My kind of activists

The KatrinaRitaville express, a very underreported initiative to tour the country with FEMA trailers to spread the word about criminal enterprise known as FEMA


photo from foodmusicjustice.com

What they're about (from their website)

Several Gulf Coast organizations have purchased two FEMA trailers, which will tour the country over the next year to raise awareness of the ongoing nature of the crisis in the region, and the continued lack of coherent government action to rebuild the region, particularly to rebuild in a manner that meets the needs of its poor and minority residents.

The trailers will be used as a focus for local education and organizing, as a challenge to presidential candidates to make their plans for Gulf Coast reconstruction clear, and as a rallying point to help to mobilize the many thousands who have volunteered their time in work projects to now join in the political efforts to force meaningful government action.

what a fraud

From the T.P.

Two U.N. advisers labeled the planned demolition of four New Orleans public housing complexes as "discriminatory" even though neither visited the city to research the issue. The U.N. specialists now acknowledge that they haven't been to New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina and were basing their opinion largely on the views of activists who have waged an unsuccessful campaign to halt the demolitions.



Miloon Kothari of New Delhi, India, the U.N. Human Rights Council's specialist on adequate housing,



and Gay McDougall of Washington, D.C., the U.N. independent expert on minority issues, joined ranks with opponents of the demolitions already under way at the St. Bernard, C.J. Peete and B.W. Cooper complexes.



Although the duo say they released the statement to influence the U.S. Congress, the timing of their comments could have broader influence.

Here's the part that bothers me

"Yes, some people were consulted," Kothari said, "but the fact that people's property was destroyed.......

They are public housing units, Mr. Kothari.

In a related article in today's paper , the University of Texas at Arlington found in a survey they did that 70% of people who lived in public housing pre-K don't want to return

Federal and local officials reacted strongly last week to the pair's statement. Sen. David Vitter, R-La., called it "theater of the absurd."

HUD said Kothari and McDougall "are misinformed about the state of public housing in New Orleans," adding that the plans to demolish old, hurricane-damaged complexes is part of a wider effort to move to a mixed-income model that will help "minority and low-income Americans . . . live in a socially and economically integrated environment."

One House at a Time

Still volunteering in Pearlington and the coast after 30 months, One House at a Time continues building homes for those left without anything in Hancock County, Mississippi.

From their website:


Pearlington lies in the southeast corner of Hancock County, along the Gulf of Mexico. Hurricane Katrina brought widespread devastation to the county with 40 confirmed deaths and millions of dollars of property damage. Nearly 70% of the county’s homes were left uninhabitable. The coastal communities were among the hardest hit areas. Pearlington, a small community of 2,200 people, was particularly devastated, as nearly every home was either completely destroyed or severely damaged. There is no Habitat for Humanity affiliate along this area of the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Hundreds of residents were living in tents in the aftermath of Katrina. Many have only what they were able to salvage, and in many cases they have nothing at all. As of Feb. 2008, there are dozens of residents STILL living in FEMA trailers.


If the video can't be seen here, here's the link to it

From the creator of this video:

I began filming this story one month after Katrina came ashore, and I recently returned to the devastated and impoverished town of Pearlington Mississippi. Even though its several miles from the actual coast, the storm surge and the wind brought this place to the brink of its very existence. The waves that came through this town and destroyed everything in their path first had to pass through a few Chemical Plants and Oil refineries out in the Gulf of Mexico. This was not merely sea water that carried these homes away, it was a deadly stew of unknown and unreported toxins.
This story follows the recovery efforts of one group that has been based in Pearlington as soon as the roads were clear enough to get in. One House At A TIme is building homes for people of Pearlington who want to stay in the place where they call home. This video tells a little of their story, but anyone who has been there will tell you, there is no video that can be shot that can express the sort of devastation that has occurred on our own soil, to our own people. So go see it for yourself, and bring a hammer.

Thanks to Clayton Cubitt for bringing this to light

Formaldehyde in Trailers

here is a website dedicated to providing information about formaldehyde poisoning in FEMA trailers and RVs sold to the general public.

Scuzzbuckets of the Century

FEMA

In addition to turning away trained first responders at gunpoint, FEMA decided to throw out all the band instruments at McDonogh 15 School for the Creative Arts in the French Quarter. Did the school flood? No. Not a drop, but some “mold” was detected on a few of the instruments so out they went. (Cleaning them with bleach would fixed the problem.)........Everyone knows that FEMA knowingly kept thousands of people in trailers contaminated with formaldehyde before they admitted to the problem.

Now it’s been discovered that that just wasn’t enough, so the good folks at FEMA added an extra twist to the trailer scandal.

Used trailers returned to the criminal enterprise (also known as a government agency) were sold to the public. The funds were to be used - 100% of them - to purchase additional emergency housing.

A 2006 Congressional investigation found that the criminal enterprise invested taxpayer dollars in emergency supplies like iPods, beer-making equipment (OK, that could be a legitimate emergency) and designer jackets. Just what every emergency victim needs. Designer duds. Or do you think those ended up in employee closets?

Thanks to Food Music Justice dot com

There WILL be floods.....

