Quote:
Originally Posted by MrGiz
I was an IDIOT.... I was inside of my house in suburban New Orleans, that night.... where in the fuck were any of you idiot / experts?
LOTS of REAL PEOPLE fucked up that day/night.... get over it!!
GOVERNMENT was NOT THE ONLY FUCKING PROBLEM!!!!
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Fixed that for ya!!!
"The reality is that we have a job to do to get flood protection in place, and we're not going to play any games on this,'' Mr. Graves wrote.
That is the responsible position, and it should be shared by all parties. Flood protection is far too important to New Orleans, and threatening to halt or delay it ill serves the public, including those neighborhoods that the non-flood asset board ostensibly want to help.
"This is a much larger issue -- it's an issue for the entire city,'' said Flood Protection Authority-East President Tim Doody. "We need to be about the business of flood protection. And every day matters.''
He's right, and this incident again calls into question the decision to create an authority specifically for the old Levee Board's non-flood assets.
That happened in 2007. Derrick Shepherd (D) [
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derrick_Shepherd], then a state senator who is now serving time in a federal prison, filed legislation to create a new entity to manage the land holdings. That was clearly an effort to inject politics back in the equation, and it's unfortunate that he succeeded.
While the new levee authorities were made up of people with expertise and training, such as geologists and hydrologists,
the non-flood authority is made up of people recommended by New Orleans lawmakers.
The new levee board wanted to focus on its flood protection mission, and rightly so. Removing responsibility for non-flood assets was part of that effort. But the constitutional amendment that abolished the Orleans Levee Board and created the new regional flood authority boards provided a method for dealing with the old levee district's land holdings. In fact, the levee board and the state Division of Administration were working on a plan to divide those assets up among existing agencies when the Legislature created the new entity.
The main argument against creating the non-flood authority was that
it created a potential patronage bonanza. But now, only a few years later, the non-flood authority showed that it has the potential to interfere with flood protection.
http://www.nola.com/opinions/index.s..._first_an.html
Residents push to rid N.O. levee boards of politics
By Anne Rochell Konigsmark, USA TODAY Posted 12/22/2005 8:00 PM
NEW ORLEANS — A New Orleans citizens' group has gathered more than 47,000 signatures in the latest
attempt to unite the region's six levee boards and stamp out any political patronage within them.
The Citizens for One Greater New Orleans is pushing Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco (D) to call a special session of the Legislature in January to
pass a law creating a single levee board made up of hurricane experts. Levee boards now contain political appointees.
Levee commissioners will play a critical role in the recovery of New Orleans because the federal government has promised more than $3 billion for rebuilding and repairing the levees, which failed during Hurricane Katrina and caused disastrous flooding.
Blanco did not support a levee consolidation bill that died last month in the state House of Representatives.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/...ee-board_x.htm
