From the Bayou to Baghdad: Mission Accomplished? (by Amy Goodman)

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from Truthdig:


From the Bayou to Baghdad: Mission Accomplished?


Posted on Sep 4, 2007
By Amy Goodman

During the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, several dozen public-housing residents and activists marched to the headquarters of the Housing Authority of New Orleans. The marchers occupied the offices for hours. As the military and police surrounded the building, Sharon Sears Jasper, a displaced resident of the St. Bernard housing project, spoke: “We are not going to stop. We refuse to let you tear our homes down and destroy our lives. The government, the president of the United States, you all have failed us. Our people have been displaced too long. Our people are dying of stress, depression and broken families. We demand that you open all public housing. Bring our families home now.”

In contrast, the day before, I had asked Mayor Ray Nagin if he made any demands of President Bush as they dined together the previous night. Bush had just spoken at a school named for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whose issues of race and poverty are starkly laid bare in New Orleans. Unlike those who had lost their homes, the mayor replied, “It wasn’t a time for demands.”

Tracie Washington is the president of The Louisiana Justice Institute and a lifelong resident of New Orleans. She says only a quarter of the more than 5,000 affordable housing units in New Orleans are filled. “There is a feeling by our government that public housing of old needs to be dismantled, buildings shut. We have litigation going right now to change that, but it’s horribly slow, and it’s tragic.”

She describes the plan by which public housing will be converted to “mixed-income” developments: “Some of these developments that are closed down took in no water. But the decision was made to take advantage of an opportunity. Hurricane Katrina came. ‘Look what we can do. We can keep these people away from here, bring in the bulldozers, tear down this housing.’ ”

It is not just renters. Private housing is being demolished as well. Washington described how the city instituted a stunning policy to allow the legal demolition of homes. Whereas once homeowners would have at least 120 days and several layers of appeals to prevent their homes from being demolished, Nagin instituted an “Imminent Health Threat Demolition” ordinance. He now gives residents only 30 days to stop demolition. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070904_from_the_bayou_to_baghdad_mission_accomplished/