evacuation. I mentioned I rode in on a C–130. Our 

U.S. military C–130s, as they carried supplies in, they carried people out, and about 12,000 people were evacuated. And the hope is 

that those who need that kind of specialized assistance, including 

some of the more complicated births, are able to get out. 

Finally, in terms of best practices, I think there were a lot of important best practices that we took forward from past mega-disasters, and one really resulted in the close, very effective collaboration between USAID and DoD. And we were able to, because of the 

work that we had done together previously, very quickly stand up 

an effective air bridge that prioritized the most important lifesaving supplies to go forward. One of the things that happened in 

Haiti is there was a clogging of supplies that went through the system, and sometimes not the most important supplies went first. So 

the seamless collaboration that was a hallmark of this effort really 

grew out of the lessons from Haiti. 

Mr. SMITH. Not to make light, but I did bring up fogging everywhere we went and pointed out that when I was seven, 8 years old, 

without any parental notification or consent, my friends and I used 

to follow the fogger in Iselin, New Jersey, on our bikes. So the ability to reduce the impact of dengue fever and some of the other, the 

mosquito-borne, vector-borne diseases that are looming, the attendant risks that fogging might bring, I think the risk versus the benefit of stopping several epidemics from bursting out is worth it and 

I am so happy to hear that. I have never seen, and I think my colleagues Mr. Green and Mr. Franks would agree with this, have 

never seen more standing water putrefying than we saw as a result 

of this typhoon which obviously is a breeding ground for vectorborne disease. 

Ms. LINDBORG. Well, as someone who also followed the fogging 

trucks as I was growing up, but in fact there is a great concern 

about not just trying to address the standing water, but also to revitalize their surveillance system, the health surveillance system. 

Because one of the concerns is in the wake of the storm that we 

need to very quickly have the ability to identify where you have an 

outbreak so that you can do the fast treatment. So it is really those 

two actions, the surveillance system and the preventive fogging 

that are underway. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you so very much. 

Mr. Green? 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I again thank you for 

your leadership. It has been stellar. I would like to follow up on 

one thing that you mentioned, Ms. Lindborg, about the Filipino 

community in the diaspora. In Houston, Texas we have approximately 39,000 Filipinos, and I will tell you that the community has 

organized, and the community has raised what I think is a fairly 

handsome sum of money that has been sent to the Filipino commuVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:06 Jun 04, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00027 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131203\85788 SHIRL
24

nity, of course in the Philippines. Sent to the Philippines. So I am 

honored to tell you that my community is onboard with the effort. 

I had the opportunity to go to Pakistan after the earthquake, and 

I saw the communities that were flattened, homes just leveled. I 

went to Sri Lanka after the tsunami and I saw a train, a rail car 

that had been lifted away from the tracks and was over some long 

distance away from where it should have been. Went to Haiti after 

the earthquake and saw the devastation that took place there, and 

quite frankly there is still great work to be done in Haiti. Went to 

Louisiana, I am from Louisiana, I was born there. So I went to 

New Orleans after Katrina, and I saw the devastation that took 

place. 

And in my humble opinion, what I saw in the Philippines rivals 

all of these others. I think it is right there with some of the great 

disasters of my time. And my hope is that you will continue to do 

what you are doing. Dr. King reminds us that the arc of the moral 

universe is long but it bends toward justice; however, we have to 

note that it doesn’t do it of its own volition. It does it because of 

people who will go into harm’s way to try to help others in their 

times of need. So I thank you for what you are doing, and I trust 

that USAID will continue to be the great servant that it has been. 

I want to talk about the business community for a moment. I had 

the preeminent privilege of meeting with some of the leading citizens who are the heads of major corporations, and we talked rather 

extensively about the largesse and lagniappe, their monies that 

they have that they can accord in a crisis, that they can share in 

a crisis. And I think that they have stepped up to the plate. They 

are making plans to do more. One of the things that we talked 

about was schools. As you know, the infrastructure in Tacloban has 

been destroyed and approximately 90 percent of the infrastructure 

for schools has been destroyed. And children are without what they 

would normally do in the course of a day and that is be in a classroom. 

These business leaders indicated a willingness to be of assistance 

to help with schools, and so my hope is that there will be some coordinated effort between the business community and the NGOs, 

the government, all of the parties involved to help children. I am 

concerned about people in the dawn of life and in the twilight of 

life. Our children are a precious commodity, and my hope is that 

we will do some things to help them with their educations. The 

senior citizens, persons who are not able to take care of themselves 

to the extent that you and I can take care of ourselves, I would like 

it if you would to comment on efforts that are being made to help 

them, comment on the schools, the efforts to help reestablish 

schools as quickly as possible. 

And finally, when we met with the mayor of Tacloban she indicated that the number one concern was shelter. The number one 

concern was shelter. This was the case of course in Louisiana after 

Katrina. Shelter was of great importance. It was the case in Haiti 

and in Pakistan, as well as in Sri Lanka. And I know that we have 

a lot of experience in dealing with shelter after these tragic events, 

but I also know that what you said is true about them being in 

harm’s way to this very day because the typhoon season for them 

reaches its zenith, its apex, in the month of December, so there 

25

may be something else looming on the horizon. Their number one 

need is shelter. So if you would, comment on the shelter issue. 

And finally, one additional comment and compliment, if you will, 

with reference to the ability to move 800,000 people. That is remarkable. It is no small feat. And to do this with a limited amount 

of time speaks well of the coordinated effort that it took to get it 

done. I know you have mentioned it, and if you want to say just 

a bit more about how that was accomplished, I will be honored to 

hear. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will await the lady’s answers. 

Ms. LINDBORG. With my apologies for coughing, sorry. That is an 

amazing set of places that you have visited, and you have seen in 

each instance the awesome power that these natural events have 

to disrupt and to destroy. So to address your issues, let me first 

of all just honor your community for their ability, their commitment to mobilize, and the fact that they focused also on raising 

cash. One of our major messages has been to the American people 

who want to provide assistance is to focus on cash as the fast and 

most effective means of helping the people of the Philippines. So 

thank you for that. Also, we do have a listserv that we will provide 

your offices that is kicking out regular updates that are of interest, 

specifically or especially to the diaspora. So we will be sure to get 

that to you. 

On the private sector, this is an incredible and important part 

of the response, both the private business sector and the American 

public, and we see how those contributions are very important and, 

in fact, quite a large portion of the reconstruction effort both the 

immediate and the longer-term reconstruction. We have in USAID 

a special working group that we have set up specifically to look at 

how to bring forward those partnerships. And I know that a number of the NGOs are also quite experienced and committed to 

partnering with the private sector, so I think we will see a lot of 

those efforts going forward. Schools are essential. It is part of getting a sense of normalcy back into people’s lives, and even temporary schools, so that you are able to help children focus on the 

future instead of just on their loss. Children are amazingly resilient, but it is important that they have the opportunity not to lose 

out on those critical schooling years. So that is a part of the infrastructure. That is one of the largest priorities. 

