NEW ORLEANS, Nov. 16, 2007
Katrina Homeless Make Tent City Of Despair
About 250 Camp Outside New Orleans City Hall Demanding More Be Done
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Photo
A man sleeps in his bed under a gazebo at a homeless camp in a park across from City Hall in New Orleans Friday, Nov. 9, 2007. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
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Photo Essay
Gulf Coast Marks 2 Years
Somber ceremonies on anniversary of Hurricane Katrina making landfall.
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Interactive
After The Storm
The road to recovery for the people and places along the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast.
About 250 homeless people have erected pup-tents - the only affordable housing they say they could find since Hurricane Katrina -- and created a colony of despair in a grassy plaza outside City Hall.
Mayor Ray Nagin's second-floor office faces the camp, and its residents rally almost daily with the chant: “Hey, Ray! How about a house today!”
Nagin has not met with the group, but he said in a statement that the city “is working with numerous agencies to address the homelessness” that worsened after the hurricane.
The mayor said many of the homeless in Duncan Plaza have refused temporary shelter and rental assistance, and he is concerned about unsanitary conditions and safety.
Julius Nelson, 32, leader of a group called Homeless Pride that formed in the plaza, said shelters are overflowing and rental assistance is useless in a city where the storm destroyed most of the inexpensive apartments. He feared Nagin's statement meant the mayor would break up the camp.
“You've got people all over New Orleans sleeping in abandoned buildings, in abandoned cars, everywhere,” Nelson said. “You don't have any affordable housing. People don't even go to the crowded shelters. They come straight here.”
New Orleans has 12,000 homeless people, up from 6,300 before Katrina, according to UNITY of Greater New Orleans, a group that helps the homeless.
Nagin said his office of public advocacy has provided food, clothing and shelter to more than 1,000 people this year. On Thursday, he urged state officials to release rental subsidies that UNITY plans to distribute at the plaza.
Still, the encampment has grown from a half-dozen tents three months ago to more than 40 pitched on two grassy knolls. A gazebo in the plaza center is a pen for sleeping bags, cardboard and newspapers on which more homeless people sleep.
Some call it a safe haven because National Guard humvees begin their patrols from a Holiday Inn across the street. But a 39-year-old homeless man died in his tent Nov. 8 after he was beaten elsewhere the previous night and wandered back, authorities said.
“Bad things happen out here,” said a 47-year-old woman who asked to be identified only as Donna. A gold ribbon tied to jesters bells hung on her tent zipper not for decoration, she said, but as an alarm after a stranger tried to enter one night.
The camp has become so hard to ignore that some observers believe it will force the mayor to take action on housing, an issue many critics say he has failed to address.
“His hand is being forced,” said Sam Jackson, a member of the group Concerned Compassionate Community, one of several that brings food to the park. “The mayor can work to get these people a place to stay. Or, he could run them all out. But isn't that harsh?”
Of the 200,000 homes the hurricane destroyed, 41,000 were affordable rental units, according to estimates by the nonprofit group PolicyLink. Since the storm, fair-market rent for an efficiency apartment has risen from $463 to $764.
The storm also destroyed homeless shelters, reducing the number of beds from 832 to 232, according to UNITY.
About a third of the people in the plaza work at least part-time, but they cannot find affordable housing, UNITY said.
Katherine Scott, who stocks the camping section of a nearby Wal-Mart, said she has seen tents purchased one-by-one by people who look down on their luck.
“They've been buying them up faster than we can stock them, the sleeping bags, too. That just makes you cry,” she said.
A church near the plaza offers laundry and showers to the homeless. Several groups bring regular meals. A few people living in the plaza give haircuts.
Those living in the plaza relieve themselves at fast-food restaurants, or in a row of bushes on the far end of the grounds, the smell wafting through the compound on a breezy day.
As night began to fall on the camp, Donna watched a group of people open beer cans after a day in which they did not leave the grounds.
“Around this time people start drinking. They've been fed. They don't have a reason to go out and work,” she said. “But where else do they have to go?”