Here's an exerpt from an
Op Ed piece that appeared in the New York Times last week about the state of the country's levee system


Last month, a 30-foot section of levee ruptured in Fernley, Nev. While the cause of the breach, which swamped 450 homes and forced dozens of people to evacuate, is unknown, anyone familiar with the drowning of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina will tell you this: Levees fail.

Indeed, there are more than 100 antiquated earthen berms across the country in danger of collapsing. What happened in Nevada is a harbinger of a much larger problem nationwide.

Click here to read the entire piece

Thanks to Food Music Justice dot com

A window to the soul of America

From the website Food Music Justice dot com

To me, there is no story more pressing
than New Orleans - what happened there,
and what hasn't happened.

In a way, it's a window on the soul
of America.

On the one hand we see an unspeakably
corrupt administration. On the other hand courage and generosity that restores one's faith in human nature.

New Orleans in spite of being 80% destroyed by the failure of the federal levee system is coming back strong.

Strong enough to host the NBA All-Star game, to stage over thirty large scale parades during Mardi Gras, to operate its schools, hospitals, roads, hotels and restaurants.
The music is back and the incomparable food and culture.

All without the help of the federal government which promised so much and has done so little
- and done so much harm.

Three short videos that tell the story:

1. A short art piece which conveys the pain of losing one's home whether in New Orleans or Bagdhad.

2. A rare and little seen video that captured what it means when a levee fails: "From street to roof in three minutes"

3. A vivid recap of how thoroughly the city and its people were abandoned by the government whose job it was to help.

Click here to see the three videos


Thanks to Ken McCarthy of New York for keeping the word out

Thanks, Mr. Riggio

Barnes and Noble Chairman Leonard Riggio announced plans to invest $20 million in Gentilly at a press conference last Tuesday (February 27th).



In an initiative that should place at least 120 families into new houses built with energy-efficient features and elevated to a height that should protect them from future floods. Riggio plans to spend $20 million from his family's charitable foundation on the effort.

Residents who participate in the program will receive a new home at no cost, provided they surrender their flooded, uninhabitable house -- or the vacant lot where it once stood -- to Project Home Again, the nonprofit that Riggio spun out of his foundation. The charity will give each family a mortgage equal to the difference between their new and old homes and then steadily forgive the mortgage over a period of five years, after which the family will own the house outright.



A devotee of New Orleans music, Riggio said no flood could wipe out the music, food, culture and "genius" that New Orleans has bequeathed the rest of the country.

Project Home Again will construct single-family homes on 50-foot lots in three sizes: two bedrooms/two baths; three bedrooms/two baths; and four bedrooms/two baths. The homes, which will be offered at no cost to eligible families.

PHA is intended to be a zero overhead operation, with all $20 million going directly to building homes. Eligible applicants must have lived in Gentilly two years prior to the storm and own a home (or former home site) in Gentilly that is uninhabitable due to Hurricane Katrina. They must be willing to swap their old uninhabitable home or site for a new home, and have a family consisting of two to eight individuals. Here are the eligibility requirements

Bringing Nature Back

From the Sunherald dot com:

Live Oaks are being planted along the Gulf Coast.
It will take many years before their replacements reach the grandeur of the originals, but the new Live oaks being planted will be spread along the Coast from Gulfport to Pearlington.


Volunteers planted five Live oaks at the Humane Society of South Mississippi on U.S. 49 in Gulfport.

Other planting sites were Clower-Thornton Nature Park


Turkey Creek in Gulfport,


Railroad Park in Long Beach


War Memorial Park in Pass Christian,




as well as sites in Pearlington, Bay St. Louis, Waveland, Lakeshore and Henderson Point.

Three Live oaks are being planted at the foot of the Bay St. Louis Bridge.

Scuzzbucket of the Week

James E. Delancey of Gulfport, MIssissippi. A waste of oxygen, this drunk apparently passed out on Hwy 190 in Covington.

Here's the story:

Deputy Kerry Snaples, 22, of Ponchatoula, died at about 4:20 a.m. Sunday when his motorcycle struck a pickup that was stopped in the westbound lane of U.S. 190 near Covington High School. The Sheriff's Office did not release the deputy's identity Sunday because of difficulty contacting his family.

....the impact knocked the truck into a side ditch. The truck's tail lights were not on, and he says its dark gold and gray paint would have been difficult to see on the dark highway.

Covington Police, who are investigating the case, booked the driver of the pickup, James E. Delancey Jr., 37, of Gulfport, Miss., with vehicular homicide, DWI and driving with a suspended license.

Delancey's blood alcohol level was "several times" the legal limit and he admitted to taking prescription opiates before driving, Covington Police spokesman Lt. Jack West said Sunday.

Condolences to Officer Snaples' family.

Katrina continues to affect lives

Katrina continues to affect lives; media needs to acknowledge this

From an editorial from a Tennessee paper last week, an excerpt:


Now there's no use in beating a dead horse. But then again, you can't really ignore the elephant in the room either. Animal clichés aside, lack of media coverage of the Katrina aftermath is hurting recovery, because no one really knows how bad it is or how to help.

We, as mass media consumers, never got answers to the questions posed in news coverage. The matter was simply washed away.

The irony of this is we, as an editorial board of a newspaper, are complaining about lack of media coverage. Then again, it should be noted that we try to do the best we can, but just simply cannot afford the high-tech and in-depth coverage. But you, the reader, probably already knew that.