Thanks, Ann you scuzzbucket

A bill that would have put the brakes on the state acquiring land for the proposed new public hospital in New Orleans has been jettisoned by the Senate Education Committee.

After sailing through the House earlier this session, the proposal by Rep. Rick Nowlin of Natchitoches, failed to get passage in the Senate committee. Senators voted 7-1 against it Thursday, led by opposition from New Orleans Senator Ann Duplessis.



Ann Duplessis is a Scuzzbucket Extrodinaire. She authored a bill that passed last year, giving the leges a $34K raise. And now we learn that she is instrumental in the failure for HB 780 to get passage in the Senate Committee.


After sailing through the House earlier this session, House Bill 780 by Rep. Rick Nowlin, R-Natchitoches, ran into a 7-1 buzzsaw, led by Senator Ann Duplessis, D-New Orleans, who disputed the notion that the bill was designed to protect private property rights.

This bill is more about the new hospital being focused at Charity Hospital," she said, referring to some of the bill's backers who oppose the lower Mid-City site and want the state to gut Charity and rebuild within its shell.

Duplessis also pointedly asked Nowlin, "Are you from New Orleans?"

Nowlin said private property rights, the importance of medical education across Louisiana and the hospital's advertised $1.2 billion price tag -- with $300 million in state money already committed -- made it acceptable for a northern Louisiana lawmaker to weigh in.

State Treasurer John Kennedy, a critic of the hospital planning, said, "I don't see this as a New Orleans bill or a health care bill. This is an expropriation bill. . . . We shouldn't take land until we know we can build a hospital."

Wondering if Annie is in the pocket of previous scuzzbucket LSU president John Lombardi ? Wouldn't surprise me. You'd think that someone who represents New Orleans East, an area completely devastated by Katrina wouldn't be so blatantly greedy.

State Sen. Ann Duplessis said the legislative pay raise issue was skewed by those who do not believe elected officials are credible.

As an example, she pointed to the photo of her Mercedes that popped up on the Internet before the governor vetoed the pay raise.

Duplessis, D-New Orleans, said the car is part of her compensation package as a banker.

“It’s a 10-year-old, broken down vehicle,” she said.




Hell, she couldn't work to open a hospital in her own district. One opened recently that was bankrolled by a private citizen.

What a bee atch

The French Market VIEUX TO DO

Occurring this weekend in the French Market and adjoining venues is the Vieux To Do, another wonderful free festival in New Orleans.

A trifecta of free festivals celebrating Louisiana culture: The French Market's Creole Tomato Festival; the Louisiana Cajun Zydeco Festival, sponsored by the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and Foundation; and the Louisiana Seafood Festival, sponsored by the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board. All held along the French Market, the festivals will feature two stages of Cajun-zydeco music, cooking demonstrations of Creole tomato dishes, 11 seafood vendors, costumed characters and more.

• When: Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

• Where: The French Market, on North Peters Street from St. Peter Street to Esplanade Avenue.



We attended last year as well as in 2007 and it was a blast both times, despite the heat.

There are plenty of places to cool down, such as watching chef demonstrations

click here for a full lineup of events. Some of the chefs demonstrating on Saturday are from Dickie Brennan's, Andrea's, Bacco and Cafe Degas. The above link also has a line up of some good Zydeco musicians as well.

Fort Pike Reopens....Again

After nearly being closed due to damage sustained from Hurricanes Gustav and Ike, Fort Pike reopened today.

The Fort reopened 2 1/2 years after Katrina but was completely closed after the two 2008 storms battered the 182 year old Fort.

From the article in the TP:
The historic site which sits on New Orleans' eastern shore near the Rigolets had been closed for more than two years after storm surge from Hurricane Katrina submerged the 14-foot-high structure and left significant structural damage to the site, which has already fallen into disrepair due to decades of neglect.



Marsh grass and other debris that inundated the area after Gustav reached more than five feet high inside the fort's gun emplacements, said Joseph Yarbrough, president of the Fort Pike Foundation.

"It kind of devastated us a little bit to have a setback like that," Yarbrough said Friday.

It was the most recent of several hits, which resulted in Fort Pike being listed in 2007 as among the 10 most endangered battlefields in the United States. The list was compiled by the Civil War Preservation Trust, a nonprofit group in Washington, DC.


Looking forward to visiting the old Fort again. It's a great piece of history.

Summertime is here

The cool fronts are over, the heat is on. The temperatures hardly dip below 80 during the night. Summertime has arrived.