You quite rightly raise shelter both as a priority and one of the 

areas that is always one of the most challenging after these storms. 

We have learned a lot, I think, in terms of the importance of providing transitional shelter that gets people very quickly into the 

kind of shelter that can withstand additional weather events, understanding that it may be awhile for the permanent shelter solutions to fully come onstream. We saw this even in Katrina, as you 

noted, after Katrina. 

The other challenge is there is often a desire to look at policies 

that help citizens not rebuild in the areas that are at greatest risk, 

and these are the tough policy decisions that it often takes a while 

for a government to responsibly work through to a solution. So our 

strategy was to first of all provide just that urgent lifesaving shelter material that got people out of the elements. And we have our 

shelter expert on the ground now to work on transitional shelter 

programs, and particularly we will be very supportive of the issue 

26

of ensuring that people’s rights very much respected as we look forward to the longer-term shelter solutions that will take a while to 

come forward. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Green. Just let conclude before I go 

into our second panel. Greg Simpkins, my staff director, and I were 

recently in Nigeria. It was in September. We visited Jos and Abuja. 

It was mostly on trafficking, health, and an effort to get Boko 

Haram designated as a foreign terrorist organization. But while we 

were there we did visit with a number of NGOs, including a bishop 

in Jos, who had lost funding for AIDS orphans. And it raised a serious question that I have been asking for 30 years, more than 30 

years, and that is about the robust inclusion of faith-based organizations. I believe whether we are combating things like HIV/AIDS 

through PEPFAR, the program there, or malaria, tuberculosis, or 

doing relief operations in a typhoon or other natural disasters, that 

the efficacy of the relief operation is enhanced when faith-based operations are robustly included. 

They have networks. They have people on the ground. The multiplier effect is incalculable, and I have seen it over and over again. 

And what I found in Nigeria was that only 9 percent, 9 percent, 

in other words 91 percent not, and particularly when the health 

care grid is primarily faith-based, were getting monies, grants from 

the U.S. Government. And it was very disconcerting to me. I know 

that Catholic Relief Services is getting support, and we saw it 

when we went to the Transfiguration Church. Matter of fact, a 

week before that I understand that Cardinal McCarrick had celebrated mass there, and we received communion while we were 

there. It was a church without a roof, completely blown off and destroyed. And it had just been rehabbed and unfortunately will have 

to be so again. 

But I just would encourage you to realize that every dollar spent 

there does get multiplied because of that unbelievable commitment 

that has nothing to do with money and has everything to do for 

service for service’s sake, but also because of the multiplier effect 

of the volunteers that are then included in the operation. So if you 

could take that back or if you wanted to respond. 

The second thing is that the recovery must be sustainable, and 

know that you have friends and advocates here. It is bipartisan. 

Mr. Green, Mr. Franks, I, the chairman Mr. Royce, all of us, I believe, if we know of a need as your folks on the ground say, ‘‘Hey, 

the cash for the work needs an additional push,’’ or they need this 

or that, let us know and we will try. I can’t guarantee results, but 

we can try to increase the capabilities that you will have on the 

ground to help the people who have been ravaged by this storm. 

Yes, Ms. Lindborg? 

Ms. LINDBORG. Well, to your first point, amen. We have a lot of 

really important, wonderful faith-based partners and I think we 

are seeing especially how important that is in the Philippines with 

the network of churches that they have. I was on a call with faithbased community members across the country just last week talking about the Philippines response and also hearing about all the 

efforts that are happening in this country to support both the relief 

and the recovery efforts. So I absolutely agree with you that that 

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is an important part of the landscape, and some of our most valued 

partners, including the two who are coming up next. 

On the offer to help us keep sustained attention on this, I very 

much thank you for that, and I would welcome the opportunity to 

take you up on that offer. We see all too often that after the cameras go away, these kinds of responses fall off the page and people 

move onto other issues. We will be there with our teams, with our 

funding and programs and we welcome the partnership in helping 

to keep the spotlight on the sustained effort. And again I cannot 

thank enough Chairman Smith, Congressman Green, and the rest 

of your subcommittee for the continued focus and support for these 

kinds of critical efforts. 

Mr. SMITH. I would just add that if that kind of sentiment could 

be shared with the Secretary of Health and others, I raised it with 

our meeting with him, and it was like it was a foreign idea to him. 

And I asked him to look into it and he said he would, because they 

don’t include faith-based organizations in those things that they 

fund. 

Mr. Green wanted to make a comment? 

Mr. GREEN. Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And for fear that 

I will forget, I also want to thank Ranking Member Bass again for 

allowing me to be here. I want to add an amen, if I may, to what 

you said about the faith-based initiatives. They not only help after 

a disaster, but also before. I have seen evidence of it, because they 

know where the vulnerable are. They know where the help is needed. They are intimately familiar with the people in the neighborhood, and they can do an awful lot with the evacuation process. 

And when people have to shelter in place, and that is usually 

what you finally hear and that is something that I dread hearing, 

but shelter in place, there is no more that we can do given that 

the hurricane in our case or the typhoon is so near now that we 

have to just stay where we are. Well, when that happens, it is usually these institutions, these faith-based institutions that are still 

there. We leave, but they ride these things out, and as soon as it 

is over, they know exactly where to go to render the most aid. So 

I would just like to give my compliment to you for bringing this up. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Green, and I would just add one 

other thing. The concern that we have about the bias against them 

is well founded. After Superstorm Sandy, I offered a bill on the 

floor of the House of Representatives that passed 352 to 74, totally 

bipartisan, and it would have provided FEMA funding for houses 

of worship, many of whom were the frontline defense in terms of 

humanitarian aid to people in New York and New Jersey ravaged 

by Superstorm Sandy. The bill passed. FEMA opposes it. The Senate opposes it and refuses to even bring it up for a vote. 

I can’t tell you how disappointed and egregiously wronged I think 

those who are first and foremost in the relief side are when they 

are being told they are not going to get FEMA relief. There is no 

separation of church and state issue because they can apply for an 

SBA loan. They can do all kinds of other things, but they can’t get 

that critical FEMA support. So that kind of bias, which I know you 

don’t share, needs to be guarded against because again that first 

line of defense is so important. And so Mr. Green and I would be 

28

in absolute agreement; the more you can help out in that regard 

the better. Thank you. 

I would like to now welcome our second panel beginning with Mr. 

Sean Callahan who is the chief operating officer for Catholic Relief 

Services. He has also served as executive vice president for overseas operations and regional director for South Asia at Catholic Relief Services, among other roles. He has led CRS’s regional response to floods, droughts, earthquakes, cyclones, and man-made 

emergencies in South Asia. In his time working with Catholic Relief Services he has experienced a terrorist attack at a Sri Lankan 

airport, worked closely with Mother Teresa and the Missionaries of 

Charity in Calcutta, and worked on programming in Afghanistan 

during and after the Taliban. 

