Mayor Ray Nagin Causes Problems AGAIN

[tezi]

Nothing is the matter with these people.

This is not about racism IMO.. or the homeowners being "rich"

SO many elements into play here.
These are not "manufactured homes" these are litterally trailors that in no way shape or form will be safe when another hurricaine hits.

Those homeowners in many instances are probably still trying to fix their homes.
There is only so many contractors and equiptment and supplies available.

As for where these women will live..
Certainly if they had wonderful jobs they would not be in this situation.
Its safe to assume that most are working lower end jobs.
I think its also safe to assume in light of the damage not many of these jobs are still available.
Realistically why even put these women in an area where they will have little oppurtunity for employment and potentially in danger of another hurricaine?

Also it is worth mentioning.. and anyone who has ever seen a Fema trailor park can attest to this...
It is not going to be just a bunch of young single mom's and their toddlers..
Its going to be their boyfriends etc.
We all read enough here of these things to know what statistacally is going to be going on.
SO lets not pretend otherwise. The drugs and domestic abuse etc.
These are not the upper ends of society folks. In the time since the Hurricaines with Fema's assistance those that would make a better life for themselves most likely already have.

Honestly as a homeowner do you want this in your neighborhood?
If you did then you would buy a house at a nice cheap rate in some run down crime ridden area.

I am not saying that these people do not deserve a place to live or help (which they have been getting since Katrina hit)
I am saying that those homeowners deserve to not have their neighborhood turned into hell and their children in danger due to increased crime.

With all due respect, these "trailors" as you call them, are manufactured homes. They have been sitting 35 miles from where I live since October because that @ss Nagin is such a putz. I don't understand why people look down on folks that live in mobile homes. I am not ashamed to say I live in one, because we own it and that's all we can afford right now.

These rich people in New Orleans seem to think that because there are mobile homes within their midst that the crime rate is going to go up 100%. Well, gee, maybe they should think about someone else other than themselves. Maybe if folks had a decent place to live, they wouldn't feel the need to commit a crime.

I am so sick of people thinking they are so much better than everyone else, because they are snug in their nice homes. All I have to say is, "what comes around goes around." They would do well to remember that.

 

[AdoraBlue]

If all of the money the oil companies have spent greasing greedy politicians' hands had been instead spent by the state of Louisiana, the city of New Orleans and the United States of America on the levees, marsh preservation, coastal erosion prevention and/or restoration, evacuation plans and everything else that went wrong in Katrina/Rita, then things would be a lot different today.

There is a lot of $$$$$ up for grabs south of I-10 and that money was used to allow 10,000 plus miles of canals to be dredged in Louisiana's coastal marshes, thus effectively destroying Louisiana's natural hurricane defenses.

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=1028887
The concept of wetlands as storm buffers is not new to Louisiana. In the late 1960s, the Corps of Engineers produced a report that has become gospel for coastal wetlands advocates: 2.7 miles of coastal marsh reduces storm surge by 1 foot. And while many storm researchers today consider that report to have been widely misinterpreted, there is no disagreement that wetlands can reduce the worst effects of a hurricane: wind and rising water.

If you use natural gas piped in from the Louisiana marshes, even some of your money is/was involved.

This is my opinion, as a native and politically jaded Louisianian.

 

[AdoraBlue]

http://www.nola.com/weblogs/bourbon/index.ssf?/mtlogs/nola_bstdiaries/archives/2006_02_21.html#114723

<snip>Their routine rarely varied. One day ran into the next. Then a shooting would happen and the streets would clear for a day, maybe two, then return to normal. This was their future, marked out for them by a society that had forgotten its rich history. Then came Hurricane Katrina, August 29, 2005. There was no more hiding these people who had been left behind for decades. This time they were left behind for all the world to see.<snip>

This lady's story is very touching and enlightening, IMO. The whole New Orleans debacle is layered and complex and will not be easily solved, if ever.

 

[tezi]

You know something that just makes me see red? All the money that was supposed to go to make the levees stronger went to build the bridges so people could get to the casinos to make it easier to gamble! No one is going to tell me that Nagin or whoever was mayor at the time didn't know anything about this.

Nagin is a disgrace, he needs to be run out of LA on a rail.

We have a lot of evacuees where I live in S. AR. And yes, the crime rate has increased, but there are no jobs here. If you have a job and live here, you better thank God you have a job. There are a lot of jobs right now in LA involving the cleanup and rebuilding. I think that anyone who is able should be put to work, and maybe the crime rate will decrease. But, then again, there are always going to be people who take advantage of others and don't think they need to work.

 

[BhamMama]

The Hammond Highway Bridge over the 17th Street Canal isn't just for casinos. They were working to expand it and flood proof it. And as of 2005 it was 1 million over budget and 1 year behind!

