The two largest employers in New Orleans are Entergy (the only Fortune 500 company to have it's HQ in New Orleans pre-Katrina) and Tulane University. Entergy New Orleans is in bankruptcy. Tulane University was self-insured and has just announced a restructuring plan that has left students, alumni and former employees reeling. Neither of these companies are expected to receive a cent of federal assistance.
And as you know - the diaspora due to Katrina has flung anywhere from 30-40 percent of the "blue" population of New Orleans to Houston, Atlanta and Dallas mostly. About 10% are in further flung locations such as Utah. ....more on the flip
A recent survey of address change data estimates that about 60% New Orleaneans have either returned to their homes or are temporarily in areas right around their destroyed neighborhoods, but still in the GNO (Greater New Orleans metropolitan area) and poised to leap back to their former neighborhoods once they receive a green light on rebuilding and levee reconstruction.
It is felt that this 60% represents mainly middle to upper income New Orleneans who had the means to return and the means to locate adequate interim housing. http://www.latimes.com/...
Entergy is in the midst of securing lines of credit in order to assist in it's restructuring after being refused assistance by the Bush Administration.
Lawmakers and Entergy officers, as well as I, feel that it's logical and necessary for them to request the same assistance that airlines received Post-9/11. Or at the very least, a fraction of what has gone to KBR and Halliburton for non-existent reconstruction projects on NON-AMERICAN SOIL such as in Iraq.
I can attest that electricity rates have already started going through the roof and without a way to keep rates in check, not only will individuals be unable to afford to live in New Orleans - but what company is going to want to conduct business with soaring energy coasts? Bush's reasoning for denying assistance is that investors, not taxpayers, should shoulder the burden of dealing with the Katrina losses. WHAT business in the Bush worldview doesn't shove off the burden of increased costs off to it's customers?!http://www.nola.com/...
And so please explaint to, why we are rebuilding schools in Iraq and then turning a cold shoulder to schools in our own country? Tulane suffered damage just like everybody else in New Orleans, but it was self-insured for reasons that escape my sense of logic. Tulane is not getting any federal assistance or FEMA flood remediation assistance. Nothing.
Now, yesterday Iraqi voters exiled in the US were offered ample resources to vote here in the US with all sorts of federal assistance to make absentee voting as painless as possible. Let's compare that to the current tug of war on voting in New Orleans
First, FEMA refused to assist the state and city officials with data on displaced citizens, which lead the state and the city to consider running TV and Radio commercials on their own in Houston, Dallas and Atlanta in order to communicate with their citizens
FEMA also promised to pick up the tab on replacing voting machines and repairing polling places in order for elections to proceed as normal. Well, I am sure you can guess how those assurances have gone. http://news.yahoo.com/...
Mayor Nagin (D), who is the most vulnerable with the change in demographics, has pressed for elections to continue despite the setbacks in order to bring a sense of "normalcy". Secretary of State Ater and Governor Blanco - both democrats - both agree that it is not possible to conduct fair elections without proper polling places, destroyed voting machines and with communication lines severed to displaced citizens.
Articles on Iraqi Voters and New Orleans Voters here:
http://abcnews.go.com/...
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/...
http://www.alertnet.org/...
http://www.katc.com/...
What is most hysterical about this is that its LOCAL REPUBLICANS - namely "also ran" Rob Couhig - who have filed a lawsuit about the decision to delay elections. No polling places, no voting machines, no method to include displaced democrats - NO PROBLEM, let's proceed!