[StBernard] Katrina flood victim: "Somebody has to be accountable"

[Westley Annis]

Katrina flood victim: "Somebody has to be accountable"

Updated: Sep 26, 2012 9:43 AM CDT
Written by: Jessica Holly - email

Arabi, La -  The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is off the hook when it comes
to the billions of dollars in damages from Hurricane Katrina's catastrophic
flooding.  A day after that decision by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals,
flood victims in St. Bernard Parish and the 9th Ward, and those who
represent them, are trying to make sense of it all.

Maria Schlumbrecht's Katrina nightmare still isn't over.  "Paycheck to
paycheck, every week we buy something, a fan or a light fixture," she said
as she stood in her home, still unfinished after seven years of work. 

Maria, her husband and two children are living with her parents.  Every year
they hope this is the year they will be home for Christmas. 

"When both of us are working a full-time job to be able to put money into
the house, that limits your time," she explained.  "So it limits us to about
an hour or two in the evening and weekends when we can." 

They still have a long road ahead to recover from a disaster that she says
should have been avoided.

"When hurricanes come into the Gulf, we plan and we prepare and we do what
needs to be done to protect what's ours," she said.  "The disaster that
Katrina caused was not nature-made.  It was a man-made disaster."

It's a disaster many flood victims blame on the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers.  They allege the Corps' poor maintenance of the Mississippi
River-Gulf Outlet Shipping Channel resulted in the catastrophic flooding.

Monday, the same three-judge panel that ruled against the Corps earlier this
year changed its ruling.  The panel now says federal law protects the Corps
from a liability lawsuit on this issue.

Attorney Joe Bruno represents thousands of homeowners.  "Devastated,
outraged, confused" were the words he used to describe his reaction to the
reversal. 

"It's a sad day for the people of this country," Bruno said.  "It is a slap
in the face for the people of the city of New Orleans and it is a rubber
stamp to continue the Corps' reckless engineering practices which
constantly, it seems to me, puts cost over safety."

Bruno says the battle isn't over yet.  "We will continue to fight until
there is nothing else we can do." 

Bruno says he has options he can pursue at this point. He can ask the court
to reconsider.  In that case, the matter could go before the entire 5th
Circuit bench instead of a three-judge panel.  Bruno says his other option
would be to go straight to the U.S. Supreme Court and request a hearing.

Meantime, families such as the Schlumbrechts will continue their fight on
the home front.  "We spend every waking moment and every extra dollar we
have here," said Schlumbrecht.  At this point she is counting only on time
and hard work to finally bring her family home.