This is not Bush wacking here so let's not beat me up....

"It appears that the money has been moved in the president’s budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that’s the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can’t be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us.

Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, New Orleans Times-Picayune, June 8, 2004."

This was a known problem for years before Katrina, at least since 2003! There are at least nine articles in the Times-Picayune that cite the reasons why. The silt was gone, the levees were sinking, money earmarked for the study of what to do was removed and put into Homeland Securites. Out of 20+ million, they got 3.9 million. Not even enough to start a study much less maintain one. Add in the fact that they hadn't gotten any of the monies promised since 2003 and it adds up to ziltch! And every single levee was not finished or not started work on.

Not to say that Nagin aint an idiot, he is! But ya know, innocent people shouldn't have to suffer because of his actions esp when he wasn't the only one to fail them. This is a farce from the top down. He just happens to have a bigger mouth than the others and draws attention to his defaults.

I'm praying he is voted out!

My Aunt said that some of the trailors (and that's what we call mobile homes) were sitting there ready to move in but they trucked them back out.
And I've said it before, I have seen with my own eyes, train loads, every day, of FEMA trailors going through my city to the coast. Granted some are used in Mississippi, but that many? While we have mobile homes sitting in Ark at a cost to us taxpayers? And I've been to New Orleans, they need at least the FEMA trailors, but many don't! WHERE are these going?

As for where they could put them with the impeding hurricane season on the horizon? I don't know. I do know thet want people out of tents and FEMA trailors in the parking lots. Anywhere is safer than there right?

Oh and before someone starts yelling that we are giving LA monies. EVERY state has federal grants and monies given them, some are earmaked for certain projects that are not as detailed as the levees even. So no, this wasn't a special case.

 

[AdoraBlue]

Five words for you:

Oil companies, Baton Rouge, Washington.

Louisiana's coastline has metaphorically been raped and only tiny fractions of the proceeds from the oil companies have been used to restore the coastline, shore up and build new levees, etc. Yet the politicians' pockets are lined with gold.

Go figure? Wonder how much Fast Eddie has stashed away from oil company bribes?

 

[BhamMama]

Five words for you:

Oil companies, Baton Rouge, Washington.

Louisiana's coastline has metaphorically been raped and only tiny fractions of the proceeds from the oil companies have been used to restore the coastline, shore up and build new levees, etc. Yet the politicians' pockets are lined with gold.

Go figure? Wonder how much Fast Eddie has stashed away from oil company bribes?

YUP! Dat too!

I was searching just yesterday for the tax breaks they gave big companies. Was just a blurb I remember reading but it's stuck with me.

I also wonder if Nagin made that little call to Jesse Jackson to do a protest about the g'vner race and how he'll handle it when he's booted of off the throne? Prolly hear cries of racism and they are preparing now so it won't be such a shock to our systems.

 

[tezi]

YUP! Dat too!

I was searching just yesterday for the tax breaks they gave big companies. Was just a blurb I remember reading but it's stuck with me.

I also wonder if Nagin made that little call to Jesse Jackson to do a protest about the g'vner race and how he'll handle it when he's booted of off the throne? Prolly hear cries of racism and they are preparing now so it won't be such a shock to our systems.

Oh, you know Nagin made that little call to Jesse Jackson to scream racism. And they probably hooked Rev. Al Sharpton in via three-way calling!

I also wondered how much money it was costing tax-paying Americans to have those mobile homes sitting here in S. AR, knowing that there were people who needed those homes whether it was in LA or MS.

And MS sure didn't get a fair shake during this whole mess either. However, you don't see them on TV complaining about it. They are going about the business of cleaning up and attempting to rebuild their lives.

If Nagin wins the election, I will wonder what the people in New Orleans have been smoking. He's done them no favors, that's for sure. I'm sure he's lined his pockets though! I also didn't know that he bought a house in the Dallas area after the hurricanes. What does that say to the good people of New Orleans? He probably used some of that federal money to pay for his house, that wouldn't surprise me in the least!

 

[BillyGoatGruff]

Actually NO I am not kidding ... if you had looked at the link you would see those parks all have camping..
I don't know what state parks your talking about?
But my husband is a park manager and your incorrect about constant encampment. Parks that already have camp grounds are prepared for that.
Fema has used Florida parks for such purposes. The areas meant for restoration are not public accessable. As for schools? we have always been very close to our childrens schools while living in a state park.
ANd um ?? School busses???

Furthermore the origianl link to the article on this thread states tha the neighborhood would be fully supportive of the trailors being set up in the much larger lot across the street rather then the very small area they are currently set.

