da po' blog

See You There!

2007-08-10T14:26:00.000-05:00

At Rising Tide 2.

But I won't see you here at da po' blog. I am not posting here anymore. I am posting under my name on another blog, which shouldn't be too hard to find.

Thanks for reading. Later, da po' boy.

111 Human Beings

2007-08-02T22:39:00.000-05:00

As of August 1, 2007, there have been 111 murders in New Orleans this year. With 212 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of one murder every 1.909 days – basically, a murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 191 murders. In a city of 300,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 63 murders per 100,000 residents.

If nothing changes, 80 more human beings will die a violent death on the streets of New Orleans this year. And most of those who die will be African-American men, often young, and almost always they will be shot.

The Times-Picayune has a blog with a map of all the murders and information about all 111 deaths, including victim names and details about the status of the murder investigations. This is the way it should be done.

Along with citizencrimewatch.org, we are well served on the mapping front.

St. Anna's Episcopal Church is recording the murders of 2007 on a board outside of the church. From the T-P article:

The Rev. Bill Terry, the pony-tailed pastor at St. Anna's Episcopal Church, updates The List each Monday afternoon with a black permanent marker: date, name, age, gender, manner of death (shot/beaten/stabbed).

***

He and Elaine Clemments, a deacon in training, sought to both funnel their outrage and honor victims. When a victim becomes a statistic, people have a tendency to look at the victim and make a value judgment: He's a criminal, he probably deserved it. To Terry, it makes no difference.

"It's a human being someone loved," he said, sitting in the rectory hall, clutching a cup of coffee.

Human beings someone loved.

January – 17 human beings someone loved murdered

February – 13 human beings someone loved murdered

March – 18 human beings someone loved murdered

April – 14 human beings someone loved murdered

May – 15 human beings someone loved murdered

June – 19 human beings someone loved murdered

July – 14 human beings someone loved murdered

07/01/07 – 2 murders

98) A 26-year-old man was gunned down in the 1500 block of North Johnson Street early Sunday and a man was arrested in connection with the slaying later that same morning.

***

According to investigators, First District Officers responding to a call found the victim lying in the driver's seat of a vehicle, suffering from an apparent gunshot wound to head. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

99) The most recent crime related death took place just around 9 p.m. in Orleans Parish in the 1800 block of St. Roch.
Police said they found the body of a 65-year-old man in the side alley of an abandoned warehouse. He had a gunshot wound to the head.

07/05/07 – 1 murder

100) An autopsy determined Jerome Banks, 27, of New Orleans was killed by a shotgun blast to the chest, said chief cororner's investigator John Gagliano, who released his identity.
About 6:55 a.m., police responded to a call found Banks lying in high grass in the driveway of a vacant house in the 6000 block of Beechcraft Street, said Garry Flot, a public information officer for the New Orleans police.
He said police found evidence that Banks was shot nearby in the 4500 block of Skyview.

07/13/07 – 1 murder

101) One man was killed and two others wounded, but a baby narrowly escaped injury Friday evening, when gunshots from a passing vehicle were fired at a parked van in Central City, New Orleans police said.
None of the victims was identified by police. One died at a local hospital, where he was taken shortly after the shooting. He had been with at least three other people in a parked van, the apparent target of a drive-by shooting at about 8:35 p.m., police said.

07/14/07 – 1 murder

102) An 18-year-old man who was shot and killed in Central City on Saturday has been identified as Keith Paige of New Orleans, the Orleans Parish coroner's office said.
Paige was shot Saturday about 5 p.m. at Freret and Third streets, New Orleans police said. He died the same day at 7:55 p.m. at University Hospital.
An autopsy showed he died of multiple gunshot wounds…

07/18/07 – 2 murders

103) A 33-year-old man was shot in Eastern New Orleans at about 12:30 a.m. on Michoud Boulevard near Adventure Avenue, New Orleans police said.
The name of the victim is being withheld pending notification of family members.
According to investigators, Seventh District officers responded to a call of a "male shot" and, upon their arrival, found the victim lying in the street with multiple gunshot wounds to his body next to a vehicle. Emergency medical technicians were summoned to the scene, where he was pronounced dead.

104) Paul Burks, 24, of New Orleans was shot about 10:30 p.m. in the 2100 block of Annunciation Street, between Jackson Avenue and Josephine Street. A private citizen drove Burks to Touro Infirmary, where he died Thursday at 1:24 a.m.
An autopsy showed Burks suffered one gunshot wound to the back, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano.

07/21/07 – 1 murder

105) The New Orleans Police Department is investigating the shooting death around 9:30 a.m., Saturday, of a 54-year-old man near the corner of Jackson Avenue and Baronne Street in Central City.
Police did not immediately have any motive or suspects in the shooting at a car wash at 2139 Baronne St., police spokeswoman Sabrina Richardson said. The coroner's office did not immediately identify the victim.
Richardson said officers responded around 9:30 a.m. to a report of shots fired. They found the victim dead at the scene of a gun shot to the head.

07/22/07 – 2 murders

106) A 26-year-old man was shot and killed about 1:30 a.m. Sunday at the intersection of Eagle and Spruce streets, the New Orleans Police Department said.
Dallas Jerome suffered multiple gunshot wounds to the torso and a fatal shot to the head. He was pronounced dead at the scene, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano.

107) A New Orleans teenager was found shot to death and another one wounded in an Algiers neighborhood Sunday night.
New Orleans police continued the search for a motive and suspects Monday after James Johnson, 19, was found dead and an 18-year-old wounded.
New Orleans police officers responded to a call Sunday shortly after 8:30 p.m. reporting a man lying near the street at 3537 Timber Wolf Lane. They and found the older victim with a gunshot wounds, including one to the head, officer Sabrina Richardson said. He was taken to University Hospital, where he died, said John Gagliano, spokesman for the New Orleans coroner's office.

07/26/07 – 1 murder

108) New Orleans police are looking for the gunman in an early-morning carjacking that left one man dead Thursday.
A friend said he'd rented his Panola Street pool house to 49-year-old Anthony White, who became the 108th homicide victim in New Orleans this year.
White was a contractor for Jacobs Engineering out of Baton Rouge, Brad Robinson said. He was shot and killed at about 3 a.m.
"It was a carjacking, and it could've happened to you -- it could've happened to anybody watching this broadcast. The guy was in the wrong place at the wrong time," Robinson said.
White's blue 2002 Jeep Liberty was taken.

07/28/07 – 1 murder

109) A man was fatally shot Saturday night in the Zion City neighborhood, New Orleans police said.
The unidentified man was found dead in the Palmetto Canal along the 4100 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard shortly before 9 p.m.
The man died on the paved area inside the canal, not in the water. He appeared to have multiple gunshot wounds, said Sgt. Joe Narcisse, a police public information officer.

07/30/07 – 1 murder

110) Police received a report of gunshots around 7 a.m. in the 1400 block of Bienville Street, according to New Orleans Police Department officer Garry Flot. When police arrived, they found a man lying face down on the ground. He had been shot several times, Flot said.
The victim was identified by the Orleans Parish coroner's office as 24-year-old John W. Barrow III. Barrow was living in Baton Rouge, but had recently returned to New Orleans, said John Gagliano, chief investigator for the office.
Barrow was gunned down in a patch of well-grown grass, under the shade of a tree that reached to the top of the development's three-story buildings.

