Katrina: New Orleans 'not safe'

2005-12-01 09:39

Memphis - New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin said his city will never be totally safe from hurricanes, no matter how much its levees are strengthened, but he has urged Hurricane Katrina evacuees to come home anyway.

Nagin spoke on Wednesday night to a crowd of more than 700 at a Memphis church - many of them evacuees - as he continued his come-home campaign to rebuild New Orleans.

He made the same plea to evacuees in Houston during the weekend and was scheduled to appear on Saturday in Atlanta.

Nagin said the levees that failed after Katrina hit were being repaired to withstand a Category 3 hurricane, a level of threat they were designed for, but failed to withstand.

Category 5 hurricane

He said the levees must be upgraded to protect the city from a Category 5 hurricane, but it would be difficult to obtain the hundreds of millions of federal dollars necessary.

Estimates for strengthening the levees to that extent had run as high as $32bn.

Nagin said regardless, "I don't think we'll ever be in the position, where when a hurricane is coming, that we'll be able to sit back and not think about evacuating".

He sought to assure the evacuees that life in New Orleans was "getting better every day", with utilities being restored and storm debris being cleaned up.

New Orleans had 485 000 population

The mayor said: "We'll be above 300 000 people that could potentially live in the city before the beginning of the year."

New Orleans had more than 485 000 residents before the hurricane hit, and evacuees remained scattered across the country.

The mayor's wooing was met with at least some resistance.

Ashley El-Amin, 29, said she was not encouraged by Nagin's comment that fast-food restaurants and hotels were offering salaries much higher than before the hurricane.

City's announcement

El-Amin, a former counsellor for troubled teenagers, said such jobs, despite the higher pay, "won't even pay half of my college loans".

El-Amin said she also was upset by the city's announcement that Mardi Gras, though scaled back, would take place early next year. She said: "This is not the time to party."

Clinton Brown, 67, was also unmoved. Brown said he wanted to rebuild his house on the city's badly flooded eastern side, but dealing with government officials in trying to get started had been confusing.

Brown said: "I'd like to go back. But, I don't have any better feeling now about getting back."

- AP