And I would like to introduce Mr. Chris Palusky who is a humanitarian professional with more than 15 years of international 

relief, development, and fundraising experience. During that time 

he has served on a wide range of emergency responses assisting 

with both natural disasters and complex humanitarian emergencies. He has worked in hot spots and crises for a majority of his 

time as a humanitarian specialist including in Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Sudan, Burma, Lebanon, and Mali. In 

addition to his experience with World Vision, Mr. Palusky has 

served in leadership positions with other leading humanitarian organizations including CARE, MAP International, Samaritan’s 

Purse, and World Relief. 

Mr. Callahan, the floor is yours. 

STATEMENT OF MR. SEAN CALLAHAN, CHIEF OPERATING 

OFFICER, CATHOLIC RELIEF SERVICES 

Mr. CALLAHAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I appreciate the 

fact that you are holding this session along with Ranking Member 

Bass and the other subcommittee members, and certainly Representative Green. Before I go, and I am going to summarize my 

comments, I just ask that the written testimony be added in for the 

record. 

First, I thank you very much for this opportunity to speak. I also 

want to just again thank both you and Mr. Franks as well for participating in the trip out, which CRS was able to participate in 

hosting you as well. These type of trips, I think, are not only important for the stewardship of the resources that the U.S. is committing and to generate energy, but it is also a type of trip that 

shows the compassion of the U.S. We found that when we were 

there, and we arrived a week after the disaster as you stated earlier, I arrived with Cardinal McCarrick, the outpouring from the 

Filipino people and the thanks to the United States was really 

overwhelming. Anyplace that we went, people came out of their 

way to thank the United States for that commitment and support 

that was provided at that time. And I think that type of recognition 

really shows something of the Filipino people, but I think also it 

is something that the United States should be very, very proud of. 

I want to just reflect as well, because the comments here earlier 

about the type of response that occurred, and just to quickly summarize, I think that the United States, the U.N., and the local organizations including the Filipino Government really did an outVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:06 Jun 04, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131203\85788 SHIRL
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standing job, has been articulated here before. From our point of 

view, it was a rapid response on the ground. We have a presence 

in the Philippines of over 100 staff working with local civil society, 

the church organizations. We had people in these sites a day after 

the disaster occurred and the response was immediate. 

I would also just highlight from the previous presenter Nancy 

Lindborg that the USAID and particularly OFDA was very forthright and took advantage to communicate directly to faith-based organizations like Catholic Relief Services to let us know if we needed any assistance at all during this process to get in touch with 

them. The head of OFDA and his deputy actually made preemptive 

calls to us to say if things don’t move fast, if you are having anything be blocked up that they would assist in moving that forward. 

They set up not only a DART team on the ground in the Philippines, but they also set up a special emergency coordination unit 

here in Washington. So I will say they were wonderful, including 

on the ground. 

I know she traveled with you, but mission director Gloria Steele 

met with us as well during our visit there. And she was very supportive of the efforts that we had, knew of the funding that had 

been previously provided, and was looking forward to our assistance in the long term. So I will say that was very positive. I would 

say the U.N. as well used one of our shelter models as the cluster 

key model that we would use into the future, and so the U.N. as 

well at that time, particularly UNICEF and OCHA, were particularly strong out there right out of the gate. And so I would just reiterate that those type of activities. 

I would also say as you spoke about it and as Representative 

Green mentioned, it sounds like we have been in the same areas 

in Pakistan, in tsunami, and in all of these different emergencies 

as they have gone forward that I think there has been a lot of 

learning that has gone on. Frankly, the tsunami was the first time 

that we really worked closely with the American military setting 

up temporary bridges to get to islands and locations that were completely transfigured as the geography had changed and then in 

Haiti as well. The U.S. military really came in the Philippines, and 

I know in Haiti the U.S. military tried to do it with a lighter footprint, with a lighter presence and they were going out providing assistance. In the Philippines, when they came in there was joy from 

most of the people that we talked to all around. It was just very, 

very impressive. Even in the media outlets, the fact that we had 

an aircraft carrier, as was mentioned earlier, and were seen as 

ferrying assistance back and forth, it was seen as assisting other 

countries and providing helicopters and lift capacity, was just very 

impressive at that time. 

And so from on the ground, people frankly were questioning their 

own governments, but no one was questioning the U.S. resolve to 

provide assistance. So I will say that. And as comments have come 

about as well about the diaspora in the United States, we have had 

much outreaching from the diaspora providing assistance for this 

case. We have raised over $15 million in private contributions. The 

Catholic Church of the United States has initiated a national collection through which the resources will come in. So the solidarity 

of the American people has been utmost. 

30

In addition to that, CRS is a member of an international Catholic 

organization called Caritas International. That group came together, and we met and had an international meeting out in the 

Philippines with our local church partners. And I would be remiss 

if I didn’t talk a little bit about our local church partners. As we 

responded to this disaster, and Cardinal McCarrick and I as you 

mentioned were there a week after the disaster and he celebrated 

mass in the cathedral without a roof and in the rain at that time, 

it is not only the material assistance that we are seen in the 

United States as providing, but it is also the spiritual. It is that 

solidarity. And I think as Representative Green appropriately said, 

it is that kinship. 

And after the mass, the people coming up to the cardinal who 

concelebrated frankly with two archbishops from the Philippines, 

who were so taken that an American cardinal would come, that the 

Archbishop of Cebu traveled with him to the location where he had 

been stationed before, Archbishop Palma of Cebu, and then the 

Archbishop of Palo was also present at that time, Archbishop John 

Du. We also met with the cardinal in Manila who was organizing 

a day of prayer for the people in the Philippines and raising assistance as well there. 

When we talk about assistance, you will notice in the CRS report, we don’t mention that CRS is focusing on food assistance. And 

the reason is because the local Catholic Church was focusing on 

food assistance. We were providing shelter, water sanitation, and 

hygiene, but the local church was twinning with local parishes that 

did not get devastated by the super cyclone, and they actually provided assistance to various dioceses. So NASSA, which is the 

Caritas of the Philippines, and individual dioceses in the Philippines were reaching out. So I think as Mr. Franks also mentioned, I think the solidarity of the resiliency, the strength of the 

Filipino people is admirable after being through such a disaster. 

And I will say after this mass with Cardinal McCarrick, we had 

journalists and others who were in tears after this as they were 

struggling to find family members, as we were going by as they 

were burying people at the side of the road. So it was a very emotional time, but the Church was there immediately. 

When we arrived in Palo outside the cathedral that you mentioned, we were greeted by a young man who was in biking shorts 

and a t-shirt. Turns out he was the monsignor of the chapel. And 

the only way he could get around to register people to find out who 

was missing and to connect with different people was to ride on a 

bicycle. And they were going around the island trying to locate people by bicycle, register people, tell people that after mass CRS was 

going to be there and provide distributions and provide assistance 

and register people. 

So right way they were setting up the M&E systems on the 

ground, locating the people, and identifying, as Mr. Green had 

mentioned earlier, the most vulnerable people in the community to 

make sure that they were assisted. He apologized to the cardinal 

in the way he was dressed, and the cardinal just went up to him 

and gave him a big hug. So it was really a very wonderful, wonderful moment as we saw that type of Church response and solidarity 

31

that will continue. And the Holy Father has also spoken of that as 

well. 

