Katrina: The LA Diaspora, Reconstruction, and the Challenges Ahead

It's taken me a while to compose my thoughts from the optional disaster that occurred in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Page after page has been written on racist media portrayals and perceptions, racialized poverty, the systematic undermining of FEMA and Gulf Coast shore protection, and the indifference, incompetence, and malign neglect of state and federal officials, and many more pages will be written on the heavy economic impact, the profiteering of oil and gas companies, and other such things.

So, I realized there were basically two things that have received extremely short shrift in the media -- the destruction in Alabama, and the long-term socioeconomic repercussions of this disaster. Since I am not a reporter, and do not have staff in Alabama, I decided that I would focus on the repercussions. Specifically, I'd like to address the futures of the people displaced by the flooding, and the imperatives that will be faced if redevelopment is to be just.

By now, we are hearing reports that much of the French Quarter in New Orleans was relatively unscathed, compared to the rest of the city, which should be welcome news to some as they contemplate what the new New Orleans will look like. Naturally, some see the coming razing of 82% of New Orleans as an incredible opportunity to remake the city in the way that it should be. And it is. However, in whose interests will this redevelopment take place? In all likelihood, the tendency and desire will be to create a somewhat smaller, Disney-fied version of the city that people 'round the world love.

But where does that leave the former residents? Surely they won't be able to afford the condominiums and other types of premium housing that the coming resort town will be putting its heavy emphasis upon building. Will that 27% of New Orleans residents who lived below the poverty line have a place in the new New Orleans? Or will Louisiana and its Chamber of Commerce seize the opportunity of having benignly murdered thousands of poor black people and kicked out others, to turn the Big Easy into a citadel for the wealthy and privileged?

Over a quarter million refugees have flooded into Baton Rouge, and over 100,000 more are currently being spread across the 48 states from Massachusetts to Texas to California. What will be their fate?

Honestly, there are at least three types of evacuees. The first, college-educated, wealthy people with flood insurance, who escaped days before the disaster took hold, certainly have rough times ahead of them, but ultimately can temp in the places they are and return to the city to start anew. In the long term they will be OK.

Then you have a certain class of people, college or high-school educated, who have stable job histories but little money and no insurance, and may find it easier to start new lives where they have been relocated. In the short term, they will need assistance, but eventually they will get back on their feet. However, when the waters are gone, the decrepit structures bulldozed, and the plans for a new city begin to take shape, will their voice be heard? Surely many will desire to return. The leaders of their community, and national leaders, have to assure that they are not priced out of the new vision for the city.

Finally, there is the underclass. What becomes of people who have no safety net? How will they cope? Can the cities they have been evacuated to cope with their needs? Already Dallas and Houston are calling them a burden. To be sure, New Orleans had for years done a piss-poor job caring for this segment of the population -- bad schools, brutal police, scarce hospitals. The challenge as the city is rebuilt is how to build a community that is committed to the least of us. Rebuilding has to be just. It's not all right to consign the poor of New Orleans to permanent exile, which is undoubtedly a temptation of city planners, state officials, and, to be frank, racists who would rather be rid of the "problem."

When NOLA is rebuilt, who will it be rebuilt for? The rich? The upwardly mobile? Will there be affordable housing? The real concern for advocates as the aftermath of the Optional Disaster occurs is whether there will be a place for 100,000 people who will return to the Crescent City to bury their dead and rebuild their lives. Capitalists may see this as an opportunity to make quite a few dollars. But the progressives and socialists among us must articulate an alternative vision -- that the Paris of the South can be rebuilt not just as a resort, not just as a home for the rich, but as a place that casts off the entrenched poverty and misery of the old New Orleans, and builds a new New Orleans that cares for and provides opportunity for ALL the people who lived there before the flood.