Katrina by Gary Rivlin is on Bookshare.
Flanders writes: "It's New Orleans remembrance time; that time where, for
the last ten years at the end of August, public attention returns for a bit
to the city that abandoned its poorest. Poor people clinging to rooftops in
the richest nation on earth: the pictures shocked the world and broke our
hearts."
Protest for affordable housing in New Orleans. (photo: flickr)
New Orleans' Deadly Floodwaters: Now From Gentrification
By Laura Flanders, GRITtv
28 August 15
It's New Orleans remembrance time; that time where, for the last ten years
at the end of August, public attention returns for a bit to the city that
abandoned its poorest. Poor people clinging to rooftops in the richest
nation on earth: the pictures shocked the world and broke our hearts. Mostly
black, in a majority black city, democracy failed as spectacularly as the
public safety system. Not only the levees, but also the social contract was
breached. A decade later, the city's back. The levees are rebuilt, tourism's
thriving and the population's growing, but the social contract lies in
shreds.
Let's remember. Hurricane Katrina didn't destroy New Orleans. The storm's
eye passed to the east. It was the levee breaks that followed that wiped out
entire neighborhoods. Public safety systems that had never served all
residents well, failed the most vulnerable. A million were displaced,
hundreds of thousands lost land and loved-ones.
Ten years on, the Census reports that he region's regained almost 94 of its
pre-storm population. New Orleans is almost 80 percent as big as it was.
More statistical successes are tallied in graduation rates from new private
schools, people housed in new private homes, and patients cured in private
hospitals. A sprawling new University Medical Center was scheduled to open
this month.
But instead of fixing its public accountability problems, the city's farmed
those problems out to private contractors. Got a problem with that private
school or home or hospital? You can protest, but watch out for the cops.
The poor black residents who were losing homes and loved ones ten years ago
are still losing them, now to gentrification. If you are rich, and like your
property prices to rise, it's good news that house prices are up fifty-eight
percent since 2000. An employer? Wages are as low as they get and worker
bargaining power has sunk lower than that. A whiter, wealthier city? You've
got it. Entire neighborhoods have flipped from black to white.
But democracy, the principle that societies are held together by a diverse
fabric, and being a member of one requires looking after one another? While
some communities are still clinging on to their right to have a say in their
city, that principle has long ago been left to drown. Money talks, and it
has flooded everything.
And not just in the Big Easy. What's different about the flood of
gentrification is there seems to be no shock in it. New Orleans's recovery
numbers look a lot like the rest of the nation's. Recovery? Whose recovery?
Whose city? Who's clinging to your rooftops?
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Protest for affordable housing in New Orleans. (photo: flickr)
http://grittv.org/?commentary=new-orleans-deadly-floodwaters-are-now-from-ge
ntrificationhttp://grittv.org/?commentary=new-orleans-deadly-floodwaters-are
-now-from-gentrification
New Orleans' Deadly Floodwaters: Now From Gentrification
By Laura Flanders, GRITtv
28 August 15
t's New Orleans remembrance time; that time where, for the last ten years
at the end of August, public attention returns for a bit to the city that
abandoned its poorest. Poor people clinging to rooftops in the richest
nation on earth: the pictures shocked the world and broke our hearts. Mostly
black, in a majority black city, democracy failed as spectacularly as the
public safety system. Not only the levees, but also the social contract was
breached. A decade later, the city's back. The levees are rebuilt, tourism's
thriving and the population's growing, but the social contract lies in
shreds.
Let's remember. Hurricane Katrina didn't destroy New Orleans. The storm's
eye passed to the east. It was the levee breaks that followed that wiped out
entire neighborhoods. Public safety systems that had never served all
residents well, failed the most vulnerable. A million were displaced,
hundreds of thousands lost land and loved-ones.
Ten years on, the Census reports that he region's regained almost 94 of its
pre-storm population. New Orleans is almost 80 percent as big as it was.
More statistical successes are tallied in graduation rates from new private
schools, people housed in new private homes, and patients cured in private
hospitals. A sprawling new University Medical Center was scheduled to open
this month.
But instead of fixing its public accountability problems, the city's farmed
those problems out to private contractors. Got a problem with that private
school or home or hospital? You can protest, but watch out for the cops.
The poor black residents who were losing homes and loved ones ten years ago
are still losing them, now to gentrification. If you are rich, and like your
property prices to rise, it's good news that house prices are up fifty-eight
percent since 2000. An employer? Wages are as low as they get and worker
bargaining power has sunk lower than that. A whiter, wealthier city? You've
got it. Entire neighborhoods have flipped from black to white.
But democracy, the principle that societies are held together by a diverse
fabric, and being a member of one requires looking after one another? While
some communities are still clinging on to their right to have a say in their
city, that principle has long ago been left to drown. Money talks, and it
has flooded everything.
And not just in the Big Easy. What's different about the flood of
gentrification is there seems to be no shock in it. New Orleans's recovery
numbers look a lot like the rest of the nation's. Recovery? Whose recovery?
Whose city? Who's clinging to your rooftops?
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