Here are a few pix taken about a month ago when we took a day trip to Gulport for a little "beach" time.

click on pictures for larger versions


We used the parking lot connected with the Ken Combs pier. As you can see, there's still a lot of Post K construction going on.


The pier's located at Highway 90 and Courthouse Road in Gulfport. This beachfront property used to be full of hotels, stores and restaurants.


We were the only ones on the beach that morning. It was great!


Well, we did share the beach with the birds. But they were quiet.


Taken in Bay St. Louis, these flowers signify the feeling of summer to me.

Scuzzbucket of the Week

HT to Swampwoman for the heads up on an article written by James Gill in the TP this week regarding Mr. John Lombardi, president of Louisiana State University.




.....The sparkling intellects of LSU offer New Orleans a lifeline, but the populace is too stupid and backward to be roused from its torpor. Time is running out to get the rabble in line. So says LSU President John Lombardi, who nevertheless remains determined to save New Orleans from itself.

Lombardi is just the man for the job, being, as he is fond of pointing out, from the efficient north. Lombardi got on his hind legs in New Orleans last week to rally the LSU troops in support of the “major academic medical center” proposed for a vast tract in Mid-City. Lombardi’s plans to win over the doubters evidently do not include a charm offensive. He has “never met a place like this, ” where people speak in a “code” he neither understands nor wishes to understand. He doesn’t know from “krewe.” The city does not contain “as many sensible people” as he had hoped — sensible people, of course, being those who agree with him. New Orleans is “on the edge” and Lombardi is offering it one “last opportunity to be a competitive, high-powered American city.” But he is up against idiots who want to “preserve old New Orleans in amber, ” and force LSU to revamp and reopen the old Charity Hospital. It is imperative that the issue be “settled this year, ” and the “Legislature needs to get out of our way.”

What a pompous old fool.

Hurricane Season 2009

The 2009 Hurricane Season began on June 1st. We've got a good 6 - 8 weeks to go before we enter the heart of the season, probably more than that.

Here's a look around the NOLA blogosphere, recognizing the start of another season

Celcus provides a tongue in cheek look at the opening .

Cliff discusses his idea of hurricane preparedness , which I find amusing.

Varg presents a list of storm tracking websites at the Chicory.

The New Orleans News Ladder offers links to several June 1st activities regarding wetlands and coastal erosion.

Nolacleophatra discusses her preparations and recalls her evacuation during Gustav last year.

Louis Maistros wrote an oped about being prepared but not panicking.

More as they become available.

Four years later still not okay

I know the rest of the country's been suffering "Katrina Fatigue" for some time now: tired of hearing about how things are difficult down here, tired of hearing about people who want handouts, blah blah blah.

NPR has run a story about REAL Katrina Fatigue in its piece covering Gulf Coast Mayors.




Moss Point, Mississippi Mayor Xavier Bishop works from a white trailer next to the damaged City Hall, which will soon be torn down. But his office is surprisingly barren. There are none of the customary photos of the mayor posing with the local Little League team or accepting an award from the Rotary Club, just piles of paperwork and empty display cases.

Bishop says it took two years and navigating a litany of red tape to get federal and state funds to help the city regroup. And citizens have grown frustrated with the slow progress. It's come with a price for Bishop.

"Fatigue. I am worn out. I'm battle worn, I'm battle scarred," he says.

Bishop is one of five Mississippi Gulf Coast mayors who are not seeking re-election. One of them is embroiled in a Katrina fraud scandal, but the rest say they can't muster another four years of dealing with the storm's aftermath. That means a new crop of leaders will have to come up to speed fast.

Of those calling it quits, perhaps the biggest surprise came in Bay St. Louis where Mayor Edward Favre is retiring after 20 years.



"It was a tough decision but I thought about it and thought about and I just couldn't find the spark," he says. "I've always said if I didn't have all to give, I didn't belong. And this last four years has just really taken its toll."

Favre, 55, was raised in this bayside town of 8,000 near the Louisiana border. He's a soft-spoken, animated character with a stout build and a quick laugh.

"It's still home and it always will be," he says. "When we get far enough away where we can't smell the salt air and hear the mullet jumping, it's too far from home. Too far from home."

The mayor is driving along the once washed-out beach road, where workers are trying to rebuild the city's infrastructure.

