jawfish

New Orleans: Restoration and Restitution
john posted in politics & culture on January 18th, 2006

New Orleans’ mayor Nagin has announced a plan to rebuild the city. It’s a framework really, in which residents are encouraged to demonstrate the will and ability to return, before the city declares a commitment to the worst neighborhoods.

Should New Orleans be rebuilt at all?

Should we spend federal money on the rebuilding?

What’s actually possible in the current situation?

What do we owe New Orleans?

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So what gives me the right to question the high-falutin’ predictions of massive restoration for dear old feckless New Orleans?

Well, it’s my tax money thats going to pay for all or almost all of the reconstruction, that’s why. Given a choice, I might prefer that some of that money go somewhere else. If New Orleans wants to float bonds and fund their own work, then go right ahead.

LA Times article on the Mayor’s announcement.

NPR’s- OnPoint show featured a liberal economist, Ed Glaeser, who suggests paying displaced residents a lump sum, rather than rebuilding unsupportable neighborhoods. Scott Cowen, President of Tulane University, the Times-Picayune City Editor, David Meeks, and the callers present a fair cross-section of highly emotional reaction. The show is interesting because it displays both a broadly impractical reaction to the disaster, plus a straightforward analysis that does not take political considerations into account. There is, of course, a measure of the usual angry hand-wringing.

Glaeser, the economist, infuriates the locals on the NPR show by pointing out that the New Orleans economy is profoundly moribund, with few oil or dock workers resident, some tourism and the rest health and service industries. Various people decry the loss of neighborhoods and demand to have them back, without any conception it seems, that neighborhoods require infrastructure, police, fire, schools, recreation, housing, and jobs. All of that is gone in much of the city, along with the tax base in the flooded areas, and there is little prospect of better jobs.

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Meanwhile the facts as nearly as I can see from a distance are these:

Some substantial part of the city is currently ruined, possibly the majority.

A very large area is geologically unsound, below sea level, sinking, with levees that sink faster than they can be raised.

The protective buffer marshes in the Gulf have been destroyed over the years, and there is a huge, but inactive plan to restore them.

The city’s tax base is much smaller, and there is little prospect of one large enough to support its past population with services of a quality expected in the rest of the country.

Cleaning up the mess- bulldozing, carting, and removing cars is a monumental task far beyond the ability of the old city, let alone today’s. The DMV can’t even handle the paperwork for the abandoned cars, the city hasn’t enough landfill for the destroyed houses.

The Corps of Engineers will be charged with rebuilding the levees, but they are traditionally unreceptive to more sophisticated projects like marsh restoration and natural management which are essential to long-term hurricane protection.

Global warming is making hurricanes a little or a lot worse than those in the past.

The nation is rapidly bankrupting itself in the Iraq war, at a cost which could have restored the entire state of Louisiana in happier times.

New Orleans is not exhibiting a tough can-do culture. One may appear, or the disaster may be too great for any city. .

New housing built with private dollars will not accept any low-income renters. New houses cannot be built cheap enough for low-income owners.

Whatever new architecture and neighborhoods are built, they will have, at best, an ersatz character like South St Seaport in Manhattan, or Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. They may attempt faux seediness like the House of Blues chain.

If the Mayor can count votes, he will have concluded that there are none down in the flooded areas, all the votes are on high ground.

The Bush administration has neither the money, nor the will, nor the interest really, to back the sort of public-private partnership that will be required to restore infrastructure for two hundred thousand people.

Louisiana has neither the financial nor management resources to run an unprecedented construction project.

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What could be done, given the money and will?

If you accept the list of facts and assumptions above, then a smaller New Orleans could be salvaged with roughly half its former population. The marshes can be partially restored and some levees removed or fortified. Presumably, a tourism economy similar to Las Vegas could support the smaller city. Large tracts could be returned to marsh or lake. The industrial infrastructure at the port and the oil companies can take care of itself. Once long-term physical security is assured, private capital can re-develop salvageable areas. Possibly something more interesting than cheap sprawl could be built, but the record across America indicates otherwise.

Really determined home-owners with no mortgage and construction skills could strip their houses to the frame and rebuild, but a little of that and it becomes clear that it’s easier to demo the old house and start over with a better design. Maybe they’ll change the building code and create a raised indigenous architecture on pilings.