© MMVII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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See all 56 CommentsThey''re actors reading a script.
Congress - Please finish the investigation into the Kronger brothers....
Seems a Bu$h buddy/CIA/Blackwater employee named Kronger is under suspicion for netting $22 million for his part in placing ''''put options'''' on some airlines stock, possibly knowing which planes would be flown into the WTC buildings...
This same family goes all the way back to ''''Iran/Contra''''...
This same family is involved in the Blackwater shootings...
Could it be that some in the CIA and the Pentagon actually pulled off 9/11?
Why was Cheney in command of NORAD that day?
What exactly did Bu$h know about the atrocity?
Will personal greed be the undoing of the cabal?
Or will the White House make the investigation GO AWAY???
Congress - Please finish the investigation into the Kronger brothers....
Seems a Bu$h buddy/CIA/Blackwater employee named Kronger is under suspicion for netting $22 million for his part in placing ''''put options'''' on some airlines stock, possibly knowing which planes would be flown into the WTC buildings...
This same family goes all the way back to ''''Iran/Contra''''...
This same family is involved in the Blackwater shootings...
Could it be that some in the CIA and the Pentagon actually pulled off 9/11?
Why was Cheney in command of NORAD that day?
What exactly did Bu$h know about the atrocity?
Will personal greed be the undoing of the cabal?
Or will the White House make the investigation GO AWAY???
It was getting in the way of you guys doing yer ******** jobs.
Gee...I wonder if the two trillion dollars we''re wasting in Iraq would be better spent here at home? Thanks Bu$hies!
New Orleans is smoke and mirrors and a money pit. Get over it and move elsewhere - but only if you want to earn an honest living. If you want to lay around a whine all day, then remember, you are the ones who RE-elected that moron Nagin.
sbbm
Really? Billions? Where did you get that figure?
New Orleans has become a magnet for the disinfranchised and those looking for a handout.
There''s a lot of idiots in here who don''t know a thing about New Orleans and don''t care as long as they can find a way to defend Bush against indefensible incompetence. You idiots should visit New Orleans sometime. You would realize that the vast majority of displaced people were working families. Their neighborhoods still look like a bomb hit them. Of course in your "rational" we have trillions to spend rebuilding Iraq but there''s never enough to invest in our own here at home. You people should crawl back under the rock you came from. You are not real Americans and you are truly lower than the people you criticize here.
barbaraf4
I pray that what happened to the hard working families of New Orleans should not befall you as well. The first slap in the face was delivered by nature. The second by inept and incompetent government agencies who''s job it is to help all Americans in such catastrophes. The third was the insurance companies that refused to honor their policies. The fourth was in the hollow promises of an administration that said it would rebuild and instead funneled the rebuilding money back to it''s friends and supporters. The last slap in the face is being delivered by so-called fellow Americans who wish to write them off and call them lazy. The vast majority of displaced people from this storm were working families. You people disgust me because you are satisfied with parroting the lies of others rather than educating yourself. You choose willful ignorance because it preserves your sick world-view that Bu$h is a decent human being and a good President.
I''m from Texas. I did NOT say anything about Bush being a decent human being and a good President. He isn''t. But that has nothing to do with the New Orleans situation. A lot of money got poured into that problem and unfortunately, a lot of good, decent people got caught in the snare; however, that does not change the fact that New Orleans was full of welfare recipients who, at best were renters. They have no where to live, in addition to the fact that they are unemployed. As a landlord, I would not fix up my property without raising the rent, and now no one can afford the rentals. Now, look at the pictures of tent city. All those people sleeping in, even though it is daylight.
