Kathryn Cramer has been all over the Katrina story with NOLA disaster, tracking water levels in specific parts of the city using satellite photos and other amazing feats of technology.
In doing so much work with individuals locating their homes, she has made some compelling observations:
The question is this: How much of New Orleans does FEMA plan to restore, and how much does it plan to simply replace? And if the houses are replaced with something else, are they to be replaced for their original owners? Or will the land be taken by eminent domain and redistributed?
Although she has found some vague information on the FEMA timeline for general “debris removal”:
[i]t’s not clear to me whether this time-line applies (or even could be applied) to the cleanup of New Orleans. But now that Michael Brown is out of the way, presumably some plan for the future of New Orleans is coming together.
Whole neighborhoods will need to be torn down entirely. We know this. It’s obvious from up there in orbit where Digital Globes satellites live. But how many neighborhoods? And who will decide? Will FEMA tell you in advance if your house is to be razed, or only after the fact? FEMA needs to make its plans public as soon as possible.
…before the real looting begins. Bureaucratic looting of people’s lives, property, and wealth.
Read the rest and tour her amazing research abilities in the Katrina archives.
The disaster has raised many questions all over the political landscape. The bloggers at Whirled View have also come up with many strong observations about the efficiency of the government response and what this means in the future.
Living Below Water: The history of a sinking city.
Yeah, There’s Going To Be More: When a city that was built on a landfill is flooded.
Plenty of Troops?: “Sows ears cannot be turned into silk purses indefinitely.”
Preparedness: Why we have to anticipate disasters ahead of time. (We might even have to use thing handy little thing called science.)