Has the U.S. government done enough to rebuild the areas affected by Hurricane Katrina?
966574
I was pleased to see your question mentioned the "areas" affected and not just New Orleans.  New Orleans damage was not inflicted by the hurricane, but the levy breach.  The Mississippi Gulf Coast was decimated.  There are still residents who do not yet have a FEMA trailer, and its 14 months plus after the fact.  There are many insurance companies who are not paying because the damage was "flood" damage, and not covered.  HELLO!  The "flood" was caused by a hurricane!!!!!\n\nNo, the government has not done enough.  They have spent far too much time worrying about how to go about it and too little time getting their proverbial hands dirty and actually doing the work.  Church and college groups in this area are continuing to go down and help with demolition and rebuilding - weekly.  There are still mountains of debris that has not been removed.  \n\nThis Thanksgiving and Christmas season, there are thousands of families who are facing their second holiday season without a real home, and still with no answers from the federal government, state government or their insurance companies.  And the national media continues to focus on "New Orleans".  Our nation lost National Historic Sites on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi, "Beauvoir", the home of Jefferson Davis being one of them.  Major damage in the state of Mississippi extended as far inland as Jackson, Meridian and even as far north as Tupelo and New Albany.  The scope of this was diminished in the national media, and has largely been relegated to history by many American citizens.  It is not history to the residents who are living in FEMA trailers, or tents, still fighting insurance companies, still have no jobs because the companies are not back up and running - I could go on and on.\n\nSo, no, I think the government has done a grave disservice to those citizens who were left homeless, jobless, and in many cases only with the clothing on their backs by Katrina.  And these "celebrities" keep showing how they have built this house or that house - there is still tons to do.  This problem is not fixed - not by a long shot.
1074777
It's not entirely about politicians, though I agree that they do play a role. First of all, the majority of people affected by hurricane Katrina were poor and black. What is the race and economic status of most of the flood victims? Many of the people in New Orleans could not afford or didn't have opportunity to leave town. It is much easier to escape a flood than 100+ winds, flying debris, combined with flooding. I agree that Mayor Nagin should have done more to help people evacuate, but hindsight is always 20/20. I don't think he had any malacious plans, but he certainly didn't handle the situation properly. It is not a north vs. south thing so let's not make it about that. We are all citizens of the same country. Let's focus on helping those in need and not making controversy and comparisons where they are not needed.
879089
Sorry, no bashing from me. This year, our community suffered a devastating flood. We were a Federal Disaster Area and had over 100 million in damages. The community immediately set out to repair our own damages. We cleaned out mountains of trash, mud, silt, raw sewage, waste products, etc... No one sat down and said, "Poor me, where is my government check?" We just took care of our own and got on with life. \n\nToday, less than 4 months later, many of our businesses and homes are open and livable. Tell the people of New Orleans to stop sitting around waiting for government handouts and clean up their own messes and renew their own lives.
290714
1)More visibility to the weaknesses of the current Administration; 2)Perception that the socio economic classes were hit "more" equally in MS than LA 3) New Orleans looked at as major tourist industry... my question would be How much money is being spent in each place? Who is it going to? and What is being done? So far, from what I've seen there's a whole lot of nothing going on in either place, except to try to make Bourbon Street presentable for Mardi Gras (only 6 months after the disaster)
610045
hello, i am from louisiana, 30 minutes south of new orleans. i am not exactly sure what the answer is. you are probably talking about the 9th ward (which is one of the hardest hit areas), it is not one of the best neighborhoods and that could be why they do not want to rebuild. i heard something about it becomming a rich neighborhood. but honestly who would want to rebuild there. the entire area is protected by a levee. the other area that was hard hit was chalmette, the entire parish flooded and the water was up to the roofs of the homes. i personally would not live in an area protected by a levee. also i am sure that most of the people in the 9th ward area can not afford to rebuild. the insurance companies aren't exactly being fair. i hope i helped you understand a little bit better, if not feel free to contact me.
489499
The U. S. Government.
3949
Unfortunately, the government does. Hence the reason they were in poor shape before Katrina and destroyed afterward.\n\nNew Orleans is/was one giant welfare state. Nearly the entire popuplation was government-dependent, and that is why most of its citizens acted so helplessly after the hurricane. This is never a problem in other cities, where citizens are proud of their self-sufficiency and laissez-faire capitalism.
975736
Katrina wiped out a few.\nThey're regrouping.
939631
You have a good point. I just returned from a trip to the Mississippi coast. There is still a lot of storm damage yet to be fixed. Insurance companies have refused to pay settlements claiming the storm surge flooding caused all the damage. People are still living in campers in the driveways of their destroyed homes. More than half of the businesses haven't reopened, and lots of people are without jobs.\nIt was hard for me to believe I was still in America.
564729
no. the problem is that all this "enforcement" costs money and time and we seem to want these things but then we get pissed when the govt tries to enforce them. Big govt is not good. We need to keep our selves safe. keep ourselves reponsible, and dammit, keep ourselves from dying from hurricanes ALL BY OURSELVES!
204179
There is the Katrina Emergency Tax Relief Act of 2005.  Here is the information about it:\n\n\nhttp://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=149391,00.html
584494
#1 The city of New Orleans was allocted the $$ years ago to fix the lEVEE's. Their corrupt goverment spent it elsewhere.\nThe mayor did a crappy job during Katrina. He should of had the city evacuated. He had plenty of notice. We all knew! The governor was too busy crying about it. Literally crying and then when all was said and done she blamed who else? The President of course. But as the mayor said it will be a chocolate city again! I wouldn't live there if you paid my rent and fed me!
