Seattle Post Intelligencer Opinion

WASHINGTON -- When President Bush pledged that the U.S. Gulf Coast would become "one of the largest reconstruction efforts the world has ever seen," he suggested that an unprecedented investment of billions of federal dollars would transform the region not only physically, but socially.

Bush said that "as many jobs as possible should go to the men and women who live in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama." Indeed, rebuilding the region -- its levees, roads, energy grids, homes -- is to become the work of those affected by Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath.

So far, however, the government has acted in ways that would seem to encourage a different segment of the U.S. population to do this work. On Sept. 8, Bush issued an executive order lifting the Davis-Bacon Act mandating that construction workers on federal contracts be paid at least the average wage in the region. The decision was followed days later by a Homeland Security Department announcement that it will not apply sanctions toward employers who hire people unable to provide proper documentation.

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