.
07/31/07 – 1 murder

111) One man is dead and another is hospitalized in stable condition after an early morning shooting Tuesday in the 9th Ward.
Shortly before 1 a.m., 5th District police responded to a call of "male down" near the corner of Marais and Pauline streets near the Industrial Canal, officer Sabrina Richardson said.
Officers found one man with a gunshot wound in his chest and another with a gunshot wound in his buttocks, according to police.
John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish coroner's office, identified the man with the chest wound as Kevin Underwood, 22. Underwood died at University Hospital, Gagliano said.

What's Matt at Fix the Pumps Going to Do Now?

2007-07-04T10:56:00.000-05:00

He said good bye on his blog. I have a suggestion for his next challenge:

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
Vacancy Announcement Number: SWGY07068166D

Changes to the Job Announcement: Must Possess a Professional Engineering Registration
Opening Date: June 29, 2007 Closing Date: July 13, 2007
Position: Supervisory General Engineer, YF-0801-2
Salary: $56,301 - $107,991 Annual
Place of Work: Hurricane Protection Office, Executive Support Division, Technical Support Branch, New Orleans, LA
Position Status: Temporary Position Not to Exceed: 3 YRS -- Full Time
Number of Vacancy: 1

Just kidding.

I nominate Fix the Pumps as the first inductee into the NOLA Bloggers Hall of Fame.

Thanks, Matt.

You Attack Jesus. You Attack America.

2007-07-04T01:26:00.000-05:00

Slidell Mayor Ben Morris, with my emphasis:

"Our money has God's name on it. The Pledge of Allegiance has God's name on it. Congress opens up with a prayer. And they run around like chickens with their heads cut off, that this is fostering religion. I don't think it fosters anything. I don't think that's what the Founding Fathers had in mind," Mayor Ben Morris said. [LINK]

Slidell Mayor Ben Morris says the city will fight the ACLU. " Guess again boys, You're in for a fight. As diverse we are, Slidell is an All American city. We will not cut and run. File you damn lawsuit.' said Morris. [LINK]

"I fight daily with FEMA for the recovery of our city, and now we must fight these tyrants, this American Taliban, who seek to destroy our culture and our heritage," Morris said. [LINK]

Because Ben Morris, the Mayor of Slidell, the executive of the city, equates Christian heritage with American heritage and the heritage of Slidell, and says so publicly and vociferously, one may conclude that to attack Jesus is to attack the City of Slidell, an “All American City.” Extending the analogy, one may conclude that the mayor of Slidell is saying to attack Jesus is to attack America.

If this is not the establishment of a religion by government, or at least the preference of one religion, I don’t know what is.

City Court Judge Jim Lamz knows better. His statements, and those of representatives from his court, minimize the role religion plays in the their desire to keep Slidell Jesus up:

"Due to the display's historical place in the courthouse, I explored options to obtain a definitive ruling on the constitutionality of the display without an adversarial court battle," he said. "I could find none." [LINK]

"It's more than just a picture of Jesus," [court spokeswoman Ann] Barks said. "It might have more to do with the business of the court than purely religious reasons." [LINK]

"The ideas expressed in this painting aren't specific to any one faith, and they certainly don't establish a single state religion," he [Mike Johnson, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund] said. "The reason Americans enjoy equal justice is because we are all created equal, endowed by (our) Creator with certain unalienable rights. This painting is a clear reflection of the ideas in the Declaration of Independence." [LINK]

What we have here are two contradictory reasons for Slidell Jesus to stay up: It should stay up because it is not religious; it should stay up because it is religious.

The “not religious” reason is held by those tasked with defending Slidell Jesus in court. If Slidell Jesus is not religious, but historical, then it does not violate the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment and may remain exhibited in the lobby of the Slidell City Court.

The “religious” reason is held by Mayor Ben Morris, speaking for Joe and Jane Slidell. He equates (or conflates) his Christian heritage with Slidell’s heritage, even extending it to represent America’s heritage. To him, putting up a picture of Jesus is like putting up an American flag – not in a historical sense, but in a truly patriotic sense. He is saying that America’s history *is* religious, specifically Christian, and that’s why Slidell Jesus should stay up.

Joe and Jane Slidell are the crux of this decision. We know what the politicians and the ACLU think. We’ve seen the press conferences. But, what does the average person think when they walk into Slidell City Court and look up at Slidell Jesus?

It is safe to assume that the people who want the picture to come down look up and see a religious image. That’s why they want it to come down.

And, after reading about the protest rally last week, I think it is safe to assume that the people who want the picture to stay also look up and see a religious image:

"You know, (the ACLU) is picking on a small community," said Randy Lee, 60, of Slidell. A self-described Christian fundamentalist, he gripped a hand-lettered sign that read "In God We Trust."

"Christians are seen as very passive. It's time for Christian people to stand up and say, 'Hey!'"

The rally lasted about an hour and was peppered with prayer and shouts of "Hallelujah!" and "Praise Jesus!" Toward the end of her speech, the Rev. Kathleen Javery-Bacon, of the Holy Ghost and Fire Revival Ministries in Slidell, raised her arm to the sky while chanting, "Jesus! Jesus! Jesus" as the crowd echoed her cry.

So, pretty much everyone looks up and sees a religious image. But what about the message? The words written in Cyrillic… are they a universal message about judging wisely as a city court certainly should?

Who cares. I can’t read Cyrillic. Can you? If you can, that's actually pretty cool. I'm sure it is a useful skill.

But if you are not there to translate for the average Slidellian, he or she will look up and see a picture of Jesus holding a book. Mostly likely, he or she will assume that book is the Bible. Then, under the Bible-wielding Jesus, he or she will read, “TO KNOW PEACE, OBEY THESE LAWS,” and can only conclude that “these laws” refer to the Bible.

And Ben Morris is okay with that.

I like to think the Constitution isn’t.

One more thing. For those who can read Cyrillic, they know that the phrases in Slidell Jesus’ book are Gospel verses:

According to the court's research, one quotation is from John 7:24. In the King James version of the Bible, it reads: "Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment."

The second quotation is from Matthew 7:2: "For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again."

Sure, they talk about judgment. But, knowing a little bit about Christianity, that word “judgment” isn't talking about whether or not you go to jail, but whether or not you go to heaven - or go to hell like me.

Happy 4th!

There Was No Downtick

2007-07-03T22:33:00.000-05:00

Part of the reason I started keeping track of media reports of murders in New Orleans was because I saw varying numbers of how many people were murdered. And, when the numbers didn’t vary, the explanations for them did. So, I wanted my own information to make my own conclusions.

I have posted my numbers throughout the year on this blog. It appears I missed two, possibly three murders.

The T-P says this murder was the number 100. I had it as 97. I went back and found a murder I missed, as well as a hit and run fatality that I did not include, though I should have because that is a murder. New Orleans Citizen Crime Watch had both.

I can not find a third murder that I missed. It is probably out there, or the T-P may be including a murder that the coroner concluded happened in 2006, but the victim was found in 2007. I count it in the 2006 stats. The NOPD has counted it both ways, as a 2007 murder and a 2006 murder.