I will say that the immediate response as has been mentioned 

and as Representative Green mentioned, we have focused on the 

shelter and getting out, we have already assisted 16,000 families, 

so over 80,000 people. Because when we were out there, people 

were just in open air, and it was raining on them. Even our aid 

workers, one of them turned to the Archbishop of Du and said, 

‘‘Archbishop, have you ever slept in your office?’’ And the archbishop kind of looked at him. He said, ‘‘Why do you ask?’’ And he 

says, ‘‘Because I am sleeping there now.’’ So it was the type of 

thing where everybody was joining together, but even the church 

structures, people were around the outside of the walls because 

many of the roofs had been destroyed. 

And so we are looking to a future. The Church has said that it 

wants to rebuild its institutions, but the people come first. So they 

are looking at how to help the people get their necessary shelter, 

but the Archbishop of Palo had mentioned that 72 out of his 74 

churches have lost their roofs. They are still sheltering people in 

those facilities. His personal house that we went into looks like it 

was hit by a bomb. The floors are slanted now. Everything is completely ruined. But he wasn’t there trying to recover his possessions, he was getting assistance and aid out there. So the Church 

has been very strong there. 

You have also talked about the issue of protection. We have been 

focused on sheltering in place, and the reason why we are focusing 

on sheltering in place is: One, the design that we have is using 

these very solid tarps for protection, but also the recovery of debris 

so that they can use that in the rebuilding of their homes. The 

sheltering in place is another way that we find of providing protection for people, particularly women, children and the elderly, so 

that they aren’t transited to a camp where they might be more vulnerable. So sheltering in the locations where they are part of the 

community, where the church can continue to keep in touch with 

them, where they come back and forth to the church, so we are seeing that as one way, particularly in Palo and Tacloban, as preventing some of the issues of trafficking and violence against children and women. 

We are also working closely with the local government, the Department of Social Welfare, in those areas to make sure that those 

people stay safe. Our second focus area has been water and sanitation and so we have been looking at WASH. We have got bladders 

out in communities that don’t have access. We have been accessing 

and trying to provide greater access to the water facility in Palo, 

which is chlorinated. Our water engineers even say it is probably 

over-chlorinated at this time. But like those cloud fogging trucks, 

it is probably better to have a little over-chlorination because people can’t clean. 

In the WASH area though, we are also focusing on protection 

there in that we are separating facilities for men and women. We 

found this in Haiti in the camps as well that we needed to make 

sure that there was a separation between shower facilities and 

bathroom facilities for men and women and children so that they 

were protected at that time, and that we have adequate lighting 

32

which has been a problem in those areas. But we have been providing hygiene kits to people so that the women can have flashlights, and are organizing a buddy system so that individuals don’t 

go alone and are in open air defecation, but are in areas that they 

can be somewhat protected. 

We have done some cash for work and cleaning debris in various 

areas and then trying to reuse debris and also the coconut trees 

that have been knocked down. It is a key area that we are looking 

at for rebuilding and for preventing epidemics, as Nancy Lindborg 

mentioned earlier. In addition to that, we are looking for the longer 

term, and I will just follow-up quickly on that. 

As we look at the longer term, we are really looking once again 

on shelter for the longer term. Building back better, as we learned 

in Haiti, and durable solutions. One of the key problems we think 

we are going to run into as this comes down is again land titles, 

whose property is it? Most of these people have lost everything, and 

so we are supposing that as we start in this rebuilding process 

there is going to be many people that will have no title to the land, 

that there will be no historical memory, and so that will be a key 

issue. 

We are also looking at livelihoods. And many of the people there 

as you know were fishermen and fisherwomen, and they also harvested coconuts. Fifty percent of the coconut harvest now is completely lost. Those trees take 5 years to rebuild. So we are trying 

to generate, in this emergency phase opportunities for livelihoods 

with cash for work and other opportunities so that people can regenerate their livelihoods. 

So I would just say as we look to the future, our recommendations would be really to commend yourselves and the other actors 

of the U.S. Government and the U.S. military for a tremendous 

first step in the response. It has been fantastic, and I appreciate 

the fact that you are looking not only at that emergency response 

but the future, that there continue to be the ongoing funding for 

the relief. We need to continue to focus on that as we move into 

the future, and I think showing our solidarity at this time where 

we are in the holiday season and being thankful for the things we 

have in this country as Thanksgiving, and come into Christmas 

which is a very big holiday in the Philippines. Many of these people 

will be without that. 

As you rightly said, many people, and the children because there 

are no schools, have been sent to a very strong family structured 

network in other areas of the Philippines. There is concern that we 

have and others have that that is more of an opportunity for children and women to either be lost, be trafficked, or exploited. We 

are looking at ways that the Church shares information from one 

diocese to another of where people are coming and make sure that 

they are checking in. We do find that education is a key way of protecting children. If you can get children into school, it is a daily 

mechanism where teachers and outside people can check—are they 

withdrawing, are they being fed properly, do they need other 

things? So we find the greatest protection is to make sure the 

schooling is back and that we get these kids back in school. So 

whether that means they are moving to other family sites or 

33

whether we get schools up in Palo and Tacloban would be key for 

the future. 

Also, with the support for the recovery phase, shelter is going to 

be a key area. And then we were lucky that the Church actors had 

been trained in disaster risk reduction. They knew once it happened how to go out and register, how to do triage in certain areas. 

We need to continue those processes as the Philippines continues 

to be hit by bigger and bigger storms, and we need to focus on 

building resilience of those communities. 

I would also propose that we strengthen the emergency response 

capacity of the local mission. I know Ms. Steele has been very 

strong on the development aspect and they have been very supportive of the Bohol reconstruction that have gone on there, but I 

don’t think they have the team and the staff to respond to a 3- to 

5-year effort that is going to be there. And I would say that we look 

at mechanisms to assist her and her staff in responding over the 

longer term and in assisting the Filipinos in developing. 

I will say that as has been mentioned before, the Filipino community has been quick to respond. They have been very resilient, 

a very proud people, and a very caring people, and I think the government now after maybe a little bit of a slowish start is winding 

up and moving forward. So I think with some leadership from the 

U.S., which I think they would very much welcome, they would be 

positioned well for the future. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Callahan follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Callahan, thank you so very much, and thank 

you for the tremendous job Catholic Relief Services is doing. We 

were fully briefed by Joe Curry while we there, and Donal Reilly 

took us, literally, around Tacloban. So we got to see the operation 

up front and close, and we were extremely impressed. 

Mr. Palusky, thank you for your leadership and for briefing us 

before we left. I have been a great fan of World Vision my entire 

life. 

