More talk about clearing out the homeless camp under Claiborne Avenue. The city is changing nonprofit agencies to work with, moving from one that tried to put the homeless in permanent housing to one that puts them in a shelter. Sounds like they're taking the easy road, to me.

flood control in Pennsylvania

There's a proposal on the table in Pennsylvania to spend $100 million on flood protection, something that's stirring a bit of a debate in the central part of the state.

Essentially, none of the projects that would be funded are in central PA because "Harrisburg-area officials decided years ago they preferred to go with nonstructural flood-protection measures...such as the flood forecast and warning system, instead of levees, floodwalls or channels," according to the article. Other places in the state -- mostly western and northern parts -- will get funding for those types of structural protection measures.

When the Susquehanna does flood, it takes a lot of water. The Patriot-News reported that the river, which is normally about 4 to 5 feet deep, has to rise to 21 to 22 feet to breach its banks and flood the town of Shipoke. And "Most Shipoke residents wouldn't want a floodwall blocking their beautiful view of the river."

"Conventional wisdom today says that floodwalls only move the flood somewhere else. 'Based on what happened with the levees in New Orleans, I'm not seeing that it's worth looking at.'"

It raises an interesting debate, much like the one in Southeast Louisiana. The government has an obligation to protect its people, but they're choosing to live in places that are prone to disaster. (I know I'm ignoring the socioeconomic circumstances that only allow the poorest parts of society to live in the lowest, most disaster-prone areas. This is just for argument's sake.)

The difference between PA and LA is that the Pennsylvanians living in the low areas don't want structural flood protection, while the Louisianans in comparable situations are demanding that the levees be raised. Maybe it can be explained by the fact that the structural "protections" are already in place in Louisiana, so the people there have gotten used to the idea.

I don't really know.

the homeless colony on Claiborne

Apparently Mayor Nagin is going to try to do something about the homeless colony under the bridge on Claiborne Avenue.

Essentially, there is a road at ground level, and there's an elevated highway running over the top of it. The neutral ground in between the travel lanes is mostly used for parking, but there's one section that is home to an enormous homeless colony.

We drove by that spot nearly every day on our way to the Lower Ninth. It was emotional. There was a cold spell in January, I think, which caused a lot of problems.

I definitely think it's important to give these people a place to go, but we also need to address the underlying problem. The article said that many of the people have become homeless since the storm because rents have skyrocketed. There's a problem when people who could afford housing in the past can't anymore. This is when the government needs to step in. Simply putting them in a shelter isn't addressing the bigger issue.

cynicism and optimism

Since Super Tuesday, there's been an increased focus on the Gulf Coast. All four of the remaining candidates have at least mentioned rebuilding efforts in their campaigning since Tuesday, when it became clear that Obama and Clinton are still in a dead heat and that states like Louisiana (and Pennsylvania, further down the road) are going to have a say in the primary process.

I don't know if I'm just becoming too cynical, but I wonder if they would have come out with plans for restructuring FEMA and creating a "point person" for rebuilding efforts if Louisiana's primary didn't matter. It's interesting to note that "The two leading Republican candidates...have offered less specific recovery plans than the Democratic front-runners." Interesting because Romney has dropped out, almost ensuring that McCain will be the Republican nominee. And interesting because the Republicans held a caucus last month that pre-selected many of the party's delegates, so there is much less at stake for the Republicans, who have "offered less specific recovery plans."

Hm.

At any rate, pushing the cynic aside, it is good that the candidates are still paying attention to the Gulf. The editors at the Times-Picayune seemed afraid that after Edwards -- who started and ended his campaign in New Orleans -- dropped out of the race, the remaining candidates would forget about the issue. "People in the Gulf Coast expect the remaining presidential hopefuls...to show the kind of passion Mr. Edwards displayed when it came to what he called the 'moral responsibility' to help rebuild the lives of millions of Americans across the region."

Obama spoke at Tulane yesterday, an event that made me seriously contemplate flying to New Orleans for the day. I haven't watched the speech yet, but that's on my schedule for the afternoon, so I will have a recap later today or tomorrow. But the Times-Pic's coverage of his speech...wow. The man makes the cynic in me go away. I know full well that he's got speech writers, and that they research the issues and put in jabs at Brownie and Bush flying over Katrina's destruction. But he makes me believe and he makes me trust and he makes me think that maybe this country isn't quite so doomed, after all.

He's the kind of politician that silences the cynic in me, and I don't know if I've ever found a politician who could do that before.

"No Reservations" recap

I really liked the show. Really. It made me miss the city, made me want to go back.

My thoughts?