None of this can be done without robust pragmatic leadership of the kind that bailed out New York in its fiscal crisis. The leadership, while politically savvy, must be insulated from everyday politics, and be seen as incorruptible.

What seems impossible?

Re-creating the poor neighborhoods is not possible, and most people wouldn’t even see it as desirable. Private money will not seek out indigent renters or home-buyers, and the public record of low-income housing is not hopeful. Perhaps it doesn’t need to be said that they won’t re-populate areas with indigent residents, especially when so much construction is required in middle-class neighborhoods. Federal support is unlikely to better the tepid response so far, unless there is an impact on the Republican congressional count.

Honeyed talk of multi-culturalism and diversity may be raising unrealistic expectations. It’s just a sop to the poor folks that lost all their possessions, and have been moved somewhere else. Oh there will be museums built for this or that great musician, with much grandstanding and ribbon-cutting. Some construction jobs may benefit a few previously unemployed residents, but I would guess that many of those will be filled by workers from out-of-state.

In then end, after the political waltz, the advocacy, and the dramatic coverage, it comes down to the economy. Cities are the product of their economy. Cities are the ecology which both nutures the economy and is produced by it. The great cultural life of cities always comes in those which have or once had robust economies. If it’s true that there isn’t much beyond the tourist economy in New Orleans, then its hard to see major revival short of a Las Vegas style extravaganza.

What do we Americans owe to our countrymen in New Orleans?

Some of the displaced home owners have some insurance, but I have seen no data on how much. Its a sure bet that virtually none are paying their mortgages or taxes, so their loans will be foreclosed when the moritorium period is over. Without credit they will not be able to borrow and rebuild. Renters also lost all their possessions, and both groups lost their cars, jobs, friends and connections.

Why did they buy or rent in such a fragile place? Well because everybody around them did, and the Corps of Engineers, the building department and the banks said it was proper. No home buyer can be expected to outguess these institutions, so I say they are owed restitution for their mortgages, equity, and personal goods. I believe the federal government owes us all emergency support, and so resettlement, clean-up, social and health services seem completely appropriate for a time. Localities that accept indigent residents deserve federal help, too, though the border states have never gotten help with the immigration problem.

Many newspapers are reporting that ex-residents want “their neighborhoods back” which I interpret to mean, they want to live among the same bonds of family and friends and return to the colorful traditions of music and Mardi Gras, in the same place. Maybe its the shock of the natural and man-made disaster, but even months afterward there seems a lack of understanding that the physical neighborhoods are gone. Maybe there are just a few loud voices, overly represented by the media, ever hungry for conflict. In any case they can’t rebuild without a very large infusion of federal money. Without restitution, the homeowners will lose both equity and credit, turning them into renters. Without a tax base the city can’t provide services.

What do we tell our representatives to do about New Orleans?

Before any federal reconstruction money is spent, the following steps should be required:

The Corps of Engineers and the state agencies have to agree on a long-term delta management plan that includes massive restoration of marshes, and removal of as many levees as possible.

An independent board, as called for in Mayor Nagin’s announcement, has to be created to oversee construction, planning, and expenditure. Something structured roughly like the Port Authority of NY-NJ must have the power of condemnation, and political insulation.

The city of New Orleans and the other governmental units must show at least a plan to reform their police, fire, and maintenance staff.

There must be an understanding that the city will condemn most of the land below sea level, and return it to parks or a naturally flooded state.

There must be a system of flood insurance to protect the rest of us from having to do this all over again when the next hurricane comes.

Some type of restitution must be made for the failure to survive a category three storm and the failure to provide decent emergency services. Unfortunately there is no way to punish the governments at fault, because they will have to provide for the reconstruction, so the lessons will be moral unless voters choose to throw the bums out.

Unfortunately, the people of Louisiana have got to take it or leave it. They haven’t got much leverage.

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What others are saying:

Salon ( second part requires paid subscription, but worth a free look)

The Nation wonders if rebuilding money could go to the people of New Orleans.

The New Yorker on the utter collapse of the Police Department.

Bloomburg reports on Bush’s call for private rebuilding. Much to read between his lines.