Either way, whether a third uncounted murder exists or not, my numbers in this post for the 2nd quarter of 2007 are wrong. At least 2 should be added to the total.

This means, unfortunately, there was no downtick:

Jul-Aug-Sep 2006 – 53 murders
Oct-Nov-Dec 2006 – 52 murders
Jan-Feb-Mar 2007 – 48 murders
Apr-May-Jun 2007 – 49 murders (possibly one more)

I would also like to highlight some great keeping-it-in-perspective comments made by MAD in the previous post:

With the metropolitan population now at 91% of the pre-K level, use of the 260,000 Orleans Parish population estimates to calculate Orleans murder rates creates a statistical anomaly. While any murder is one too many, of course, we are not really a far more violent city than we were before the storm, as the raw data otherwise suggests. The high murder rate in N.O. murder is in part a function of the artificial setting of narrow parish boundaries, a constraint that many other cities do not share. Draw the parish boundaries for Orleans around Central City, and you will see rates that rival Baghdad, while the rest of Orleans magically becomes "safer".

I agree.

I responded by saying the point of my post is not to judge the relative safety of any given person in New Orleans, but rather to point out that “statistic anomaly” and use it to judge the effectiveness of the New Orleans criminal justice system. They know where the “Baghdads” of New Orleans are, yet are either powerless, incompetent, or uncaring enough to stop the murders there.

MAD made another good point to keep in mind while comparing New Orleans to other cities:

The problem is with publications like the TP boldly declaring to the country that we are once again the "murder capital". We all know what that does to our ability to successfuly rebuild. I am not at all suggesting that we gloss over our problems with violent crime, but if per capita comparative analyses is the standard for informing public perception as to which cities are safe and which are not, then let's compare apples and apples. If 100,000 or so Orleans Parish residents still reside in the area and continue to interact with the city for job and other purposes, but now live just outside of the parish boundaries, then let's factor that into the determination as to the city's per capita murder rate.
Utilization of per capita measurements is valid only if all cities are measured by the same or comparable objective standards, but random and arbitrary political boundary determinations make that difficult and wholly unreliable. A better approach would be to compare murder rates among the nation's SMSAs.

I would still say that the murder rate for New Orleans lets us judge the effectiveness of the New Orleans criminal justice system. For murder rates, the parish boundaries are in no way artificial. Something is going on in New Orleans that is not happening in Jefferson, which is right next door and for a long time had two times the population after the storm.

But the local murder rate does not give an accurate assessment of the safety of the region.

A Downtick of Upticks

2007-07-01T01:16:00.000-05:00

[EDIT # 2 - 07/03/07] The T-P says this murder was number 100. My count put it at 97. I found one murder I missed, and maybe they are counting this hit and run, which would be a murder. Possibly, there is one other murder I missed, or they are including a murder which the coroner says happened in 2006, but the victim was found in 2007. I count that murder in the 2006 stats. The NOPD has counted it both ways.

The beating I missed and the hit and run add two to all my numbers in the 2nd quarter of 2007. This means, unfortunately, that there was no downtick.

[EDIT] So, overnight there were two more murders yesterday and one early this morning. That changes all the numbers I had when I wrote this at 1 a.m. The edits are in brackets.

As of July 1, 2007, there have been 93 [95] murders in New Orleans this year (by my count). With 181 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of one murder every ~~1.94~~ [1.90] days – basically, a murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with ~~187~~ [191] murders. In a city of 262,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 71 [72.9] murders per 100,000 residents.

If nothing changes, 94 [96] more human beings will die a violent death on the streets of New Orleans this year. And most of those who die will be African-American men, often young, and almost always they will be shot.

From July 1, 2006, to July 1, 2007, there have been ~~198~~ [200] murders in New Orleans. Using an average of the population estimates over that time period (223,000 in July 2006; 262,000 in May 2007; the average is 242,500), New Orleans has a murder rate of ~~81.6~~ [82.4] murders per 100,000 residents over the past 365-day period.

As a point of reference, the next highest murder rate in the country in 2006 was Gary, IN, (pop. 97,715) with a murder rate of 48.3 murders per 100,000 residents. And the next highest city with a similar population was Birmingham, AL, (pop. 229,424) in fifth place with a murder rate of 44.5. I am not sure what their murder rates are over the last year.

However, there has been a “downtick” (as Mayor Nagin might say) in this last quarter (April, May, and June) with 45 [47] murders:

Jul-Aug-Sep 2006 – 53 murders
Oct-Nov-Dec 2006 – 52 murders
Jan-Feb-Mar 2007 – 48 murders
Apr-May-Jun 2007 – 45 [47] murders

In fact, each quarter has seen fewer murders than the one before it. Let's hope that's a trend, not a blip.

Of course, though I throw out all these numbers, it is not the numbers who die. It is not the numbers we mourn. Family and friends don’t lose numbers.

We lose people.

17 people in January.

13 people in February.

18 people in March.

14 people in April.

15 people in May.

16 [18] people in June.

06/02/07 – 1 murder

78) The woman, Tammie Johnson, 36, of New Orleans, died of a shotgun blast to the chest, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said.

On Saturday shortly before 8:30 p.m., police were called to a house in the 4800 block of Rosalia Drive and found Johnson on the floor.

06/03/07 – 1 murder

79) Larry Hawkins, 26, of New Orleans, was found shot dead shortly after 7 a.m. in an alley in the 1300 block of Bartholomew Street.

He suffered two gunshot wounds to the face, Gagliano said.

06/04/07 – 2 murders

80) Earlier Monday, Terrell Ceazer, 25, of New Orleans, was fatally shot in Treme.

***

He died Monday shortly after 4 a.m. at University Hospital, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano, who released his identity.

An autopsy showed he died of multiple gunshot wounds.

81) Police said a man was shot to death by his wife Monday evening in the Central City neighborhood, the fourth slaying in New Orleans in three days and the second Monday, police said.

The Orleans Parish coroner's office identified the dead man as George Hammond, 45, of New Orleans.

Police said his wife, Janet Hammond, was a suspect.

Police responded to a call about gunshots in the 1800 block of Second Street shortly before 7:30 p.m., and found George Hammond inside a blue shotgun double, Sabrine Richardson, a police public information officer said.

06/05/07 – 1 murder

82) The Orleans Parish coroner's office has released the identity of a 19-year-old man who was gunned down Tuesday night in Central City.

Someone used an AK-47 assault rifle to shoot Persale R. Green shortly before 10 p.m., New Orleans police said.

Green, of New Orleans, was found face down on a sidewalk in the 1600 block of Baronne Street, midway between Terpsichore and Euterpe streets.

An autopsy showed Green was shot several times, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano, who released his identity.

06/09/07 – 2 murders

83) The first shooting occurred about 9:40 p.m. on a sidewalk in the 3400 block of Touro Street, between Pleasure and Lafreniere streets. An 18-year-old man died at the scene, in the area of Interstate 610 and Elysian Fields Avenue.

84) About 45 minutes later, the second shooting took place at Marais and Spain streets, in the St. Roch neighborhood. A 27-year-old man was found dead in the street. He suffered multiple shots to the body, police said.

06/10/07 – 1 murder

85) Samuel Gonzales, 26, of Guatemala, was killed Sunday about 2 a.m. in the 4200 block of Clara Street in the general area of Napoleon and South Claiborne avenues.