"This is the area completely replacing all the utility lines, also including the new sidewalks and roadwork," he explains. "Hopefully putting everything back the way it was pre-Katrina."

Favre admits the city wasn't prepared for the devastation that Hurricane Katrina brought. It had not set up shelters and didn't think many parts of town were threatened because they had survived the deadly Hurricane Camille in 1969. They were wrong. Katrina's 30-foot storm surge practically wiped the town out. And for Favre, there was a personal toll as well.

"I came out of it with a pair of shorts, flip-flops and a T-shirt. That's all I had left to my name," he says.

Those shorts have come to have some significance here.

"Shortly after the storm we had a meeting and the president came down, so I go to it in flip-flops, shorts and T-shirt. And everybody said, 'What are you doing?" Well guys, no offense, that's all I have. I don't own a pair of long pants, this is it period. And so it came to signify that until the city was put back together, until it was made whole again that I'd wear the shorts. When you start dressing up it kind of signifies that everything is OK, and everything's not OK."

The next mayor of Bay St. Louis will have some short pants to fill.

One step forward

House Bill 780 was passed by the committee yesterday.


This is one small step forward for those who want to preserve Charity Hospital and save Lower Mid City from being decimated to make way for an unnecessary hospital complex desired LSU and requires them to to show that they could finance the construction of the new hospital complex before seizing land from residents and business owners of Lower Mid-City.

The bill will now pass out of the committee to be debated before the entire House of Representatives.

Thanks to those who emailed, called or faxed their reps. Be ready to do it again.

Scuzzbuckets of the Week

I don't know whether I want to cry or throw up regarding this story.

Metairie parents arrested for cruelty to juveniles and desertion.

In one of their headlines, nola dot com described the two children as "feral" due to
the fact that they can't speak.



Nicolette Brady, 35, and Chad Lee, 34, were jailed on charges of cruelty to juveniles and child desertion. Brady also was booked with resisting arrest. The children were placed in the custody of their grandmother.

The Sheriff's Office received an anonymous telephone complaint about children in the apartment Sunday afternoon. Neighbors, who would not identify themselves, confirmed that the children often were left unattended in diapers and had no language skills.


The agency's incident report said Deputy Shenandoah Jones found the boy and girl "hanging" out of an open window about 1 foot off the ground. He tried to talk to the children but noted "neither would speak" and "they apparently didn't understand" what he was saying. Jones also watched as the boy began rocking a dresser that almost fell on him.

the one-bedroom apartment's floor soaked with water. Jones described a swarm of gnats and flies in the kitchen and cockroaches throughout the apartment, the report said. A layer of black mold covered most surfaces, including the water in the toilet. Jones noticed no food in the refrigerator and several exposed outlets with electrified wires in the kitchen.
The children were covered in small scabs and cuts that paramedics later identified as bites from mosquito and mites, the report said.

Hurricane preps tax holiday

Hurricane preps tax holiday scheduled this weekend.

In 2007 House Bill 225 was passed that designated the last weekend in May as a sales tax free holiday for the first $1,500.00 of the sales price for the purchase of the following hurricane preparedness items:


Any portable self-powered light source.

Any portable self-powered radio, two-way radio, or weatherband radio.

Any tarpaulin or other flexible waterproof sheeting.

Any ground anchor system or tie-down kit.

Any gas or diesel fuel tank.

Any package of AAA-cell, AA-cell, C-cell, D-cell, 6-volt, or 9-volt
batteries, excluding automobile and boat batteries.

Any cell phone battery and any cell phone charger.

Any nonelectric food storage cooler.

Any portable generator used to provide light or communications or
preserve food in the event of a power outage.

Any "storm shutter device". The term "storm shutter device" shall
include materials and products manufactured, rated, and marketed specifically for
the purposes of preventing window damage from storms.

Any carbon monoxide detector.

Any blue ice product.

So go save yourself 4% this weekend and get ready for storm season.

Memorial Day

Mark Folse over at Toulouse Street has written a must read post about the citizens of New Orleans.

An excerpt

These are a people who have seen death and devastation, known loss and disappointment that is painful to catalog and still they get up on certain days and march down to the appointed place and eat and drink and dance and are happy. They are at once not that different from my parents sitting out on Memorial Day and at some deep level they are profoundly transformed. As we approach the fourth anniversary of the Hurricane Katrina and the Federal Flood they are people who have pulled themselves up by their bootstraps and made the case for why we should be here. Few people since the days of the pioneers have a stronger claim to a place.