You're ignoring the very real reality that the vast majority of the people displaced by NO had never, ever lived outside NO--possibly never even been outsie their projects/neighborhoods. So you you would rather put them in the woods. Even woods with plumbing and electric lights is still the woods.
And most of the state parks near New Orleans are in fairly marshy areas, with lots of snakes, mosquitoes and a high water table.
And school buses coming to pick up a few 100 children to take them to very small, underfunded local shools, doesn't address the fact there would be a few hundred adults, most without any means of transportation, living in the parks.
The only grocery stores I've ever seen near state parks are mom & pop convenience stores/bait shops that charge the max for milk, bread and other staples. Within a few weeks the park would start to resemble a Hooverville. And the park would have to turn away non-permanent vistors--although I doubt many campers would want to spend the weekend in what would essentially be a shanty town.
Basically, sticking these people in state parks is a "out of sight, out of mind" solution. As if those don;t have a way of coming back and biting everyone concerned on the .

 

[BhamMama]

Alabama must have done such a good job that everyone forgets we are even a part of the coast lol.

Seriously, it went much smoother down in lower Al than we'd ever have hoped. Though we didn't take a direct hit she was such a big girl that winds and being on the nasty side of her really played havoc on lots of tiny towns down there. Bayou La Batre for instance. I may not agree with everything our g'vner does but by golly he had it handled and done well.

He also had plans for evacuees up and running hours, yes hours, after Katrina hit. First call was opening up hotels, then the civic center, then closed bases. We had approx 1.4 million people in flux from three states, in two days, pass through Birmingham.

I think Gov Riley should give Blanco and Nagin some pointers about how natural disasters should be handled. If they'd had any clue it wouldn't have been nearly as messed up I think.

The price for those trailers in Arkansas, $25,000 per month rent for the land, FEMA spent $441 million on the 10,777 trailers and is preparing to spend another $6 million for gravel to keep them from sinking. Yet, they say they can't be used in a flood plain. And the reason for the gravel? The project calls for FEMA to gravel 170 acres of a field that over 10,000 homes sit on at a cost of 4 million dollars. Jerry Hall of FEMA says it will make the homes easier to move. Not many places to put them huh? How long have they been sitting there in a field? What 8 months now?

 

[tezi]

Alabama must have done such a good job that everyone forgets we are even a part of the coast lol.

Seriously, it went much smoother down in lower Al than we'd ever have hoped. Though we didn't take a direct hit she was such a big girl that winds and being on the nasty side of her really played havoc on lots of tiny towns down there. Bayou La Batre for instance. I may not agree with everything our g'vner does but by golly he had it handled and done well.

He also had plans for evacuees up and running hours, yes hours, after Katrina hit. First call was opening up hotels, then the civic center, then closed bases. We had approx 1.4 million people in flux from three states, in two days, pass through Birmingham.

I think Gov Riley should give Blanco and Nagin some pointers about how natural disasters should be handled. If they'd had any clue it wouldn't have been nearly as messed up I think.

The price for those trailers in Arkansas, $25,000 per month rent for the land, FEMA spent $441 million on the 10,777 trailers and is preparing to spend another $6 million for gravel to keep them from sinking. Yet, they say they can't be used in a flood plain. And the reason for the gravel? The project calls for FEMA to gravel 170 acres of a field that over 10,000 homes sit on at a cost of 4 million dollars. Jerry Hall of FEMA says it will make the homes easier to move. Not many places to put them huh? How long have they been sitting there in a field? What 8 months now?

Good God! Wasted money if you ask me. There is no excuse why these homes weren't moved in for ALL the people who needed them.

You can't miss them sitting out in that field, everytime we go to Texarkana we see them. In October, we saw them trucking them in, we must have passed 100 of them!

BTW, Nagin should take a lesson from Gov. Mike Huckabee and his wife of AR. When the Gov's mansion was being remodeled, guess where the Gov and Mrs. Gov lived? In a mobile home!!!!!! And they weren't ashamed of it either. Mrs. Gov showed it off to all the TV stations! And I'm sure they didn't have to live in one, but they act like people who aren't too good for anyone. Unlike a certain mayor of New Orleans.....

 

[BhamMama]

BTW, Nagin should take a lesson from Gov. Mike Huckabee and his wife of AR. When the Gov's mansion was being remodeled, guess where the Gov and Mrs. Gov lived? In a mobile home!!!!!! And they weren't ashamed of it either. Mrs. Gov showed it off to all the TV stations! And I'm sure they didn't have to live in one, but they act like people who aren't too good for anyone. Unlike a certain mayor of New Orleans.....

Good for them! Sounds like y'all are in good hands!

 

[tezi]

Good for them! Sounds like y'all are in good hands!

Yeah, he's ok. There is talk that he may try to run for President!

 

[BhamMama]

Yeah, he's ok. There is talk that he may try to run for President!

I'd take him over our lovely ex Judge Roy Moore any day!