You are right of course about the Corp’s responsibility, although I also say that the local levee board contributed to the problem through corrupt deals (the casino deal, for example, diverted funds that should have been used for levee maintenance.) So, a bad situation was made worse.

And, the other issue where I feel the local govt bears strong responsibility is in the evacuation planning. Even if the levees had performed according to the plans, they would not have protected against a storm of this magnitude. Knowing this possibility always existed, the city had decades to better plan for the safety of residents (even if they still wouldn’t have been able to protect property). I give them credit for finally getting the car evacuation planning right (it was quite impressive compared to past storms- my family members had ridden out hurricans in their cars while stuck in gridlock on I-10). But it is an abomination that they hadn’t planned for the evacuation of citizens who didn’t have cars.

And on top of that, even if the design had performed as promised, it was only ever meant to protect against a Class III storm. So, the local govt certainly bore responsibility for better planning in the event of a storm like Katrina that exceeded that. I give them credit for finally getting the car evacuation planning right (it was quite impressive and a huge improvement over past attempts at evacuation- I have family members who had experienced hurricanes in their cars while stuck in gridlock on I-10 during past storms). But the fact that they didn’t complete the planning for the citizens who couldn’t evacuate by car was an abomination.

Since about 1930 flood protection has been the exclusive province of the US Army Corps of Engineers. They and Congress have selected the projects to be funded and built.

The Corps has selected the contractors and supervised the work. None of that was at fault. What was at fault is the DESIGN of the levees, exclusively the result of the Corps of Engineers and their consultants, yet the Corps are protected from liability for their error. Presumably that was with the implicit promise that if they failed (which they did and to their credit documented their failure in a 6,000 page report) that the Full Faith and Credit of The United States would reimburse the Citizens of The United States for their failure.

Keep in mind that in addition to Oil and Gas contributed by a poor state to the national economy at enormous environmental cost, everyone in Louisiana paid the same Federal Taxes as everyone else. Meanwhile other wealthy states like Florida and California have prohibited off shore drilling in less environmentally sensitive areas, all the while happily consuming the oil pumped from Louisiana.

The machinery imposed on us to get some compensation has exacerbate the problem and is still not flowing to the people who need help.

If FEMA were competent they could have managed the process themselves, instead that impede every local effort and them blame the locals for not moving fast enough.

I lost my house, and even though I have paid for Flood and Home Owners insurance for many years I haven’t gotten an nickel in Federal Aid, and don’t expect to get any. I still can’t find a contractor to repair my house.

There is no “extra� protection provided by the developers for the homes being built on the floodplain – there are no additional levies, walls, or pumping stations to move waters out of the way. In fact, I live in a town with population greater than one million people with very little vertical buildings for homes, condos, apartments, and whatnot. The only undeveloped land left in the city limits for new home construction and retail space, without having to drive 20-45 miles out of town, is the floodplain.

In fact, the same city is currently using eminent domain to “purchase� floodplain land currently being used as manufacturing, car salvaging shops, light industrial, and so forth to build new high-dollar homes and retail space.

My point is that all areas prone to flooding should not be constructed in. If it is not okay in New Orleans because of a 50-year probability of a category 3 or greater hurricane hitting the coastline, then it should not be okay elsewhere because the same probability of a home in a 50-year floodplain will be devastated. I don’t want to use my tax money to pay for homes in New Orleans, but I am also very adamant about not wanting my tax money being used to replace one of these high-dollar homes. I do not see a difference between the two.

Since it’s obvious that the local leadership is failing in the face of this disaster, at what point should somebody (feds? other?) step in? Or should they?

Nagin definately shares some blame, but honestly, what he faced was totally new. No mayor ever faced the challenges he did during and in the aftermath of Katrina.

All the carping about school buses flooded and not used for evacuation was rendered mute in my opinion following the disaster that was Houston’s attempted evacuation for Rita. But I rarely heard anyone blaming Bill White for sitting in a traffic jam for 12 hours and covering 8 miles in the process.

Nagin could definately have done better, but no one has ever walked in the shoes nature gave him.

Unfortunately, there are many folks in NOLA who would willingly shoot themselves in the head, if they were convinced that the blood would spatter on their political/cultural/social foes.

I dunno if it is because they dance funny, or they speak funny, or they eat really spicy food, or if it some bizarre holdover from the Napoleonic era – but I have *never* seen a city more hell-bent on self-destruction than NOLA.

~EdT.

For comparative purposes — it’s not dissimilar from saying that Americans deserve what they get because they re-elected George W. Bush. (No, that’s not meant to inflame…)

CStanley — Yes, many states profited greatly from the oil reserves. LA, however, was not compensated as others were. In fact, that’s the primary reason I supported the Offshore Drilling bill that just passed. A quote from WaPo’s article of Dec 12 explains (my emphasis):

in 1949, Gov. Earl Long was so determined to get all of the oil and gas royalties from drilling off his state’s shores that he turned down an offer from Truman that would have put a portion of that revenue into Louisiana’s coffers. Louisiana ended up with nothing, and since then the Treasury has collected $160 billion from offshore oil and gas production all over the United States.