Gonzales was found after shots were heard. Police said he was a local resident, but he was from Guatemala, said Gagliano, who released his identity.

06/11/07 – 2 murders

86) A 19-year-old New Orleans man was fatally shot Monday afternoon in his car on a Central City street, dying about three hours later after driving himself to the hospital, police and the coroner's office said.

Darryl Williams was pronounced dead at Touro Infirmary at 3:50 p.m., said John Gagliano, spokesman for the Orleans Parish Coroner's Office.

87) Robin Malta, 43, was found dead in his house at 634 Port St. between Chartres and Royal streets when his sister went to check on him, Gagliano said.

He said the exact cause of death was not known, but the case was being treated as a homicide Monday night.

06/17/07 – 3 murders

88) In a third, unrelated case, the coroner's office Friday identified a man shot to death early Sunday in the Lower 9th Ward as Jason Wynne, 21, who lived in St. Bernard Parish but was originally from Georgia, said John Gagliano, chief investigator of the coroner's office.

Wynne was found in the middle of Gordon and Urquhart streets by 5th District officers responding to a report of shots being fired in the area shortly before 4 a.m., New Orleans police said.

89) Jerrell Jackson, 21, was shot Sunday about 6:30 p.m. in Central City in the 2200 block of Josephine Street, between Simon Bolivar Avenue and South Liberty Street. He was pronounced dead at 7:25 a.m. at University Hospital.

90) In a second fatal shooting on Sunday, the coroner's office has identified the victim as Christopher Roberts, 33, of New Orleans. Police officials didn't provide any information about that killing, which occurred in the 1900 block of Esplanade Avenue.

06/22/07 – 1 murder

91) A 22-year-old man was fatally shot early this morning in eastern New Orleans, police said.

Officers responding to an emergency call found the man laying in the street around 4 a.m. in the 7800 block of Star Street, New Orleans Police said in a news release. The man, whose identity was not released, had been shot several times.

***

The man killed in Little Woods was identified as Samuel Williams Jr. He had gunshot wounds to the back and head, police spokeswoman Officer Jonette Williams said.

06/29/07 – 1 murder

92) A 19-year-old New Orleans man was shot to death Friday on an Annunciation Street sidewalk in a neighborhood of mixed-income homes where the St. Thomas public housing complex was located, police said.

The man was identified as Jeremy Tillman of New Orleans. He was shot several times and died at the scene, police said. One bullet appeared to have entered his side near his heart, officers said.

06/30/07 – 1 [3] murder[s]

93) The murder took place shortly after 1 p.m. at the intersection of Higgins Street and Press Drive, according to Officer Jonette Williams, an NOPD spokesperson.

Fifth District Officers found the victim lying in the driveway of a home with a gunshot wound to the head, Williams said. She was pronounced dead at the scene.

Investigators have not identified the victim, but said she did have a tattoo on her right forearm that said “Jennifer.”

[ADDED]

94) The first of those slayings occurred shortly after 10 p.m. when New Orleans police officers found a 33-year-old New Orleans man dead on the porch of a residence at 1440 Annette Street. The victim, whose name is being withheld pending notification of family, suffered stab wounds to the neck.

[ADDED]

95) The second incident occurred shortly after 11 p.m. when a 33-year-old man died from several gunshot wounds to his body, said Officer Jonette Williams, police spokeswoman.
Fifth District officers responded to a call of gunfire at 3023 Republic St. and found the victim lying on the porch with gunshot wounds to the torso.

I mentioned Jerrell Jackson in a previous post. Law enforcers suspect Jeremy Tillman lived a similarly full thug life:

Police said they have no suspect, although officers speculated that revenge might have fueled the killing.

Detectives were recently investigating Tillman's possible involvement in a fatal shooting about three weeks ago in Central City, officers said, though there was insufficient evidence to arrest him.

Tillman was a "701 release" in February at Orleans Parish Criminal District Court, when the district attorney's office failed to present to a magistrate within 60 days enough evidence to detain him further on charges of possession of crack cocaine and resisting arrest, according to court records.

I do not see the justice in street justice. When Thug #1 murders someone and gets away with it, there is a murderer on the streets. When Thug #2 comes and kills Thug #1 and gets away with it, one murderer is off the streets. But we have gained another murderer, and we are back where we started. Actually, we never went anywhere.

In fact, we seem to be going backwards:

Orleans Parish prosecutors on Friday dropped all charges against the teenager accused of murdering the drummer for the Hot 8 Brass Band in December, saying their key witness, a 15-year-old girl, refuses to testify.

David Bonds, 18, was charged with the second-degree murder of Dinerral Shavers, 25, a band teacher at Rabouin High School and a Hot 8 Brass Band member who was shot in the head while he drove his wife and two children along the 2200 block of Dumaine Street on the evening of Dec. 28.

***

Prosecutors said they have been unable even to serve a subpoena to the state's witness, whose mother refuses to let her daughter cooperate.

"She will never allow her daughter to testify," said Anthony Satcher, a homicide investigator for the district attorney's office, on the witness stand Friday. "She said she'd rather be in jail."

Our community is not only afraid of the murderer on the streets, but also by the murderer behind bars. Thus, the community is held captive while the criminals are set free.

Just Felt Like I Needed to Link to This

2007-06-28T23:25:00.001-05:00

From The Elements of Style:

Omit needless words.

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

Thank you, Mr. McGannon.

A is for Audrey

2007-06-27T17:37:00.000-05:00

The 1957 Atlantic hurricane season didn't have to wait until the letter "K" to be a disaster:

Wednesday is the 50th anniversary of hurricane Audrey, a storm that tore apart Cameron parish. Up until hurricane Katrina, it was Louisiana's most notorious hurricane. Survivors of that storm will gather at the Cameron parish courthouse for a memorial Wednesday. We caught up with a Cameron parish man who was the only member of his family to survive.

"They had weathered hurricanes prior to '57, and what they did not understand was the surge. You see the surge is what killed the 500 plus or whatever people."

It just takes one hurricane. And it could be the first one.

A Picture I Would Like to See in the Slidell City Court

2007-06-26T20:04:00.000-05:00

Actually, though I am a non-believer, religious iconography fascinates me. I struggled to find the exact image of the Slidell Jesus online - the position of his hand was different in the Slidell picture than any others I saw, or the book was closed, or there was no book. Finally, I found the icon for sale on this site, which has a description:

Christ is blessing with His right hand, His fingers formed into the shape of the Greek letters "IC XC", the Greek abbreviation for "Jesus Christ". His blessing hand is turned inward as if to remind us that He is the Great Blessing, granting us an opportunity to repent and inherit eternal life. He is holding a Book of the Gospels in His left arm. It is opened to the passages reading "Judge not according to the appearance, but judge with righteous judgement. (John 7:24) For with what judgement you judge, you shall be judged." (Matthew 7:2)

Christ is traditionally shown with a short beard and long dark hair parted in the middle. His expression is serious, but not without mercy. Christ's outer robe is blue, to symbolize His humanity which he put on in His Incarnation, and His inner robe is red, to represent His divinity that He always was in eternity.

Christ Our God is the Saviour of all men who would be saved and who acknowledge their sinfulness, their need to be saved in truth by their own cooperation, and thus truly repent "for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!"