106294
The Democrats were certainly capable of establishing the safety net that the storm victims were expecting long before Mr. Bush took office, but they did NOT.  To account for all reasonable disasters that could strike the US, to the standard of reclamation that you seem to be expecting would, in my estimation, consume the entire US budget for 10 years, and would take billions annually to maintain.  (That's no road work, no medical plans, no school program support, no Social Security, no military, Nothing for 10 years.) President Bush did not dismantle any disaster programs or plans. He did not sell off supplies, trailers, food, clothing, instant homes, instant levies, yet you are holding him soley accoutable for what the State's are equally responsible for?  That is just so very irresponsible... and so very much represents the extremist closed minded left.\nTo say that anyone could have actually stopped Katrina from hitting has simply been watching too many Science FICTION movies.\n\nAh.. Name calling, that always solves things! we skate so closely to abuse. Okay, simple.... here we go...\n\nThe civil engineering effort to prevent a city that is largely below sea level from ever being submerged was within the grasp of the leadership of the State, but apparently was not pursued with much earnest as other projects were deemed (locally) as having more importance.  \n\n"In Katrina's wake, Louisiana politicians and other critics have complained about paltry funding for the Army Corps in general and Louisiana projects in particular. But over the five years of President Bush's administration, Louisiana has received far more money for Corps civil works projects than any other state, about $1.9 billion; California was a distant second with less than $1.4 billion, even though its population is more than seven times as large.\n\nMuch of that Louisiana money was spent to try to keep low-lying New Orleans dry. But hundreds of millions of dollars have gone to unrelated water projects demanded by the state's congressional delegation and approved by the Corps, often after economic analyses that turned out to be inaccurate. Despite a series of independent investigations criticizing Army Corps construction projects as wasteful pork-barrel spending, Louisiana's representatives have kept bringing home the bacon.\n\nFor example, after a $194 million deepening project for the Port of Iberia flunked a Corps cost-benefit analysis, Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) tucked language into an emergency Iraq spending bill ordering the agency to redo its calculations. The Corps also spends tens of millions of dollars a year dredging little-used waterways such as the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, the Atchafalaya River and the Red River -- now known as the J. Bennett Johnston Waterway, in honor of the project's congressional godfather -- for barge traffic that is less than forecast...."\n\nThen there's New York City (see second link). When the next big storm sweeps northward and hits that city, what happened in New Orleans will look like a summer rain.  Is anyone looking to storm proof that city?  What will its residents yell afterwards?  Should we spend 100 Trillion dollars storm-proofing NYC?  What about San Francisco?   The basic lesson is, that we cannot control the weather, or geology.  People elect to live where they may. When they live in risky places, there should not be any surprises when disasters strike. (read Geohazards: Natural and Human\n by Dr. Nicholas Coch)
919632
Dear Sir:\n\nYes, you have all the facts correct in your mind...\n\nWhat I see that you haven't got a good grip on is the \nsize of the problem.\n\nThe glaciers that the scientists are talking about extend for hundreds and hundreds of miles, and they are solid ice. They are presently sitting on solid ground and moving towards the water in a slow march, maybe 5 feet per day. These huge masses of ice are hundreds of feet high. So, the water they contain is just a massive amount of liquid when it melts. The terms gallons or liters is not applied to liquid in that huge of a mass. Terms like cubic miles is probably more appropriate. So when you talk about adding 2,000,000 cubic miles of water to the seas, some real changes in water level will probably result.\n\nIn the USA, a lot of homes and businesses are located at places where the elevation above the current sea level marks are only 1 to 3 feet.  High winds or storm surges could endanger places even higher up than that. In the area around New Orleans, La., the city is actually below sea level and is dry only because of a huge system of dikes that actually failed in a recent hurricane. As a result the city of New Orleans and much of the surrounding towns went under water.  Rebuilding, Clean-up, and repopulation could only begin after the waters receeded to their normal levels and the dikes were repaired, pumps placed back into service to clear out water behind the dikes, etc. \n\nWhat the scientists are suggesting is that in the future these flood waters might not receed...they will just stay there, and the flooded areas will stay flooded from now on...WOW.  That is a doozie to think about.
34915
First, it was a mistake to build below sea level. Why should the Federal Government pay the bill for local government's poor planning? The Libs are quick to blame a Republican run federal government. But from what I have heard, they GAVE them money and the local government divied it up for their pet projects and not on the dike.\nAnd from what I have seen regarding that hurricane, I don't think ANYTHING could have held up against it. It was aweful!
1117291
Yes, This Gov't is too ready to jump for conflict yet when it comes to disaster they leave victims hanging. Look what happened w/Katrina If Gov't had been paying att. to what was happening maybe FEMA wouldn't have been ripped off $1million by people and $ wouldn't have been wasted on those damned trailors that are justsitting in Arkansas. FCKN IDIOTS!!!!
476972
I don't think it was preventable at all.\n\nIf you piss off a large proportion of the world for long enough then someone is going to do something crazy.\n\nEven with the somewhat police state methods now being used we're still due for more terrorism. \n\nHurricane Katrina couldn't have been prevented as it was caused by weather, but the reaction in terms of getting people out could have been better. So could actually rebuilding the levies properly before the hurricane. bit of a pity most of the national guard  and army engineers who were supposed to be working on it were out of the state relieving other national guards sent to iraq or sent there themselves....