WP: 9th Ward: History, Yes, but a Future?

[Pirate Smile]

9th Ward: History, Yes, but a Future?
Race and Class Frame Debate on Rebuilding New Orleans District

By Ceci Connolly
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, October 3, 2005; Page A01

NEW ORLEANS, Oct. 2 -- No one here wants to say it aloud, but one day soon the bulldozers will come, shoving away big hunks of a neighborhood known for its poverty and its artists, its bad luck and its bounce-back resilience.

It is likely to be the largest demolition of a community in modern U.S. history -- destruction begun by hurricanes Katrina and Rita and finished by heavy machinery. On Saturday, firefighters put red tags on hundreds of homes deemed "unsafe," the first step in a wrenching debate over whether the Lower Ninth Ward should be rebuilt or whether, as some suggest, it should revert to its natural state: swamp.


Steven and Jacqueline Robinson react to the sight of their home in New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward. Some are saying that the storied but flood-prone area should not be rebuilt. (By Michel Ducille -- The Washington Post)

A neighborhood tucked into a deep depression between two canals, railroad tracks and the Mississippi River, New Orleans's Lower Ninth has spent more of the past five weeks underwater than dry. Entire houses knocked off foundations. Barbershops and corner groceries flattened. Cars tossed inside living rooms. What remains is coated in muck -- a crusty layer of canal water, sewage and dirt. Mold is rapidly devouring interiors.

The question now is whether the Lower Ninth Ward, which was devastated 40 years ago by Hurricane Betsy, should be resuscitated again. The debate, as fervent as any facing post-hurricane New Orleans, will test this city's mettle and is sure to expose tensions over race, poverty and political power. The people willing to let the Lower Ninth fade away hew to a pragmatist's bottom line; the ones who want it to stay talk of culture and tradition.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/02/AR2005100201320.html

[Pirate Smile]

1. more:

This is a natural disaster; it's nobody's fault," said Lolita Reed Glass, who grew up in the Lower Ninth with her parents and 10 siblings. "My daddy worked. He did not sit on his bottom. You're not giving us anything. What we rightfully deserve as citizens of this country is the same protection we give to other countries."

Of the 160,000 buildings in Louisiana declared "uninhabitable" after Katrina, a majority are in the New Orleans neighborhoods that suffered extensive flooding. Mayor C. Ray Nagin, an African American who worked in the private sector before entering politics, has spelled out plans to reopen every section of the city -- except the Lower Ninth. His director of homeland security, Col. Terry Ebbert, said in an interview that most homes in the Lower Ninth "will not be able to be restored." Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson told the Houston Chronicle he has advised Nagin that "it would be a mistake to rebuild the Ninth Ward."

-snip-
Originally a cypress swamp, the community of 20,000 is overwhelmingly black; more than one-third of residents live below the poverty line, according to the 2000 census. The people of the Lower Ninth are the maids, bellhops and busboys who care for New Orleans tourists. They are also the clerks and cops now helping to get the city back on its feet. The ward is home to carpenters, sculptors, musicians and retirees. Fats Domino still has a house in the Lower Ninth. Kermit Ruffins -- a quintessential New Orleanian trumpeter whose band likes to grill up some barbecue between sets -- attended local schools. About half the houses are rentals.

"It's a scrappy place where people don't take a lot of guff, but a place where people really respect each other," said Pam Dashiell, president of the Holy Cross Neighborhood Association. "It has heart and soul and beauty."

[No Exit]

5. Here's what the repuke/capitalist jackals will do:

They'll maneuver it so everyone finally capitulates to the notion that the area should not be rebuilt. Homeowners (such as the mother of the woman quoted in the article, a woman named Glass-Reed) will be paid a "fair" (read: "lowest possible") price for their property. Everyone will sigh, anticipating that the Lower Ninth will be returned to swampland.

Then, a little while later, the jackals will announce that, hey, maybe, just maybe, what with all the modern things we have today--maybe there IS hope to build on that land! Woo-hoo!

And then the jackals who picked up the properties for pennies will re-sell them for big bucks. The original property owners will be left out of their own home area, and will of course NOT share in the obscene profits.

[KingFlorez]

2. I think it should be rebuilt

The former EPA administrator under Clinton said it would be a good idea to make a landfill there and then rebuild on top of that to raise up the city.

[Pirate Smile]

3. We need some smart (non-BushCo.) people to find a solution. Here are the

final paragraphs:

Lolita Reed Glass is suspicious that property owners such as her mother will be offered $5,000 for land that is resold for $500,000. Dubbed a "Betsy baby" because she was born nine months after that hurricane brought water to the eaves in the Lower Ninth in 1965, Glass grew up hearing how her mother and seven older siblings punched a hole in the roof to escape the deluge. When they returned, her father added three bedrooms, a bath and laundry onto the pale-blue shotgun house to accommodate his growing family.

"We weren't rich; we weren't poor," she said, but those things did not seem to matter to the family. All they knew was what they had. The day before Katrina swept through, Glass evacuated with her husband and three children, her mother, six siblings and an aunt. More than a month later, they are waiting to go back.

"My mother's thoughts and prayers are that she can go home," Glass said. But if that is impossible, she at least wants to give her goodbyes to a structure built in part with her father's own hands. "I've not seen my history, not seen where I come from," she said. "We need to have an opportunity to do that."

Katrina ripped off the front porch and laundry room. The floodwaters tossed the contents like a salad, still moist. The house next door floated away. But 1939 Lamanche St. is there. And for now at least, without a red tag.

[LeahD]

4. Gee, let me guess....swampland??? n/t

[SoCalDem]

6. If they start replanting cypress and bringing in gators, maybe

..and they would have to give Pre-Katrina payoffs to the home owners, and offer federal/state owned land to allow these people to rebuild..

But we all know that won;t happen:(

[thethinker]

7. This is America

Maybe we should ask the owners of these homes if they want to rebuild them.

These homes were flooded out when LBJ was president, and after hurricane Betsy hit. The same thing happened to the same houses. They were rebuilt. They can be rebuilt again.

Some how, when LBJ was president the country was able to help these people rebuild their homes with out bankrupting the country. We had the Viet Nam war to pay for when LBJ was president. Same situation, but a totally different outcome.

Forty years ago we did not have FEMA. The people were not given one way tickets to nowhere and scattered all over the country. Forty years ago when they sat on their roofs, people came to rescue them. Forty years ago we respected the rights of property ownership. Forty years ago the public did not assume that huge sums of the governments money would go to Haliburton instead of to the property owners. Now no one even questions it.

[Blaq Dem]

8. For health's sake, maybe they shouldn't return...

Only Lord knows what toxic brew maybe lurking in the lower 9th ward. I sure wouldn't want to return. The residents should be properly compensated and have a choice to rebuild elsewhere in the NOLA area.

My guess is they'll find a major oil field underneath the neighborhood. The people will be forgotten.