Katrina Update #64Katrina Update #64Mardi Gras is in full swing here, and while New Orleans carnival season is full of tradition, none speak to the revelry that is to come quite as much as the annual greasing of the poles at the Royal Sonesta hotel in the French Quarter. This annual event happens on the Friday before Mardi Gra. A hotel engineer, accompanied by a tuxedoed gentleman and a “Southern Belle,” applies petroleum jelly to the hotel’s balcony supports to prevent revelers from shimmying up them. The annual event attracts a crowd and receives national news coverage.
Honorary Greaser In Action
Last weekend's parades happened on overcast, but otherwise rain free days. Today's forecast is not as good. Although temperatures will be in the low to mid 70's, there is a 100 percent chance of rain predicted for the afternoon. We hope the weather stays to the north (although rain does tend to keep the crowd smaller, which is great if you want to catch lots of stuff). As you might expect, many of the floats this year depict the past year's events. One krewe even adopted the "blue roof" as its theme. I'll post some of the best pictures in next week's update.
R
egional Radar
for Saturday February 25, 2006
The rest of the weekend looks good, all the way through Fat Tuesday.
Our friends Dan and Bonnie Cruz, and Kenzi Schubert arrived yesterday from Wisconsin. Kenzi, you may remember, is the person who had the kidney transplant last summer, and Dan and Bonnie were the friends Cary and I were staying with when Katrina hit. This was the first time we have seen them since the storm. All are doing great, especially Kenzi, who has lost another 30 pounds!
Last night we cooked up some hot wings and some Bratwurst Jambalaya, and new friends Karl and Jay from Cleveland stopped by. Karl is the person whose email I published in last week's update. After the parades rolled by we headed down to the Quarter, stopped at Coop's for a libation, and then headed over to Donna's Bar and Grill to hear Mama Digdown's Brass Band from Madison, Wisconsin. They are one of our favorite brass bands (check them out - buy one or more of their CD's!).
They are predicting 400,000 tourists for this year's Mardi Gras, less than half the normal 1 million. Normally, we wouldn't think of venturing down Bourbon street after the Thursday before Mardi Gras (and even then, it is pretty packed). Last night, while crowded, it was not the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd one normally experiences. Even the crowds along the parade route seem a bit thinner.
Today we are making Salmon Ceviche with homemade Tortilla chips (mmmmmmm...). I think Mardi Gras is an even better excuse to spoil yourself (and others) with good food than Christmas or Thanksgiving!
Cary's girlfriend Andrea is back with us, arriving just in time for Mardi Gras.
- The number of mayoral candidates is now up to 12 (or is it 13). I'm still waiting for Krusty the Klown to announce his candidacy. A couple of weeks ago I predicted a runoff between Ron Foreman and Ray Nagin in May unless a "spoiler" entered the race. That may have happened. Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu he was running this past Wednesday. Here's how elections work in Louisiana: they don't have a primary election, per se. If any one candidate gets over 50% of the vote, that person automatically wins the race. If no candiate wins the majority of the vote, there is a run-off election one month later between the top two contenders, making for an interesting month of campaigning. Any way, the politcal commentators down here are already predicting it will be a run-off between either Landrieu and Nagin, or Landrieu and Ron Foreman.
Mitch Landrieu is the sister of State Senator Mary Landrieu and son of the late Moon Landrieu, who was the last white Mayor of New Orleans (1970-1978). There is a soft spot for Moon because he was largely responsible for diverting Interstate 10 from its planned location along the Mississippi River to its current location just North of the CBD and French Quarter. So grateful were the citizens that they named the wooden promendade that now exists where the expressway was planned the "Moonwalk." I am not sure why he is running for Mayor, however. It seems to me to be a step down, and why would someone with higher political aspirations take on a job that has no possibility of making everyone happy in the short term. With Gov. Blanco's low approval ratings, one would think a run for Governor in 2008 would be more to his liking. Perhaps he is trying to insure Nagin does not get re-elected. Time will tell.
- An article last week in the Houston Chronicle commented about New Orleans' requirement that people show they have employment before they will be allowed to live in public housing. If you have been keeping up with these updates, you know this is something I feel strongly about. New Orleans simply can't support those who can't support themselves right now. From the article:
New Orleans City Council President Oliver Thomas declared, "We don't need soap opera watchers right now ... We're going to target the people who are going to work." Thomas, who is black, also characterized African-American evacuees as pampered by storm relief programs. "At some point," he said, "you have to say, no, no, no."
During the same meeting New Orleans Housing Authority officials said future residents of rebuilt public housing will have to show a willingness to work in order to qualify.
Later in the same article,
As Houston City Councilman M.J. Khan told the Chronicle's Eric Berger, "A city is a combination of all kinds of people." In an ideal state everyone would be self-supporting, but as Khan said, "We cannot pick and choose who will live in a city." It seems that some of the designers of the future New Orleans want to discourage poor and disadvantaged residents from returning.
Thomas' statements make one wonder how he and officials who endorsed his sentiments would have treated poor Houstonians had the municipal roles been reversed and 100,000 Texans had fled to New Orleans. Would New Orleans leaders have rejected as pampering the generosity for which Houston received national acclaim? Would desperate storm victims have been screened for their employability before receiving subsidized hotel rooms and apartments? When the buses packed with exhausted survivors arrived, would they have been turned away into the night?
Everyone who fled from New Orleans during the storm deserves the same warm welcome back that they received upon arriving in Houston and other host cities during the emergency. If they need medical care, job counseling and shelter, it should be provided with the same selflessness with which Houstonians comforted Louisianans.
If New Orleans is unwilling to do that for its own, to the best of its ability, then the Hurricane Katrina disaster has shattered its sense of community in a manner no engineer or architect can ever repair.
To quote M*A*S*H's Col. Sherman Potter, "Horse Hockey!" To claim that New Orleans is not willing to welcome "its own" is a pretty harsh statement, particulary since every public official from council members to the Governor has been pleading with people to come home. But to suggest that New Orleans commit civil suicide by accepting those without the means to support themselves is irresponsible and shows a great lack of understanding of the new New Orleans. I am going to close with two examples to drive home my point:
1). We all know stories about the lazy, good-for-nothing brother-in-law (or uncle, or cousin, or whatever) who sits around your house, drinks all your beer, eats all your food, and then gets offended when you suggest he get a job. Finally, in exasperation, the host throws the free-loader out. It's called "tough love." How is New Orleans different? Just because it happens to be a city it is supposed to bend over while the "soap opera watchers" bleed the city dry of what little money it has? I don't think so.
2). When New Orleans is sufficiently recovered – say in 3 or 4 years – should (god forbid) a storm of such epic proportions were to lay Houston to waste, I have no doubt that New Orleans would use every resource at its disposal to assist those from Houston who, by choice or not, fled the storm to New Orleans. The liklihood of that happening is rather remote, given that New Orelans unique geography is what makes it so susceptible to these storms in the first place. But I have no doubt that the people of New Orleans would be every bit as accommodating as Houston people. And then, of course, the poor and indigent of Houston would be New Orleans' problem, wouldn't it? I can't help but wonder if the "kind" people of Houston would be as willing to take them back while still in the midst of adverstiy.
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