Community | November 20, 2009 | 5 comments

In New Orleans, Elation Over Katrina Liability Ruling

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/20/us/20orleans.html?_r=1&ref=us

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Chique
NEW ORLEANS — Since the first days after Hurricane Katrina, when the streets were still under water, many residents of New Orleans and its surroundings have maintained that the flood that wrecked their lives was the government’s fault, and that the government should pay for it.

Robert Green Sr., a resident of the Lower Ninth Ward, who lost his mother and granddaughter in the flooding, near his house.

“We’re glad we finally got a federal judge to agree with us,” said Robert Green Sr., a resident.

A judge ruled that negligent maintenance of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet led to flooding in New Orleans.

On Wednesday night came news that many had hoped for but few had believed would ever actually happen: a federal judge agreed.

“My head is spinning,” said Pam Dashiell, a co-director of the Lower Ninth Ward Sustainability Project and a 20-year resident of the neighborhood. “Maybe things are really breaking for the people.”

The sense of vindication was widespread, but the practical implications were less clear. The morning after Judge Stanwood R. Duval Jr.’s decision that the Army Corps of Engineers’ negligent maintenance of a major navigation channel led to major flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward and the adjacent St. Bernard Parish, a pleasantly startled New Orleans was still trying to decipher what it meant.

Was it an opening for tens of thousands of lawsuits, or a big class-action lawsuit, that could add up to billions of dollars in compensation for residents? Or was it leverage for negotiating a broader, regionwide settlement with the government? Some experts suggested that it was a welcome but ultimately symbolic ruling that could be overturned on appeal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/20/us/20orleans.html?_r=1&ref=us
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5 comments // In New Orleans, Elation Over Katrina Liability Ruling

  • thedirtman
    • 0
      thedirtman  

    • New Orleans will continue to slide into the sea no matter what anyone says or does. No amount of technology, money, big talk, hopefulness, taxes, or God Himself can stop it.

    • 2 years ago
  • smallgod
  • thedirtman
    • 0
      thedirtman  
    • thedirtman:

      Landfill will never be the equivalent of solid earth. Solid earth is buffered by rock that can absorb vibrations caused by shock waves and natural storms.

      Homes were built in the fill from the debris from the first big San Francisco earthquake. Unfortunately, those homes subsided when the milder quake from the later half of the century occurred. The Netherlands is fortunate in that they don't get earthquakes or hurricanes. In Bangladesh the disasters happen. Bangladesh has simply learned to accept death.

      Baton Rouge, on the other hand, isn't sliding fast. Baton Rouge may not be as fun as New Orleans, but people can live safely without involving bailouts and maintaining technological miracles. Anything that could be done in New Orleans can also be done in Baton Rouge.

      The only thing sustaining New Orleans is politics. The laws of physics do not care about the politics of anyone.

    • 2 years ago
  • smallgod
    • 0
      smallgod  
    • thedirtman:

      They don't need solid ground or rock. They need their marshland back. That is not impossible. How about you go take your spiel to the people that live there and work there. I'm sure you have something to back up what you're saying or you wouldn't just be saying it?

    • 2 years ago
  • smallgod
    • 0
      smallgod  

    • I was just in New Orleans, and the people there hold that it wasn't just the government, it was the oil companies' faults (and the government for allowing it to occur this way):

      There were over 50 breaks in the levees along the CANALS built by the oil companies to access the rich wetlands. These levees were supposed to reach 75 feet into the ground to prevent flooding - the oil companies cheaped out and built them only 17 feet into the ground. Also, the oil companies in building these canals and levees interrupted the natural cycle of flooding from the Mississippi that deposited silt in the wetlands which allowed soil-catching plants to grow and not only expand the land but also protect New Orleans and Louisiana naturally from hurricanes.

      Louisiana loses a FOOTBALL FIELD OF LAND EVERY 30 MINUTES. This is a real disaster, and it can easily be not only reduced but REVERSED just as the Dutch do - add land - to their own land. Contact your representatives and the Corps of Engineers - they are the ones allowing Louisiana's record land loss to happen.

    • 2 years ago
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