Editorial: When…When…When? Is The Question

People want to know when New Orleans will be back to normal. We learned a little and a lot about that last week during several days of the Hurricane Katrina one-year-anniversary coverage. Why a little? There is no answer. Why a lot? Because we learned details about why those who are expecting a sooner-than-later recovery are inaccurate.

As we see it, the Katina event for the New Orleans area involves six major phases. First came the announcement that the storm was coming and the warning to evacuate. Second came the flight to shelters, evacuation and attempts to survive after the hurricane struck. Third, and almost simultaneously, came a gargantuan rescue effort, which as far as military involvement was concerned was no less than phenomenal. Fourth involved “first-aid” assistance efforts by a host of entities. Fifth, which is still underway and President Bush says is 80 percent complete, is debris removal. Finally we come to the physical recovery of the area, which can be broken into short-term and long-term categories. These phases are arbitrary and overlap, obviously.

Recovery in nearby Mississippi moved much faster, thanks to state and local officials who did not look to the federal government for all of the answers. It was pretty much acknowledged that the Louisiana recovery effort was hampered by bad politics at all levels.

Perhaps buried earlier amid thousands of other details but emphasized more during the anniversary presentations was the fact that 43 percent of the residents of New Orleans were renters, and many were receiving assistance. They have no physical home of their own to go back to. It was suggested that many have found greener pastures and will not return. Many have jobs, new places to live and areas to which they have adapted. On the other hand, many who left the area did so thinking their stay would be temporary, and they have every intention of going back. But thousands of homes were destroyed. So where would they live? That is why it is difficult to predict when New Orleans will be back to normal. Some are saying a decade.

Popular television health specialist Richard Simmons made a touching plea for people to come back to New Orleans. He talked of the culture and the love the city has to offer, but he also recognized recovery problems that inspired in him a level of concern for the city’s future.

We learned that New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and President Bush are now simpatico and working for the best. When will the “best” happen? No one knows. As of now there is still no master plan for rebuilding the city. Without a master plan, there seems to be little hope for federal financing, even though money is available.

One Corps official said much of the 350-mile levee and floodwall system has been repaired but that it would never stand up to a Category 5 hurricane. Should one arrive, it would destroy everything in its path, he said. The obvious goal would be to get potential victims out of the area.

Hindsight seems to have taken over. State officials acknowledged that they failed to ask for military help soon enough, and the call for evacuation was tardy by at least a day. The largest shelter in the area was a disaster.

Hundreds of victims were left stranded on a bridge for days without food or water or any other sort of help. There was and is no excuse for that.

Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of mobile homes and travel trailers ordered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency ended up in the wrong place and many are still there. FEMA did not plan well and when it acted, it did so inefficiently. It was not totally clear who was in charge.

A bit of data from a far distant place helps to bring recovery into focus. Following a violent storm in the St. Louis area, one homeowner opined that it was difficult to find a repair crew. If it was difficult in Missouri after a relatively smaller outburst by Mother Nature, what must it be like today along the Gulf where thousands of structures were destroyed? While contractors can be brought in, we must realize that they don’t just move across the country to earn what they could just as well earn at home. So costs in many cases have been inflated—sometimes way beyond reason.

A fairly large percentage of the damaged businesses in New Orleans are back in operation. But the heart of the city, represented by its people, has moved elsewhere. Will it return?

There is considerable federal recovery aid to be released for the area, but it requires solid plans, something overseers can get their teeth into. So much of the early, rushed aid got into the hands of people who did not deserve it and who did not need it.

Even the size of the disaster cannot justify the failure of government (especially FEMA) to keep a handle on how money was and is being distributed. What cannot be forgiven is the amount of greed that has taken over, by design or unwittingly, that has resulted in thousands of no-bid contracts, which resulted in payments equaling hundreds of times what some jobs would normally cost. We rave about looting during disaster, but what do we say about the greedy who take advantage of Katrina’s wrath to pilfer recovery funds? Unfortunately, when people set prices too high and government agencies pay them willingly, the transactions probably don’t represent a violation of law. Poor oversight is miserable stewardship of tax money and charitable funds.

The Katrina story won’t be complete for years—perhaps never. But government can do the right thing by eliminating some of the red tape and improving recovery from this day forward. There certainly is time for that.

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