I hear there is a rally tonight on the the Slidell City Court steps. If you are a high school student in attendence, be careful what you say.

Scary

2007-06-24T10:56:00.000-05:00

The T-P profiled the Guardian Angels in today’s paper. But that’s not the scary part.

This is:

"Criminals are cowards. They strike where it is easy," Landry said. "Criminals are going to move on if they see the Guardian Angels."

That conviction, however, is not universal. The Rev. Tony Talavera, proprietor of the French Quarter Wedding Chapel, called the Angels earlier this year, asking them to set up shop in the French Quarter. But after meeting them, Talavera changed his mind.

"They won't be effective," he said. "They are wasting their resources here. They aren't even armed. The criminals here are going to laugh at them, then rob them."

Talavera is trying to garner attention and support for a new initiative. He wants Blackhawk Protection Service, a Metairie company that employs lethally armed guards, some recently returned from stints in Iraq, to patrol the Quarter.

I missed this WDSU report, and the excellent point made at the end, which was filed in April:

The company, Talavera said, would be Blackhawk Protection Service. Its employees carry guns and are authorized to hold crime suspects until police arrive.

Blackhawk's plan involves a dozen two-man teams patrolling 24 hours a day.

Talavera said the added protection would combat graffiti, car break-ins, robberies and muggings.

Although Blackhawk said 38 businesses and 15 residents have already signed up, Marianne Lewis said she hasn't joined -- and that no one in the French Quarter should have to foot the bill for added safety.

"We've been paying taxes, and part of that is police protection. To put an additional financial burden on small business owners that they have to come up with any fee per month to keep our employees safe and visitors safe -- that's ridiculous," Lewis said.

These guys aren’t police. Their mission is “to provide physical and tactical security services to our clients with integrity, confidentiality and professionalism.” To their *clients.* Not the people.

Local law enforcement, particularly JPSO, is already starting to look like a paramilitary force. The last thing we need is an actual paramilitary force patrolling the streets.

I am sorry that some French Quarter residents feel the police aren't effective. But, they need to focus on *making* the police effective. If neighborhoods resort to buying their safety, then only the neighborhoods that could afford it would have it.

Also, as a point of reference, there has not been a murder this year in the French Quarter as of today. In fact, the French Quarter has been a murder-free island surrounded by a sea of death. I know this doesn't mean that the French Quarter has been free of all crime. But it has been free of the most violent kind.

“We’re Not Going to Take It Down Until We Get a Legal Opinion”

2007-06-23T00:52:00.000-05:00

Judge Jim Lamz, Slidell City Court, on why the court isn’t removing a picture of Jesus with the sentence underneath it “TO KNOW PEACE, OBEY THESE LAWS” from the courtroom lobby, as heard on ABC26 news.

Judge Lamz also said in the report, “I don’t know who it is. I personally thought it might be Moses or some Russian or Greek figure. I wasn’t sure.”

Fair enough. Here’s the pic from ABC26’s website:

Here’s some pics from Google Images:

Russian Jesus.

Greek Jesus.

Moses.

And, something I came across, Christ the Teacher.

I don’t know. The hand looks a little different. But who am I to judge?

Ever Seen an Old Thug?

2007-06-22T23:10:00.000-05:00

April 8, 2005:

Members of the New Orleans Police Department have issued an arrest warrant for 19-year-old Jerrell Jackson, wanted in connection with yesterday’s shooting that occurred at the intersection of Lasalle Street and Washington Avenue. The victims were a 19-year-old male and a 20-year-old male whose names are not being released as a security measure.

According to investigators, three males traveled inside of a vehicle at the above mentioned location when a light colored Jeep Cherokee pulled next to their vehicle. The driver of the Jeep Cherokee produced a handgun and fired several gunshots into the vehicle. The driver suffered an apparent gunshot wound to the back and the front seat passenger suffered an apparent gunshot wound to the face and hand. They were transported to a local hospital for treatment and their conditions are unknown. The third occupant, a 19-year-old male, did not report any injuries.

Sixth District Detective Lawrence Dupree conducted an investigation and obtained an arrest warrant for 19-year-old Jerrell Jackson of 3032 South Saratoga Street, relative to three (3) counts of attempted second degree murder, aggravated criminal damage to property and illegal use of a weapon.

July 17, 2005:

This evening, members of the New Orleans Police Department are investigating a series of shootings that results in seven (7) confirmed people wounded in a central city neighborhood. Their ages are from 16 to 61 years of age and their names are not being released as a security measure. The offense occurred shortly after 8:00 p.m., in the intersection of Freret and First Streets.

According to investigators, individuals approached the intersection and began firing multiple gunshots into an area where several persons were standing.

***

Detectives believe tonight’s shooting was in retaliation for last evening’s murder of a 21-year-old male w ho was shot shortly before 10:30 p.m., inside an SUV at the corner of Phillip and LaSalle Street (one block away).

Two of today’s victims, the 19-year-old male with a gunshot wound to the left torso and the 17-year-old male listed in critical condition had Second Degree Murder Warrants for their arrests and are believed to have been the targets of tonight’s shooting.

July 18, 2005:

New Orleans Police have arrested 19-year-old Darrell Davis, one of the persons believed is responsible for last night’s shooting of seven (7) individuals. The offense occurred July 17, 2005, shortly after 8:00 p.m., in the intersection of Freret and First Streets.

As a result, the following persons were wounded from gunfire; a 16-year-old male wounded in the left arm and in good condition; 19-year-old Jerrell Jackson, was wounded in chest and was treated and released into police custody; 19-year-old Darrell Davis, wounded in the right ankle and in good condition; 18-year-old Tony Simmons, wounded in the thigh and listed as critical; a 22-year-old male wounded in the left arm and in good condition, a 61-year-old female wounded in the right thigh and listed in good condition, an unidentified adult male wounded in the head and listed in critical condition, and possibly an unidentified adult male who received an apparent gunshot wound to the leg and did not seek medical treatment who fled after driving other victims to the Medical Center of Louisiana. His whereabouts are unknown.

Detectives believe that a Ford F-150 approached the intersection when Davis and another male got out and opened fire. Detectives also, at this point, conclude that there was an exchange of gunfire between Davis, his unidentified accomplice and unknown persons. Seven persons reported being shot, including Davis. Investigators are in the process of building cases against Davis’ accomplice and others who were involved in the shooting.

19-year-old Jerrell Jackson and 18-year-old Tony Simmons have been identified and arrested in connection with the shooting death of 21-year-old Damien Gordon which occurred Saturday, July 16, 2005, at LaSalle and Phillip Streets. In this case, the victim was driving in the block when two or more individuals opened fire, striking him in the body. The victim later died at Charity Hospital.

November 20, 2006:

On November 20, 2006, the S/TX U.S. Marshals Service Gulf Coast Violent Offenders Task Force arrested Treg EUGENE, 20 years old, in Clear Lake City, Texas. A firearm and narcotics were recovered from the scene where he was arrested. EUGENE, of New Orleans, was wanted by the New Orleans Police Department for a murder that occurred in New Orleans on May 28 of this year.