STATEMENT OF MR. CHRIS PALUSKY, SENIOR DIRECTOR, 

HUMANITARIAN AND EMERGENCY AFFAIRS, WORLD VISION 

Mr. PALUSKY. Thank you. I have a written statement, but before 

this I just wanted to say thank you. It has been great to see, I 

mean be part of this. I have never been part of one of these events 

before, and I am just amazed to see everybody come together and 

the, well, the cross panel or how ever you describe it, just the support across the entire Congress. It is great to see people coming together and saying this is something we need to focus on not just 

for the short term but for the long term. It is something that I feel 

very honored to be here today to discuss. So thank you. 

And Mr. Chairman, this hearing is another example of your longtime commitment to vulnerable people here and abroad, especially 

children. Thank you for inviting World Vision to testify. My name 

is Chris Palusky. I am the senior director of the Humanitarian and 

Emergency Affairs Unit for World Vision. World Vision is a childfocused, Christian humanitarian organization serving millions of 

families and communities in almost 100 countries. We have 45,000 

staff, and we feel like we are kind of everywhere. 

Our supporters are in every congressional district and include 

more than 1 million donors—16,000 churches, corporations, foundations, and we partner with the U.S. Government. You have my 

written testimony for the record. 

World Vision is a child-focused organization, so my oral remarks 

and recommendations for the U.S. Government and congressional 

engagement will also focus on the needs and risks of children. I 

will draw from World Vision’s 63 years of experience responding to 

disasters, decades in the Philippines, and my own 16 years of working in international humanitarian emergencies. World Vision has 

implemented relief, development, and advocacy programs in the 

Philippines for 55 years. As of this morning, we have reached over 

70,000 people impacted by the typhoon with essential goods and 

services. We plan to reach a total of 400,000 people and are committed to the long-term recovery. 

We have been there for the long term. We have been there for 

the long term before this, and we continue to be there for the long 

term after this. Based on this experience and our learnings 

throughout the years from other major disasters such as Haiti, 

World Vision recommends that the U.S. Government: Integrates 

protection into its U.S. Government-funded disaster assistance 

throughout the response; ensures that the Government of the Philippines, NGO partners, the United Nations, and other key entities 

engage and collaborate with people impacted by the disaster from 

the start to finish of the response; prioritize the needs, including 

protection needs, of women and girls; monitors and pushes for a 

39

needs-based access to aid, services, and economic opportunities; is 

vigilant on accountability around aid to counter the corruption and 

cronyism that is often a risk whenever and wherever disasters 

occur. 

I will now say a few more words about our recommendations. 

Protection means focusing on safety, dignity, and rights of people 

impacted by a disaster. The October 2012 Guidelines for Proposals 

of the USAID Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, OFDA, requires that proposals must demonstrate protection mainstreaming 

in all sectors of the programs. Put another way, all potential OFDA 

partners must integrate protection throughout their OFDA-funded 

programs regardless of sector. It is important for USAID to ensure 

that these guidelines are being followed from the start of the program to the end. Maximizing integration will maximize protection 

for especially vulnerable people. It will also minimize the difficulties and the costliness of integration protection retroactively. 

The priority when engaging and collaborating with people impacted by the disaster should be identifying their assistance and 

protection needs and ensuring that they are met. Their meaningful 

participation at all stages of the response, including assessments, 

design, implementation, and monitoring, is essential to the success 

of the program and can prevent harm. We want to make sure that 

we are not doing programs to people, but we really want to make 

sure that we are doing programs with people. And we want to urge 

the U.S. Government to ensure that is happening across the board. 

In disasters, children are often most at risk because of abuse, exploitation, neglect, separation from their families, disease, and 

other threats. There are numerous ways, however, to reduce this 

risk, including prioritizing opportunities for adults to earn a living; 

supporting comprehensive registration of children that is coupled 

with family tracing and reunification efforts; ensuring children 

have safe places to play, learn, and recover; mdonitor an increase 

in explicit images of Filipino children online and on Skype; restoring schools; increasing training for national police and other security personnel in minimum standards of child protection; strengthening existing formal and informal child protection mechanisms at 

the community and local government levels; and finally, 

prioritizing clean water, proper sanitation, hygiene education, and 

preventing and responding to disease outbreaks. 

Basically what we are doing together right now, it is kind of the 

frontline response. We want to make sure that people are going to 

be safe, people have access to basic services, and we want to make 

sure that this kind of continues on through an evolution. Women 

and girls would potentially be at less risk, especially in evacuation 

centers, if a comprehensive plan to improve security for women and 

girls is developed and implemented with cooperation of national police and other security services. Opportunities for women to earn 

a living especially those who are heads of households are essential 

for protection from abuse and exploitation. 

The context for these recommendations includes the typhoon destroying or disrupting the sources of income for over 5.6 million 

men and women. I read that this morning, and I didn’t realize how 

many people actually had lost their sources of income. I thought, 

you are looking at 1 million, you are looking at maybe 2 million 

40

people. But seeing this morning it was 5.6 million women and men, 

it was astounding. 

Officials from the Filipino Department of Health are already 

warning that several diseases are becoming huge public health 

threats as a result of the typhoon. In addition to the emerging 

health risks prior to the typhoon, NGOs including World Vision, 

multilateral institutions like the United Nations, and the ILO have 

already identified the affected provinces in the Philippines as having 3 million children engaged in child labor. When economic opportunities for adults decrease and health challenges arise, the risk 

of children being abused and exploited often increases. 

I have confined most of my time to sharing our recommendations 

and the context for them. Congressional oversight—and this is actually really important for you guys—and engagement is an important part of strengthening the American response to disasters, and 

all of us should be prioritizing action. During the question and answer period, I would be glad to unpack the recommendations and 

give any examples. These details are also written in my written 

testimony. Mr. Chairman, thank you again for your leadership and 

for this opportunity. I welcome your questions and those of the 

other members of the subcommittee. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Palusky follows:]

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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Palusky, thank you very much for your testimony 

and for all the fine work and recommendations you have made here 

today, and without objection, your full statement will be made a 

part of the record. 

Just a few opening questions. Mr. Callahan, and both of you really, one of the things that we noticed and from questions we raised 

there were that schools may not open for months. This may be the 

end of the school year. And I think as you pointed out, schooling 

not only provides educational challenges to the child, but it also 

serves as a place for protection. It also can be, I think, a way of 

observing whether or not some PTSD and other problems might be 

manifesting, which could very well be. 

We met with a man named Papoose who, he is the same man 

who carried that 3-year-old dead girl, a little girl, who then just 

broke down. He said that at night if you really listen you can hear 

the tears of young children who get scared very easily that if there 

is a thunderstorm or some other thing that it is another typhoon. 

Very, very much on the edge, and schooling would certainly help 

with that. I think your point to Gloria Steele about a 3- to 5-year 

recovery, we need to be looking at that, working with them of 

course to make sure that there is a broader horizon as to how long, 

how sustainable these recovery efforts will be. But if you could 

elaborate perhaps on the PTSD issue. 

