New Orleans battles to recover
2005-10-28 13:38
Allen Johnson
New Orleans - Two months after Hurricane Katrina flooded 80% of New Orleans, the city renowned throughout the world for its cuisine and music is still struggling to recover her charm, her economy and her citizens.
Nearly all of the city's 450 000 residents were evacuated before or after the August 29 storm. Many haven't returned, though most of the city is dry and has reopened.
"The last report I had, we had people from New Orleans that were in 44 different states," Mayor C Ray Nagin said on Wednesday, speaking at the first of a series of "town hall" meetings on the city's recovery efforts. "We are still in the process of repopulating the city."
'Ghost towns'
Of the 1 056 people in Louisiana who died during Katrina and the storm's aftermath, 700 were found in New Orleans. Tens of thousands of homes in the city were destroyed or badly damaged. Hundreds of businesses are still shuttered, damaged by the storm or the widely publicised looting that followed. The historic French Quarter and the largely residential neighbourhoods of Uptown and Algiers escaped serious flooding. However, several neighbourhoods resemble war-torn "ghost towns".
Electricity has been restored to 60% of the city and gas service to only 46%. A boil-water advisory is still in effect for residential neighbourhoods in eastern New Orleans and the devastated Lower Ninth Ward.
Removal of storm debris remains a "major challenge," Nagin said, and garbage pickup has been "spotty at best".
Budget hampers service delivery
City services are hampered by budget constraints. "The big struggle that we are having in the city right now is that we have no money", said the mayor.
"We have no revenues coming in from sales taxes or property taxes or anywhere else," he said, apart from city revenues from the resumption of parking tickets this week.
The city is seeking loans from the federal government and a private bank to keep operating, said Nagin, who laid off 3 000 workers earlier this month, nearly half of the city workforce.
Meanwhile, personal safety and the possibility of recurring flooding are key concerns of residents who have returned to the city and evacuees still living outside of New Orleans, says Cheron Brylski, co-ordinator of the Rebuilding Louisiana Coalition, a non-profit grass-roots organisation formed after Katrina.
"We hear the same thing everywhere: 'I feel powerless. I feel confused. I can't get consistent (official) information. I don't know that I am safe in New Orleans. I don't know that my property is safe'," said Brylski.
Security reinforced
However, a New Orleans police spokesperson, captain Marlon Defillo, said on Thursday that security in the city has been reinforced with the help of 2 000 National Guard troops and several hundred state police troopers.
"The city is very safe," Defillo said. "New Orleans is probably the safest city in America right now. We are averaging very few arrests, about a 150 a week compared to 2 000 a week, pre-Katrina."
But the National Guard is expected to reduce its presence soon, leaving much of the security to a local police department besieged by investigations of brutality, desertion and corruption.
New Orleans's claim as the world's "cuisine capital" also has been challenged by the disaster.
Only 14% of the 3 718 restaurants, delicatessens and other food outlets operating before Katrina have reopened, says Tom Weatherly, spokesperson for the Louisiana Restaurant Association.
Nightlife in the legendary jazz and blues city also has been muted. "We've got about 20% of 150 live music venues open," says Louisiana music commissioner Bernie Cyrus.
And a housing crunch also has hampered recovery.
Federal official this week unveiled plans to house more than 2 000 families in federal emergency management agency (Fema) trailer villages around the city, but only two sites are under construction.
- AFP