New Orleans Police Department (NOPD) investigators obtained a warrant for EUGENE for the first-degree murder of Darrell Davis, 20 years old, also of New Orleans. The NOPD investigators allege that Davis was driving in the 2700 block of Monticello St. in New Orleans on May 28 when two gunmen opened fire. Davis’s left arm was hit by a bullet that then entered his body. Davis was able to drive away. After the shooting the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office said that two unknown men dropped Davis off at the Ochsner Medical Center at about 4:30 am. Further information by NOPD investigators alleges that EUGENE and Davis were involved in a botched armed robbery attempt of a member of a local rap record label. EUGENE is believed to have shot Davis during this robbery attempt. EUGENE is also believed to be an associate of Ivory “B-Stupid” Harris who was one of the New Orleans area’s most wanted fugitives earlier this year before his capture by Kenner and NOPD officers.

Last Sunday, June 17, 2007:

Jerrell Jackson, 21, was shot Sunday about 6:30 p.m. in Central City in the 2200 block of Josephine Street, between Simon Bolivar Avenue and South Liberty Street. He was pronounced dead at 7:25 a.m. at University Hospital.

***

Jackson survived a chest wound in a July 17, 2005, shooting, and was shot three times this year, Meisch said.

Jerrell Jackson, arrested for attempted murder in 2005; back on the streets; arrested for murder in 2005; back on the streets; shot a few times; murdered in 2007 at the age of 21. He lived a full thug life.

I am not sure if it is the same Darrell Davis in the above press releases, but the ages do match. If it is the same person, he also lived a full thug life. Arrested in a in a septuple shooting in 2005 (in which both he and Jackson were shot); back on the streets; shot and killed by an accomplice during an armed robbery in 2006 at the age of 20.

I don’t know what else to say.

Rated R for Murder

2007-06-22T01:33:00.000-05:00

Dammit. New Orleans' violent crime caused me to go ahead and get tagged with an R rating:

Why, oh why?

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:
* dead (7x) * murder (5x) * bitch (1x)

Bitch? I don't remember... ohhh. My blogroll.

Via Suspect Device, VatulBlog.

Can’t Blame the Youth

2007-06-22T00:38:00.000-05:00

From the written testimony, submitted before the actual testimony, of Chief Judge David L. Bell, Orleans Parish Juvenile Court for the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing "Rising Violent Crime in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina" on June 20, 2007:

OPJC presently has six hundred eighty-nine (689) open delinquency cases. From January 1, 2007 through today, the New Orleans Police Department arrested approximately eight-hundred (800) juveniles and the New Orleans District Attorneys Office Juvenile Division filed two hundred and eighty four (284) new delinquency petitions. Based on the new petitions we are seeing significant drug use, which we believe is a result of unaddressed trauma and mental health needs, a direct result of Katrina. For example, 28% of the cases that come before the court are for possession of narcotics.1 Most of the youth appearing before the court, eighty-two percent (82%), are fifteen to seventeen years old (15-17) who have unaddressed educational needs and lack the skills to obtain gainful employment.2

We are seeing an increase in disproportionate minority contact even though the population of New Orleans has changed since Katrina3; ninety-three percent (93%) of delinquency petitions filed are young people of color.4

[footnotes]

1 25% burglary/theft/trespass; 15% abuse/assault/battery; 11% robbery; and 9% weapons.

2 0.5% are 8 yrs old; 2% are 11 yrs old; 3.9% are 13 yrs old; 12% are 14 yrs old; 18% are 15 yrs
old; 26% are 16 yrs old; 38% are 17 yrs old, 0.5% are 18 yrs old.

3 47% African American; 43% White

4 79% African American male; 14 % African American female; 2.8% White male .08% White female.

The judge is seeing “significant drug use,” “unaddressed trauma and mental health needs,” and “unaddressed educational needs” in the juveniles that show up in court and they “lack the skills to obtain gainful employment.” And 93 percent of the delinquency petitions filed are for African American youths.

The judge probably doesn’t have statistics for the racial breakdown of the NOPD’s juvenile arrests. But, would anyone be surprised if 93 percent of them were also black?

We are damning a generation of African Americans by neglect.

We are neglecting education in African American neighborhoods. What schools have been closed the longest? How many schools are selective or cap enrollment?

We are neglecting infrastructure in African American neighborhoods. Drive through any of them.

We are neglecting security in African American neighborhoods. The clusters of murders are all in black neighborhoods.

We are neglecting jobs in African American neighborhoods. Nothing new there.

We are neglecting healthcare in African American neighborhoods. Charity? And what about preventive healthcare?

“But, wait,” one might say. “It’s the poor we are neglecting.” Race and poverty dance together in New Orleans.

Why do the numbers keep coming out this way? Look at the faces of the murdered. Overwhelmingly black. Look at the faces of the incarcerated. Overwhelmingly black. Look at the faces of the public housing residents living in substandard housing. Overwhelmingly black. Look at the faces of the public school students in a public school system that was failing before the storm. Overwhelmingly black. Look at the faces of the youths in the juvenile court. Overwhelmingly black.

Look at the faces in New Orleans. They are not overwhelmingly black. New Orleans’ population is no longer 66 percent African American. They are the ones who have not returned, or can not return.

Racial injustice. Neglect. They dance together, too.

Now I Know Why We Hired Him

2007-06-18T20:37:00.000-05:00

Recovery director Ed Blakely:

"Rebuilding a city requires people who are very talented in the rebuilding process," Blakely said during a press briefing at City Hall.

More and Less

2007-06-18T13:22:00.000-05:00

More of this:

“I’ll sleep next to my hammer drill if I have to,” he said. “There’s a story in this house, and whether it happened over a hundred years ago, or it’s happening now, it has to keep being told. It’s New Orleans culture and I’m just a page in the book.”

Less of this:

As for Tidewater’s future in New Orleans, Taylor said the company is evaluating its options.

“Our plans are to do what’s best for our shareholders,” he said. “Sometimes one wonders ... whether it’s best for our headquarters to remain in Louisiana. From my vantage point, our customer base is in Houston. Houston really is the energy capital of the world. If we’re going to be responsive to our customers ... we need to be close to our customers. So that’s a disadvantage that New Orleans confronts.

“For the time being, we have not made a decision to leave New Orleans.”

These stories are not really related. I just happened to read them one after the other in my inbox.

Finding Better Ways to Blow Up Levees?

2007-06-18T13:06:00.000-05:00

Or testing temporary pumps?

Army alerts residents to potential louder than normal explosion

FORT POLK - Residents in the vicinity of the main post of Fort Polk may notice a louder than normal explosion during the week of June 18-22.

The potential noise will be the result of a large detonation that is part of activities conducted here by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Each One Had a Father

2007-06-17T22:31:00.000-05:00

Three murders on Father's Day. Thirteen murders in June only seventeen days into the month. Ninety murders in the city of New Orleans in 2007.

88) A man was shot to death around 4 a.m. today, the New Orleans Police Department reported.

The unidentified man was found lying in the street at Gordon and Urquhart Streets by Fifth District officers responding to a report of shots being fired in the area.
He had a gunshot wound to the head. Emergency medical technicians pronounced the man dead on the scene.

89) The first shooting [of the evening], in Central City, occurred about 6:30 p.m. in the 2200 block of Josephine Street, between Simon Bolivar Avenue and South Liberty Street. A man died later Sunday in a hospital, police said.

