[StBernard] EDITORIAL: Louisiana in Limbo

[Westley Annis]

I'm glad the NY Times is speaking out for us even if it seems to be falling
on deaf ears. 


mudpie

	----- Original Message -----
	
	Periodically, the press office will share editorials about Governor
Blanco's 
	work in various areas. 
	
	EDITORIAL: Louisiana in Limbo 
	
	By: The New York Times 
	Published: Monday, January 30, 2006 
	
	
	New Orleans waits. While some heroic efforts at rebuilding are
taking place, 
	hundreds of thousands of residents have put their lives on hold
until they 
	know what the government's next steps will be, leaving the shells of
their 
	houses as placeholders. But the Bush administration has now rejected
the 
	most broadly supported plan for rebuilding communities while
offering 
	nothing to take its place. 
	
	It has been five months since Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf
Coast and 
	for many the norm is still the claustrophobic new reality of tiny
trailers 
	and multiple families crammed into single apartments. Louisiana is
trying. 
	You can hear jackhammers pounding and buzz saws whirring on Canal
Street in 
	New Orleans. Dedicated workers endure a grinding daily commute from
points 
	north, like Baton Rouge, as they try to make the city and the region
whole 
	again. But the mission is far from complete and the challenge is
beyond the 
	scope of a broken city and a poor state. 
	
	New Orleans's crisis has little relation to anything the nation has
faced in 
	modern memory, and traditional solutions will simply not help.
Homeowners -- 
	many very poor people whose houses had been in their families for 
	generations -- had varying degrees of insurance before the disaster.
When 
	entire neighborhoods are devastated, their mildewed furniture and
drywall 
	piled on the roadsides, it's impossible to tell the people who are
well 
	insured to rebuild and hope that the houses all around them will
somehow be 
	reclaimed somewhere down the line. 
	
	But the Bush administration refuses to support the plan of
Representative 
	Richard Baker, Republican of Louisiana, which would give everyone
the 
	capacity to rebuild and which had the backing of the mayor, the
governor and 
	the state's Congressional delegation. (To add insult to injury, two
days 
	after the White House shot down Mr. Baker's proposal, President Bush

	suggested at a news conference that Louisiana's problem was the lack
of a 
	plan.) 
	
	Instead of an alternate solution, the president's Katrina czar,
Donald 
	Powell, has offered sleight of hand, touting $6.2 billion in
development 
	money for Louisiana passed last year by Congress as if it were
somehow a 
	substitute. And in an attempt to narrow the scope of the problem,
Mr. Powell 
	says the government first needs to care for the roughly 20,000
homeowners 
	without flood insurance who lived outside the federally designated
flood 
	plain. The real tally of destroyed or damaged homes in the region is
well 
	over 200,000. And the real need is housing for residents, whether
they were 
	renters or owners, insured or uninsured, living above the flood
plain or 
	trusting the federal government's levees to protect them from
storms. 
	
	Perhaps too much emphasis has been placed on the wreckage of poor,
low-lying 
	New Orleans neighborhoods like the Lower Ninth Ward. That has
sparked the 
	unproductive, blame-the-victim debate revolving around whether
people should 
	have lived there in the first place. The Ninth Ward provides a
misleading 
	picture of the city, as do the relatively unscathed tourist areas
like the 
	French Quarter and the Garden District. Huge swaths of the city have
the 
	empty quality of a ghost town. Stores wait for residents to reopen; 
	residents wait to see if neighbors will return. The city and
surrounding 
	parishes will not meet Mr. Powell's neat categories, when renters
lived 
	beside owners, insured next to uninsured. He is talking like an
actuary when 
	a leader is needed to rescue this region. 
	
	Now, Congress has a responsibility to follow its own lead rather
than the 
	president's. We were outraged once, shocked at the images on our
television 
	sets, at the poverty in our collective backyard and at the
devastation of a 
	great city. As the disaster threatens to become permanent, we have
every 
	reason to remain so. 
	
	
	-30- 
	
	
	The Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation 
	Louisiana's Fund for Louisiana's People 
	www.louisianahelp.org