I have been through disasters. I did not sleep in. I got up, cleared my property and decided on a plan of action.
barbaraf4
Again, you moron, the vast majority of displaced people were working families! No doubt New Orleans had a lot of homeless before and after. No doubt they had a lot of working poor and welfare poor. That does not excuse writing off a hard working American city.
barbaraf4
I pray that what happened to the hard working families of New Orleans should not befall you as well. The first slap in the face was delivered by nature. The second by inept and incompetent government agencies who''''s job it is to help all Americans in such catastrophes. The third was the insurance companies that refused to honor their policies. The fourth was in the hollow promises of an administration that said it would rebuild and instead funneled the rebuilding money back to it''''s friends and supporters. The last slap in the face is being delivered by so-called fellow Americans who wish to write them off and call them lazy. The vast majority of displaced people from this storm were working families. You people disgust me because you are satisfied with parroting the lies of others rather than educating yourself. You choose willful ignorance because it preserves your sick world-view that Bu$h is a decent human being and a good President.
Again, you moron, the vast majority of displaced people were working families! No doubt New Orleans had a lot of homeless before and after. No doubt they had a lot of working poor and welfare poor. That does not excuse writing off a hard working American city.
Posted by micma at 02:00
Please take your noon meds and then come back to we can discuss this rationally.
Your hardworking pull yourself up by your bootstraps philosophy is surpassed only by your willful ignorance and stupidity. I doubt that medication would help either of us with that.
barbaraf4
I pray that what happened to the hard working families of New Orleans should not befall you as well. The first slap in the face was delivered by nature. The second by inept and incompetent government agencies who''''''''s job it is to help all Americans in such catastrophes. The third was the insurance companies that refused to honor their policies. The fourth was in the hollow promises of an administration that said it would rebuild and instead funneled the rebuilding money back to it''''''''s friends and supporters. The last slap in the face is being delivered by so-called fellow Americans who wish to write them off and call them lazy. The vast majority of displaced people from this storm were working families. You people disgust me because you are satisfied with parroting the lies of others rather than educating yourself. You choose willful ignorance because it preserves your sick world-view that Bu$h is a decent human being and a good President.
For those who did, they are getting what they deserve.
But when it comes to local problems, as they say, "all politics is local".
Some intelligent New Orelean''ers voted for change in their local government. It''s unfortunate that they are the victims of the stupid who re-elected Ray Nagin... a failure of a Mayor and apparently still is so.
What de ***** is so superpower about not helping yer own people?
Asia Times online (Greater China)
Nov 13, 2007
US loses wattage to China in Iraq
China is among the countries that has received contracts for building electric power plants in Iraq.
China has been invited to build power stations in Iraq. The point is that this should be done by the Americans, and this should be quite an important consideration - The American People have allocated literally billions of dollars of taxpayer money for Iraqi "reconstruction"
The George W Bush administration rightly asserts, a stable government is not possible.
Still, after several years of work and all the billions spent, as one Iraqi official acknowledged,
little has been done to provide even such essentials as electricity.
Iraqi authorities are clearly aware that transferring the assignment to non-US companies will displease their masters in Washington.
American companies have behaved in extremely "non-American" ways; they immediately created several layers of highly paid but absolutely useless management,
Brought workers from abroad for exorbitant wages and spent on themselves all the "aid" money - Presumably given to help the populace - and then departed with with nothing to show. US management is wasteful, corrupt and inefficient, after years and billions of dollars spent, and unable to return Iraq''s basic services in many areas
This is indicated by what seems to be the fact of replacing an American company by a Chinese one in building an electricity plant in Iraq.
Lastdance
Bush awarded all the - Construction Contracts to his :
Former Campaign manager.
His former - Campaign Manager - Gave the contracts to :
His own family members.
His own family members gave contracts to :
Their own In-laws
The headlines read :
10''s of Millions of Dollars - Mis-used in the Wake of : - "Katrina"
No Criminal Complaint from : The Justice Department ! !
Criminal Corporate (Nazi) America
Wins out again ! !
Lastdance
The people in N.O need to do the same. If they would have had insurance, like the rest of the people they wouldnt be homeless. Now MY insurance is up, to provide more $ for those who were insured too. Welcome to the land of expected hand outs.
How much more nonsense and profanity - Spam -
Will you post today
No money, but always find a way to get drunk.
Of course you have a reason to work. Why wouldn''t you? Self respect at the least.
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