90) About two hours later Sunday, another fatal shooting occurred in the 1900 block of Esplanade Avenue, between North Prieur and North Johnson streets, at the border between the 7th Ward and the 6th Ward.

Bob Marley Sunday

2007-06-17T19:17:00.000-05:00

"Oh oh oh Caution, the road is wet
Black soul is black as jet
Do you hear me
Caution the road is hot
You got to do better than that"

Behind the Headlines

2007-06-16T20:27:00.000-05:00

The headline on nola.com:

Help with Road Home applications available at churches

Translation: If you haven't applied yet, start praying.

Okay, that's not really what the church article is about. It's about churches helping residents get through the paperwork to apply for the Road Home Program. But, if you are of the religious lot and have not applied yet, a novena might be in order:

Based on most conservative estimates of the shortfall, the aid program is on schedule to run out of money with 41,000 eligible applicants left out in the cold.

***

There are now more than 145,000 Road Home applicants of which the state expects at least 132,000 to be found eligible for aid from the program. That compares to the original FEMA estimate of 123,000 total properties with major or severe damage. The state also budgeted for an average Road Home grant of $60,000, while the current auditor's estimate is that the average will end up being close to $79,000.

If you read this blog, you know I like numbers. They tell all kinds of stories. Let’s see what stories these numbers tell.

The state has $6.2 billion in community development block grants to use for homeowners in the Road Home Program plus $1.14 billion in hazard mitigation grants from FEMA – $7.34 billion in all. The $1.14 billion from FEMA is being withheld right now, but it must have been included at the beginning to calculate how much money the Road Home Program would have to give to homeowners:

$7.34 billion (estimated money available) divided by 123,000 (estimated households eligible) = $59,674 (average grant per household – rounded up to $60,000)

That equation corresponds to the Times-Picayune’s numbers.

The actual numbers as of June 11, 2007:

Important numbers:
* 145,252 homeowners have applied
* 87,100 benefits have been calculated at an average of $74,214 each, which promises $6.46 billion to homeowners

$6.46 billion is less than the $7.34 billion, which includes the $1.14 billion in hazard mitigation grants, but more than the $6.2 billion in CDBGs. If the state really has $7.34 billion to work with, then there is $940,000,000 left to give out. With the average of $74,214 per household, that means 12,666 more homeowners can have their grants calculated from the original $7.34 billion which the state thought it had at the beginning of the program.

87,100 + 12,666 = 99,766. At this rate, if the state and/or federal governments do not put more money into the Road Home Program, only 99,766 households will receive Road Home grants. That’s 23,234 less than 123,000 households, which was the number used at the beginning of the program to estimate how many homeowners would be eligible. It’s 45,486 less than the 145,252 homeowners who had applied as of last Monday. And the deadline to apply isn’t until July 31, so more are coming.

This isn’t news, but the current allocation of federal money is no where near enough to fully fund the Road Home Program.

Whose fault is this?

The state says the program was underfunded because of inadequate storm damage estimates by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The funding pool was based on those estimates.

But Don Powell, President Bush's Gulf Coast recovery chief, told a congressional committee the state is handing out payments for damage that is excluded under federal guidelines.

Hmmm... You know what? Both the state and Don Powell are right.

The state’s position is that Louisiana got far less money for its program than it needed and far less in comparison to other states, particularly Mississippi. I have commented on this before:

For perspective, consider that in January 2006, one year ago, the first round of Community Development Block Grants was given out.

Mississippi received $5,058,185,000.

Louisiana received $6,210,000,000.

Mississippi got 86.8% more in that first round of CDBGs than it has paid out more than halfway through their housing plan. If we had paid out at the same rate at Mississippi’s lower average payment, we would have used up over half (61%) of our first allocation. In fact, assuming our average calculated payment remains consistent at $82,581, we will completely use up that first allocation about three quarters of the way through our total applications.

In fact, our average payment went down. But, because there are more households eligible than first thought, we have actually used up that first allocation less than 2/3 the way through.

The point remains the same: Mississippi had way more than it needed at the offset, and Louisiana had way less.

Don Powell’s position is that the state gave money to households that weren’t eligible under the federal government’s conception of the plan.

He has made statements in the past that back up this assertion. While announcing hurricane aid in the the 2006 budget, Chairman Powell defined where he thought the CDBGs were going (my emphasis):

Housing. As you know, part of the announcement that was made about 10 days ago, $11.5 billion for CDBG monies. Those grant monies was allocated, $6.2 billion, to Louisiana and $5 billion, a little bit more than $5 billion to Mississippi, and other monies went to the state of Alabama, Florida and Texas.

It's a common objective and a common goal that somehow, we meet the needs of those people, those homeowners that were outside the flood plain whose homes were destroyed. Homeowners outside the flood plain whose homeowners--whose homes were destroyed.

***

We believe that the CDBG grant money in Louisiana is more than enough money to meet the needs of the homeowners outside the flood plain. we believe that number is somewhere in the neighborhood of a billion dollars, so there would be excess of $5 billion to meet other states within the state. Again, that's meeting the needs of homeowners outside the flood plain whose homes were destroyed.

***

Chairman Powell: We believe that the CDBG money meets the needs of the uninsured homeowner outside the flood plain.

***

Question: What about non-homeowners who are inside the flood plain? Are you suggesting that the Federal Government doesn't have a role in assisting them, which is, I think, the goal of the Baker plan?

Chairman Powell: Yeah. People inside the flood plain, obviously insurance was available to those folks, and most of those people either had--a lot of those people had hazard insurance or in fact did have flood insurance; a lot of them did.

***

Question: How come we have more people being helped in Mississippi, where there were a lot fewer left homeless, than in Louisiana?
And how can you say that that's enough?

Chairman Powell: Well, our focus is on housing, as I mentioned to you. I'm talking about homeowners outside the flood plain.

***

Chairman Powell: I think it's enough, it's more than enough money to take care of the uninsured homeowners outside the flood plain. And again, Louisiana can direct that money however they deem necessary, so they may want to--whatever plans they come up with, they may want to expand just what I said. That's their option. That's their option to do.

***

Question: But is it your sense that the private insurance will be adequate to take care of the people of New Orleans, in particular?

Chairman Powell: It's my sense that there's enough CDBG money that will meet the needs of the uninsured outside the flood plain and, again, that's something around [inaudible] billion, and that the state of Louisiana can direct the balance of that money as they see fit, including administering and meeting some of the needs of other homeowners.

Question: So in other words, you expect the one billion to go to the people outside the flood plain who are uninsured, and then Louisiana can take the 5 billion and apply it to people who are living within the flood plain, like in the Lower Ninth or in other--

Chairman Powell: That's true.

Question: Okay.

Chairman Powell: They can do, they can develop whatever plan they want.

***

Question: Do you think 5 billion will cover people who were within the flood plain?

Chairman Powell: Depends upon the percentage of damage and who had hazard insurance, who had flood insurance. But again, we believe that there's enough CDBG money to meet the needs of the uninsured outside the flood plain [inaudible].

Question: How much was that CDBG money again?

Chairman Powell: $6.2 billion.

I am not sure who “the uninsured homeowners outside the flood plain” are and why he only wanted to help them, but I think it is obvious that Powell felt the federal government’s responsibility was to those homeowners. Powell made it clear that they could be taken care of with the $6.2 billion in CDBGs and that Louisiana could use the rest how it saw fit.

