From the Times-Picayune and other sources:
Increasingly frustrated by a lack of solid federal commitment to a world-class levee system, two New Orleanians displaced to Pittsburgh have organized a protest rally this week at the White House in Washington, D.C.
Judith Kaufman and Shawna Doremus said they are planning the rally to keep the city's plight and its need for better levees prominent on the national stage.
"When you're outside of New Orleans, you see how easily people forget," Kaufman said. "When I first got here, everybody was talking about it. . . . Now, its just the perfunctory, 'How's your house?' But it's not about my house. It's about my ability to live there, make an income and send my kids to college. It's so much larger than that."
Without strong levees, no rebuilding will begin, she said.
"I have people telling me, 'I'll give it a year, but if they don't build levees . . .' " Kaufman said. "What prompted me to do this is talking to my friends in New Orleans. Everybody's depressed down there; you can hear the despair in their voice."
The rally will start Wednesday, December 14th, at 12 p.m. in Lafayette Park in front of the White House. To sign up to participate, call Kaufman at (504) 616-4617 or Doremus at (504) 430-7709 or visit the group's Web site.
And from This Modern World:
The goal: to remind the nation's leaders that the New Orleans diaspora is still out there, and that its members want the levees to be rebuilt so they can return home and reconstruct their lives without fear of another flood.
U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., has thrown her support behind the rally and helped the women select the optimum date. Their permit for the rally was finalized Wednesday.
Sen. Landrieu has threatened to keep the Senate in session until it approves a $35.4 billion relief package that would fortify the city against a Category 5 storm, rather than Category 3 as proposed by the Bush administration.
The two local organizers also are reaching out to the entire congressional delegation from Louisiana, and e-mailing everyone they can think of to spread the word about rallying at Lafayette Park, across from the White House, from 12 noon to 2 pm. Sen. Landrieu tentatively scheduled to speak at 1 pm.