Like he did successfully three years ago after Hurricane Katrina, Parish President Kevin Davis trucked federal authorities throughout the parish last week, pointing out mounds of debris from the latest storm to clobber St. Tammany.

His hope was to secure millions needed to fund debris pickup after Hurricane Gustav.

It didn’t work. The Federal Emergency Management Agency declined to fund the process this week, estimated to cost roughly $2 million.

Parish government must now foot the bill, forcing cuts in its 2009 budget.

“We may have some issues,” Davis said. “We’re already going to submit a budget that is low because revenue is down.”

It was unclear what programs would be scaled down or worse, cut, when the proposed 2009 budget is introduced, likely this November.

Although officials with FEMA declared St. Tammany a disaster area this month, the declaration does not provide debris cleanup costs. FEMA spokesman Manuel Broussard recently said the amount of debris in St. Tammany is “so little” parish government should “be able to handle” it without federal aid. On Friday, trash haulers’ trucks were gassed and measured — to later determine how much debris was hauled away — to pickup debris on the parish’s tab, Davis said.

“We’re not going to wait anymore,” he said.

Cleanup crews first targeted southeast St. Tammany for “green debris” such as falling trees, brushes or limbs. By Monday debris haulers will target the entire parish, sans private subdivisions.

“I want to help everybody but we cannot spend that money for private areas,” Davis said.

Meanwhile, Davis is asking residents to push debris to the sides of the streets, careful not to clog drainage ditches or block fire hydrants. He also advised residents to keep road sight lines clear and vegetative debris such as trees, limbs and more separate from construction debris like carpet and Sheetrock.

Construction debris will be picked up at a yet to be announced date, Davis said.