Secondly, the risk to relief workers and health teams. One of the 

USAID leaders that we met with, Al Dwyer, and I mentioned him 

earlier, told me when we were talking about dengue fever that he 

has had it. And he said, ‘‘I have had malaria six times.’’ And from 

our work, my work, the work of our committee in Africa and elsewhere, so often the case of the health workers and the relief teams 

are that they have experienced many of these diseases. I mean, and 

with a possibility of an epidemic of dengue and others manifesting 

very shortly, maybe fogging will work, but it does raise questions 

to their health concerns as well. Not only do they do so much to 

help others, but then they themselves become sick. 

I will never forget on a visit to Kalma Camp in Darfur, Mr. 

Simpkins and I met with the camp director who was shaking and 

had malaria. And we said, ‘‘Go lie down, we can talk to somebody 

else.’’ He said, ‘‘No, it is my job. I have to do it.’’ I mean, just extraordinary courage on behalf of others. And so, I am worried about 

the health workers, if you could speak to that. 

The cash for work program, how long, Mr. Callahan, and you 

both might want to answer this, do you envision that occurring? I 

think your point was well taken about the coconut trees. We saw 

them bent over, broken, everywhere we went. They do take 5 to 7 

years to revitalize that industry. What will the people do? Are 

there some other viable livelihoods for those 5.6 million people who 

have lost their livelihoods as Mr. Palusky just said? And on the 

trafficking side, do you think we are doing enough? Because I think 

now is when the greatest risk arises. 

The parish-to-parish idea, I think, is a good one. I had not heard 

that of sharing lists. And then finally, on the issue of all of the 

pregnant women who will need a safe venue to deliver their children, is it time for a blood drive, perhaps by the diocese around the 

area? Of course it requires a cold chain, but if the blood is not 

49

available, women will die, and it is all unnecessary. It seems to me 

we need to prioritize that as well. Mr. Callahan? 

Mr. CALLAHAN. Maybe to jump in first on, and appreciate your 

comment about the risk to the relief workers. One of the things 

that we are trying to do right away is make sure that they have 

an adequate place to stay. So there is a look at trying to get some 

containers and some spaces for some of the relief workers to stay. 

We have been very fortunate that people volunteered to be there 

during the Thanksgiving holiday season, and we have got the next 

troupe going in to celebrate Christmas in the Philippines. So some 

people who have been risking themselves are also very generous 

with their time in showing solidarity with the people there. We do 

try to rotate staff in and out and take good care, but unfortunately, 

many of us know of staff members who, similar to the situation in 

Darfur, have died of cerebral malaria and other things. And so it 

is a continual issue that we continue to monitor, but appreciate 

your concern there. 

You also mentioned on the issue of trafficking, are we doing 

enough? I would say my answer always to that is no. I don’t think 

you can do enough in the trafficking field, one woman, one child 

that is missing. And we saw this in Haiti. I saw it myself in India 

when I went to one of the relief sites after earthquakes and super 

cyclones there, where people came up to me and said, ‘‘Do you want 

a child?’’ And so we need to continually do more. I think the fact 

that this committee has raised this issue that you have highlighted, you have put a spotlight on it, I think is an opportunity 

for us to raise the issue. I know Ms. Steele is very interested in 

this area, and I think that is something that we can highlight once 

again with her and raise it with the Filipino Government. 

I would also say on the issue of the children, two things that we 

found have been very helpful in both Haiti and in Syria. One is 

child-friendly spaces that you can go and have children that are in 

areas where they can have safety, where they can play games and 

all, and where they can do things that they feel like children again 

and feel protected. So that is one area where I think that can help. 

There is recognition among the church actors that we have talked 

to already and people in the communities that trauma is a big 

issue not only for the children but for the caregivers, for the clergy 

that are there. Everyone was sitting in this super cyclone, and we 

talked to people who were sitting with poles holding up the walls 

as the roof was torn away, and someone came to assist them and 

was whipped by the wind and thrown against walls. 

And so I think the post-traumatic stress, we have brought people 

into different countries, and Syria was the latest, where we had 

interactions and had counseling for them; similarly too in Haiti. 

And we are trying something out in Syria right now with puppet 

shows for children so that they can express. Usually there are 

drawing and puppet shows, so they can express what they have 

gone through. And children are also very resilient, so if we do it 

at an early time I think hopefully that can be of assistance. 

I would say lastly, with the pregnant women, I think it is a key 

issue. We saw women there and saw some of the newborn babies 

that were there. Big concern. We did the 21⁄2-hour drive to Ormoc 

which had some generated electricity and all. I think it is a key 

50

issue. As I said, the Church is looking at the rebuilding of its institutions, health clinics, schools, and churches, and I think that it is 

a priority, how we protect these women. It hasn’t been solved as 

of yet, but we will continue to raise it. 

Mr. PALUSKY. I kind of have to mirror what you said but on a 

different front. World Vision has seen that it is important to have 

a frontline response with the lifesaving interventions such as food, 

water, and shelter, and we have done that. At the same time we 

have started child-friendly spaces. So we have, I believe it is 18,000 

children in child-friendly spaces right now, at least that is our target. We are planning to scale that up, I want to say to 40,000 children. We see that the care through child-friendly spaces helps deal 

with the trauma, the PTSD. It also helps to keep children safe. But 

it also helps to convey important messages such as health messaging, water and sanitation messaging, and we have seen this as 

one of the key mechanisms for the frontline of a response. So for 

that reason, we have prioritized it in that lifesaving intervention 

group. 

Secondly, the risk for the health team. As a survivor of dengue, 

I actually experienced dengue in Sri Lanka, so we understand that 

it is a horrible thing. I just remember shaking, and it is bonebreak 

fever. It hurts. We have prioritized, as an organization, staff care. 

So we have done everything from finding appropriate places to live, 

of course ensuring that at nighttime people have mosquito nets and 

proper healthcare. In addition to that, we have a group that we 

meet with for psychosocial care within our organization just to 

make sure that our staff is mentally okay. For our frontline responders, we are partnering with Headington Institute and they 

give us, we meet with, I call it meeting with the shrink, once every 

week. And it was great just to debrief and make sure that everybody was doing okay. 

As far as cash for work goes, we see it as one of the key frontline 

responses but also helping people to get back on their feet. So that 

yes, it will help clean off the streets, yes, it will help clean up the 

buildings, but we want to make sure that it gets cash in people’s 

pockets so that they are able to take ownership of their lives again. 

And we would see this happening for, let us say, the short- to medium-term response. We want people to have that availability of 

cash to start their lives again. 

And as far as trafficking, I would second my colleague Mr. Callahan from CRS by saying no, we are never doing enough on trafficking. For that reason, at World Vision, we came up with some 

recommendations, and we would like for, well, this group here to 

help urge USAID to help urge the Filipino Government and also 

different constituencies in the U.S. Government to push for more 

child protection programming because we do see trafficking as a 

problem now, and it was a problem before. We have actually been 

working in the Philippines for a long time on child trafficking, child 

labor. In fact, I just found out before this meeting that we have 

helped, through community groups, which we are actually responding through at this point in time, to get over 30,000 children out 

of underage work. Children who were working in factories, sweat 

shops, and in places they shouldn’t be working; they are children. 