1. Chris Rose kicked off the first segment, and I got really excited. He did a voiceover, reading some of one of his columns about finding a working stoplight in the middle of nothing. He stopped and waited for it to turn green even though there was nobody around. My experience? Some of the stoplights still don't work. They get stuck on red on all four sides, and someone just has to go for it.

2. Mr. Rose took Mr. Bourdain to get a po-boy. Yum. They drank Abita. Yum. "I'm glad I don't live near here - I'd have a serious problem with these," Bourdain said. Me too.

3. The show opened wi a thguy mowing a lawn in the midst of devastation. The commentary was something to the effect of "isn't it nice that people care about such trivial matters despite everything else." From what I was told while I was there, if you don't mow, the government will do it for you, and then they'll stick you with a $600 bill.

4. Bourdain went on a tour of the Lower Ninth, and that footage still hits me hard. Really hard.

5. They did a good job of showing that people are coming back. That the restaurant industry has been coming back. But that it's not the way it was before the storm. They mentioned the fear that as people come back, the culture is going to be lost as rich white people buy up vacation homes, instead of the people who make the city what it is.

6. Bourdain went to Emeril's restaurant. "It's easy to leave. Not so easy to stay and rebuild it. That's what we're doing," Emeril said.

7. Bourdain said the people everywhere seem to be recovering from a "collective nervous breakdown." That sounds about right to me.

8. I really like the column that Chris Rose closed the show out with. The "Dear America" column. I liked it when I read it, and I liked it even more when I heard him read it.

providing therapy?

I don't think I've mentioned this before, but I'm taking a class this semester called Disaster Impacts on Society: Hurricane Katrina. It's a fascinating course, so far, that goes along with the HRT trips to New Orleans. Professors from all different backgrounds give presentations to the class about various aspects of the impacts that the storms had on the Gulf. The first week we watched a National Geographic video about Katrina to get familiar with the details/sequence of events. The next week we had presentations on the geology/geography/environmental implications -- a lot about levees and rivers and deltas etc. -- and on the meteorology of storms and global warming.

All very fascinating stuff.

Tonight we had a short presentation about the impacts of disasters on ecosystems.

And then Debbie Stieffel gave a personal testimony. She currently works at Susquehanna but worked at Loyola University in New Orleans both before and after the storm. She gave a presentation that was first about the experience of being in New Orleans during and after the storm, and then she focused on how the university dealt with that year after the storm.

At the end, she said, "It's good for me to talk about it sometimes, so thanks for being my therapists."

Two things. First, it makes me feel really good to be able to provide that to someone. From the reading I've been doing since I've been back -- a lot of Chris Rose's stuff, but that's not all -- a lot of people who lived through it really do find comfort in telling their stories. That's something I noticed when I was in New Orleans, as well.

Second, I know that I need that therapy sometimes, too. In general, we all like to have someone to talk to, but I guess this blog is kind of my outlet for my feelings about New Orleans. A Rose column that I read in his book "One Dead in Attic" mentioned the fact that people who have volunteered in the Gulf have come away feeling like they don't want to leave or like they want to do more. And that's absolutely how I feel. I'm trying my hardest to stay connected to the city through the newspaper and through nonprofits' Web sites, and we'll see where I end up after I graduate.

I'll post tomorrow with my analysis of "No Reservations New Orleans!"

NOLA makes it back to the front pages

There's been a lot of news lately, a lot of news that I haven't blogged about yet.

Most significantly, a judge ruled that the Army Corps of Engineers is not legally responsible for damages that happened when drainage canal walls built by the Corps failed during Hurricane Katrina. The basis for the ruling is the Flood Control Act of 1928, which protects federal agencies from liability when "a flood control project fails to control floodwaters because of the failure of the flood control project itself."

Now, maybe I've taken too many of Dr. Blessing's hell/political science classes, but that looks very much like the cardinal sin of using a word to define that word. The project failed because the project failed, so the Corps is off the hook. Strange logic, but if it's in the law, then it was the legally right decision. Ethically? Morally?

Another interesting part of the case was the damage claims. Members of the class-action lawsuit filed more than $3 quadrillion in damages. Although they've lost the case (at least for now -- the lawyers say they plan to appeal), what if they had won? How would the Corps even begin to pay out that much money? And really it would be taxpayers footing the bill, anyway, but that's such an exorbitant amount of money. I can't imagine trying to crunch those numbers.

The ruling made national headlines, which are interesting to read next to local coverage of the case. The New York Times' coverage is very unique -- it's written as an outsider trying really hard to be an insider.

The Times-Pic hasn't made an editorial statement, yet, which I think is curious. Maybe it's like the New York Times said -- most people didn't expect the Corps to be found liable anyway, so this ruling doesn't come as much of a surprise.