51

We set up committees, community based organizations, community committees for helping children to get out of that but at the 

same to identify when children are at risk. We are pushing hard 

for those committees to be alert and to be able to respond. So that 

is all I have to say. 

Mr. SMITH. You in your testimony, Mr. Palusky, mentioned——

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Chairman, I want to offer just a word and 

then I am——

Mr. SMITH. Okay. Ms. Jackson Lee. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Just a courtesy. Because I just want to thank 

you for holding this hearing. I won’t stay here. I have been in another hearing and I just stepped out to thank my colleague for his 

leadership, and the ranking member. I just want to be able to work 

with the committee and collaborate with some of the committees 

that I serve on. And I will just leave these points on the record. 

And that is the response of the United States, there was an international response. And I know part of it was USAID. The identification of the deceased, the reunification of families in which I 

know that may have been raised, and I know the issue of disease 

has been raised. But specifically raising those questions, since the 

pain of those individuals was clear. And then the continuing support that the United States’ private sector can give to the Philippines. 

I thank you for allowing me to place that on the record, and with 

that Mr. Chairman, I look forward to working with this committee 

and offer my deepest sympathy to the people of the Philippines and 

yield back. Thank you for your courtesy. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Ms. Jackson Lee. 

If I could, Mr. Palusky, you mentioned in your written testimony, 

just last week Filipino authorities arrested two men in Tacloban for 

human trafficking as the men tried to take a 16-year-old girl onto 

a flight to Manila. As we meet here today, and it is an issue that 

I have been pushing within the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the OCSE, we now have an action plan which 

I think will be adopted promoting the idea of training flight attendants, bus people, and people on trains to spot a trafficker and notify the appropriate individuals. 

I mentioned it, we mentioned it several times during our trip, to 

officials. I am not sure Philippine Airlines has any intention on 

doing it, or ANA, which flies frequently on and out of Manila, as 

does United. Nancy Rivard has done yeoman’s work as a flight attendant, and she makes the point that trafficked persons need to 

be moved somehow, and very often internationally, obviously it is 

by the airlines. And very often if you have a trained flight attendant or flight attendants who can spot a trafficker and trafficked 

people, the telltale signs, inform the pilot, and then when that 

plane lands arrest or at least separate and find out whether or not 

there is a trafficking in progress. 

She told me that there was a pedophile ring coming out of Haiti, 

and they noticed there was something wrong. They finally investigated it, and ICE and law enforcement stepped in and broke up 

a huge pedophile ring operating under the cover of a terrible, natural disaster. Where it has been done, it is cost-free. It is a matter 

of training, situational awareness. And it seems to me, we need to 

52

say with one collective voice, train flight attendants. Train all people. You mentioned earlier in your testimonies about how important it is that the police and others be well aware. But they have 

got to move these individuals sometime, somewhere, and they usually use some kind of public transportation. So, if you might want 

to speak to that. 

And also, because again, I think now is the critical phase when 

in a sense Tacloban was hermetically sealed by the typhoon with 

only the military coming in with C–130s and the like, it was very 

hard for traffickers to move anyone. Now the roads, the bridges, 

the water routes, and the air routes are wide open. Now is the time 

to move in absolute earnestness to mitigate the possibility of young 

children and women being trafficked, if you might want to respond. 

Mr. PALUSKY. First of all, I think it is great to see the initiative 

taken and just the pushing to help stop trafficking. As far as different initiatives, this sounds like one of a great many possibilities. 

So we want to concentrate at a high level with governments, we 

want to concentrate at a different level of course with corporations 

with whomever’s working. So people who are working, airline organizations, but also for us it is almost more important at the community level. So we want people, your local policemen, your local, 

I don’t know, mom-and-pop owner, your just basic community 

members to come together and be able to identify when there is the 

potential of trafficking and to reduce those risks. 

So we encourage it. We are very happy to see at the high level 

and even the medium level and then of course at the lower level 

where we have been working for a long time that we just want to 

keep on reinforcing and working in this area, as we do see it as 

an area of high risk, especially now. 

Mr. CALLAHAN. I might just add that I think, as you have earlier 

presented legislation that would have a fund to address this as 

which I think would be a great opportunity. In the case of Leyte, 

I would think the most vulnerable area would be, as you suggested, 

the water routes. We came through Ormoc. There were crowds and 

crowds of people. It would be easy to move people in. They were 

overloading the ferries at the time. People are sitting on the stairs 

and you hear of all these disasters and wondering if you are going 

to be part of one as you are transferring over. So I do think in 

these transit points, highlighting some individuals that could pick 

them out, I would think in some of these cases, particularly postemergency, it would be a very challenging, but people that can go 

and fit in. 

We actually found that in Haiti on the border with the Dominican Republic, we had a group of sisters that would be there, and 

actually, they were chasing people across that bridge and stopped 

people. They had a relationship with the border guards, and if they 

came and identified something the border guard would not let them 

pass. And we did not have one case where they approached someone that actually wasn’t trying to transport someone. They then 

took the child to a safe house that the sisters were running and 

protected them there. But there are these mafia rings, type of 

mafia rings that go through there, and I think there is a need to 

have some civil society along with the officials, border guards, 

53

transport officials, and others, so that there can be a combination 

type of effort. 

Mr. SMITH. Our hope is, and we did raise this again with the two 

Cabinet members that we met with, that the Philippines would use 

this as a model themselves, to use every best practice imaginable, 

including the training of airline flight attendants to stop traffickers. Because we know they are perched and ready to exploit. So 

thank you. 

Yes, Chris? 

Mr. PALUSKY. If I could make one final follow-up on that too. We 

see it as important in the private sector, the local level, but of 

course also with the police departments and with municipal authorities. The training of those different units, different areas we 

have seen, has a huge impact on, let us say, stagnating, limiting, 

or mitigating a large effects of trafficking. So, we would like to encourage that even more, and especially throughout this response. 

So it is at all levels. 

Mr. SMITH. I would just point out parenthetically, and I think it 

is important to underscore this, the Philippines needs to know we 

are all in this together on combating trafficking. With the Super 

Bowl coming to New Jersey in 2014, Governor Christie, the Attorney General, law enforcement, state police, and Homeland Security 

at the state level are all working overtime, knowing that that 

venue becomes a magnet for these exploiters of women and children. So why should we think, if it happens in the glare of the 

Super Bowl, a typhoon-afflicted area certainly has to be an even 

greater danger area. So we need to work even more with the Philippine leadership so that they will do more to mitigate trafficking. 

Mr. Green? 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You mentioned earlier, I 

believe it was Mr. Callahan, that we have 3 million children who 

are in child labor. Sometimes that is a very polite way of saying 

something akin to involuntary servitude. I would like for you to 

elaborate, if you would, on the conditions that these children are 

having to work in, and say a little bit more about it so that I can 

get some sense of what we are talking about. 

Also, you mentioned the gratefulness of the Filipino people. One 

of the things that I hear as I move about, with reference to our foreign aid, is that people are not always thankful. And there seems 

to be this notion that because they are not thankful enough, perhaps we should do less. And of course you and I know that we do 

it because Dr. King was right. Life is an inescapable network of 

mutuality tied to a single garment of destiny. What impacts one directly impacts all indirectly, and what is happening to people in 

harm’s way today can impact us tomorrow. We are all blessed, and 

but for the grace of God this could easily have been us, especially 

those of us who live along the gulf coast. So if you would, talk 

about the children. 

And finally, if I may, Mr. Chairman, I would just like to mention 

Mr. Simpkins and Mr. Tozzi. I just want to mention that they were 

very helpful and very knowledgeable about these issues that we 

had to deal with, and spoke up and made some great points about 

a number of things that are important to the people not only of the 

Philippines but also to us in terms of our ability to message these 

54

things that we saw. So I just want to give my expression of appreciation to both of them. And I will yield back. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Green. 

Mr. CALLAHAN. Maybe just to touch base once on the appreciation that the Filipinos, because I know sometimes people feel that 

we are not branded enough, and people don’t see it enough. We, on 

every transport facility that we were on people came up to us specifically to thank us for being there for the assistance. Not just 

when we were in the churches but even in an airport the people 

would come up. 

We even had the opportunity, in Cebu they had a basketball 

game with their two professional teams to try to raise money for 

this effort. The two teams happened to be on the next morning, on 

the same flight we were flying to Manila and each one, as they 

came by, shook our hands and thanked us for being there and 

being there to assist them. So the recognition was there. Everyone 

we talked to did recognize the work of the United States. 

I will mention a comment about the children and then pass it to 

Chris because he was mentioning some of that earlier. But I think 

your comment about child labor and servitude, it really for me is 

a matter of semantics. Many cases, these children, there are certain industries for child labor that are ‘‘legal’’ for children and others that are ‘‘illegal.’’ Many of us feel that all industries should be 

illegal for children. It is one thing if it is a family type of activity, 

but in many cases, it does come more to servitude when a family 

takes a loan, their child is going to help work to pay off the loan 

and that continues on. And we see that in the Philippines. We see 

that in Brazil. We see that in African countries. And so the issue 

of servitude continues to be a big one for us as well. Chris? 

Mr. PALUSKY. Thank you. Within the Philippines we have seen 

that there are certain industries in which children are involved in 

child labor. You think of the sweatshops. You think of the garment 

industry. We have seen in a lot of corporations and a lot of, well, 

let us say, I don’t want to say corporations, I will say companies 

throughout the country that there is child labor. World Vision has 

a policy where we have been working throughout the country to 

help eliminate that, and again, it goes down to the local level. So 

we have been trying to focus on identifying what these industries 

are and actually even stopping people from coming in and exploiting people, and not even on the child labor level, but also on the 

trafficking level. 

We have seen people come in to the Philippines from the Middle 

East and other areas around the world to get domestic servants. 

So they use this as an opportunity, and especially around, I will 

say, times of disaster or when people are desperate for work to 

come in and say, ‘‘Hey, we have an opportunity for you to work in 

Dubai, for you to work in Lebanon.’’ And people are desperate, and 

they are thinking this is a great opportunity. World Vision is working with these local community members and also with the local 

municipalities, the police departments, to make them aware that 

maybe these people are legitimate, but please make sure that they 

are legitimate organizations, and you are not just allowing a person 

to be a trafficking victim. So we will continue to work in this area, 

and we will continue to hopefully highlight some of these chalVerDate 0ct 09 2002 10:06 Jun 04, 2014 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00058 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_AGH\131203\85788 SHIRL
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lenges especially around domestic servitude that we have seen especially with Filipinos. 

Mr. CALLAHAN. Just to add one point to that. I was recently on 

a visit to the Balkans and Cyprus and all, and we have found that, 

in the Middle East, we have centers now that some of our local 

partners have in Lebanon where they have Somalis, they have Sudanese, they have Sri Lankans. They have all these people that 

have been trafficked from other areas, including Filipinos. And 

they are in these centers, and there is the attempt to try to reunify 

them and bring them back home—an Ethiopian woman that was 

in Lebanon that we finally got back to Ethiopia and all. 

So these continue to be areas where obviously when they are 

trafficked or when they are put into this child labor, at times, it 

then becomes into more of a servitude. If they are transported 

across international lines, once you take their passport they are 

afraid they might be arrested then, how did they come here legally, 

and they are very vulnerable. And you need some type of opportunity, people that they can trust. Typically in our situation, they 

have gone to local safe houses. They have been rehabilitated there, 

and then we try to work with the local Embassies. But there are 

these rings that continue to be out there. 

Mr. PALUSKY. If I could just follow-up on that and piggyback. It 

actually is interesting. I worked in Lebanon for 2 years before coming to the States, and I was actually seeing some of these programs 

that World Vision and CRS, Caritas are working on together. And 

you do see people from the Philippines, Ethiopia primarily, and different places throughout the world, and people get trapped into 

this. So not only are they trafficked into the country, but their 

passports are taken. If they don’t pay back their travel loan, they 

are not given permission to stay in the country. But, they are not 

given back their passport, so they are arrested. So people sit in jail 

until they are able to pay back their travel loan or whatever fees 

that their employer feels that they are owed, and it is a vicious 

cycle. So we were working with people in the prisons who had been 

stuck there because they were victims of trafficking, and they 

weren’t able to pay in order to get back home. So we are hoping 

that, again, we can mitigate some of these things from happening 

through this disaster for places like Lebanon, Dubai, throughout 

the Middle East, and actually globally. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you. Is there anything else either of you would 

like to add before we conclude? 

Mr. CALLAHAN. I would just say that I think we are off to a good 

start here, and I appreciate the attention you, Mr. Chairman and 

Representative Green, have brought to this case by going out to the 

areas. I think as we mentioned before, I would just put that one 

last emphasis that it is not over. The disaster hasn’t disappeared. 

Syria is getting worse and worse. We heard today 12 sisters were 

just kidnapped in a particular area. We have Central African Republic. It is important that we don’t forget the Philippines and let 

that country go down. Thirteen million people were affected. This 

is going to affect the whole country over the long term. It really 

needs a significant 3- to 5-year response. And I think the Filipino 

people, I know the Filipino church, and the Government are ready 

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to put their shoulders to the grindstone. I think if we do it in solidarity with them they can achieve that goal. If we let it go, frankly, 

shame on us. 

Mr. PALUSKY. And as we heard in the testimony before ours, I 

would like to say amen. Definitely, it is going to be a marathon. 

We always hear you have got to sprint out there, you have got to 

respond immediately. Yes. With this many people affected, the 

scale of the disaster, it is going to be a marathon. So I just would 

encourage, well, the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Government, and anyone you can talk to, to keep the eye on the long run. Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much. And on that note I thank you, 

gentlemen, and your organizations for the extraordinarily important work that you do. Thank you. The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 5:18 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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