I’m not saying he was right. I am just saying on February 2, 2006, Powell was clear in where he thought the CDBGs were going.

Whose fault is it? I don’t know. But I do know there is a chasm between what the state says it needs from the federal government and what the federal government says the state is going to get.

Just to show you how far apart the state and federal government have gotten over the past year and a half, take these two statements.

The state this week:

Gov. Kathleen Blanco on Friday said she'll meet with key members of Congress next week to ask for $3 billion to $4 billion to help cover the shortfall in the Road Home program, which may only have enough money to pay two thirds of its eligible applicants.

Blanco said nobody can be sure what the exact shortfall is until the last application is received July 31, but she said it will probably be close to the $5 billion estimate offered by Legislative Auditor Steve Theriot.

The federal government in February 2006:

We believe that the CDBG grant money in Louisiana is more than enough money to meet the needs of the homeowners outside the flood plain. we believe that number is somewhere in the neighborhood of a billion dollars, so there would be excess of $5 billion to meet other states within the state.

Blanco says today that we are $5 billion short. Powell said at the beginning that we would have $5 billion extra.

That’s far apart. It seems as if no one has been communicating to anybody this whole time.

That’s everyone’s fault.

And the consequence:

Road Home has already committed more than the $6.2 billion on hand. [Road Home spokeswoman Gentry] Brann said the state had "always implied" that grants would be based on available money and that letters to applicants make that point clear.

St. Jude, pray for us and for all who honor and invoke thy aid...

New York Has a Website

2007-06-12T20:02:00.000-05:00

Called the Hurricane Evacuation Zone Finder.

New Yorkers can type in their address "to determine if they live in a hurricane flood zone."

Let's try 11 Wall Street.

Oh, dear. It looks like that address is in Zone C:

Residents in Zone C may experience storm surge flooding from a MAJOR (Category 3 & 4) hurricane making landfall just south of New York City. A major hurricane is unlikely in New York City, but not impossible.

That's okay. The New York Stock Exchange isn't that important. Plus, "A major hurricane is unlikely in New York City." Wall Street knows a thing or two about risk.

What risk?

A Category 3 hurricane in New York would behave like a Category 4 in the South. A Northern hurricane typically travels at 34 mph, about triple the speed of a Southern storm.

A major hurricane would produce a storm surge of up to 30 feet, with flooding in all five boroughs, airport and highway closings, and massive traffic jams. The lower Manhattan flood zone for a hurricane making landfall just south of the city includes the World Trade Center site, Wall Street and police headquarters. City Hall - which sits on higher ground and is located toward the middle of Manhattan - might turn into a small island as the East and Hudson rivers converge to its south. If that sounds implausible, remember that it has happened before: A September 1821 hurricane raised tides by 13 feet in an hour and flooded Manhattan from its southern tip to Canal Street.

Today, that would knock out most of Wall Street and many subway lines, and flood tourist spots like South Street Seaport.

Why would anyone build the largest securities market in the country in a flood zone?

NOLA Murder Clusters

2007-06-12T16:29:00.000-05:00

Of New Orleans' 87 murders (as of 6/12/07), 75 murders occurred inside the shaded area of the map below. That's 86% of the murders. (NOTE: These are my numbers. If you see any errors, please let me know.)

The twelve murders that did not occur in the shaded area are marked with blue placemarks. Two of those are west of the Industrial Canal. Ten are in N.O. East, including a cluster of five murders in the Little Woods area only blocks away from each other.

Also, there are neighborhoods where murders happen in clusters (more than two close together). This map displays those in the shaded areas, as well as the non-cluster murders as blue placemarks.

The neighborhood clusters:

Mid-City/Treme/7th Ward – 25 murders
Central City – 16 murders
Marigny/Bywater/9th Ward – 12 murders
Algiers/Behrman – 8 murders
Hollygrove/Leonidas – 6 murders
Little Woods – 5 murders

Notice there are five areas outside of the clusters where two murders happened within blocks of each other.

A few conclusions can be made from these maps. I am still working on some. In the meantime, I offer the maps up to the gods of the internets.

Google Map Embed Test

2007-06-04T15:55:00.000-05:00

2007 New Orleans Murders

ADDED: This is just a test. As pointed out by Schroeder in the comments, go to citizencrimewatch.org for the real thing plus much, much more.

ADDED II: Oh, look. The Times-Pic has a map, too, with more info.

Clarity of Mind

2007-06-04T11:37:00.000-05:00

I can’t blame Nagin for trying to find some:

After the group’s founder, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, visited New Orleans in April, Nagin developed a working partnership with IAHV.

“We will begin to work closely with his holiness (Shankar) and his organizations to identify the specific set of needs for the New Orleans communities,” Nagin said. “For the past 19 months, our adults and youth have endured stress and overwhelming challenges associated with the rebuilding our great city and we are open to review the proposals of his holiness Shankar’s for the achievement of harmony, stress management and clarity of mind.”

First Sri Sri Ravi Shankar Day and now the Mayor planning “to work closely with his holiness.”

My ignorance still prevents me from knowing what to make of this.

Every Blip Hurts

2007-06-01T10:34:00.000-05:00

As of June 1, 2007, there have been 77 murders in New Orleans this year. With 151 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of one murder every 1.96 days – basically, a murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 186 murders. In a city of 255,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 73 murders per 100,000 residents.

If nothing changes, 109 more human beings will die a violent death on the streets of New Orleans this year. And most of those who die will be African-American men, often young, and almost always they will be shot.

It seems every month is a “blip” or an “uptick.”

January – 17 murders

February – 13 murders

March – 18 murders

April – 14 murders

May – 15 murders:

05/05/07 – 1 murder

63) Troy Dent, 22, of New Orleans, was shot Saturday about 11 p.m. at South Claiborne and Louisiana Avenue, John Gagliano, chief coroner's investigator said.

Dent, who was shot in a car, died Sunday at 5:15 a.m. at Tulane University Hospital, Gagliano said.

05/07/05 – 1 murder

64) An unidentified man wearing a house arrest monitoring device on his ankle was shot to death in a fusillade of bullets which also wounded a 17-year-old boy Monday night in the Lower 9th Ward.

Monday's shooting came after a bloody Sunday during which at least six people were wounded in New Orleans in several unrelated shootings, according to police.

05/08/07 – 1 murder

65) Officers already in the Pigeon Town area heard shots about 7:50 p.m. and found a man lying on the corner of Hickory and Leonidas streets. He was Michael Combs, 39, of New Orleans, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said.

Medics tried to revive Combs, but were unsuccessful, according to police spokeswoman Officer Sabrina Richardson. Combs died at the scene on a sidewalk in front of a bar. Richardson did not know if the bar was open. Numerous bullet casings were found on the sidewalk and street near Combs' body.

5/9/07 – 1 murder

66) A 29-year-old man was shot to death Wednesday afternoon in the 7th Ward and another man with whom he was feuding was taken in for questioning in the incident, police said.

Jay Landers, of New Orleans, died of multiple gunshot wounds.

5/11/07 – 1 murder

67) A 23-year-old New Orleans man was shot and killed in the Iberville public housing complex Friday night, police said.

Police received a call at 7:18 p.m. of a man shot, and found Mark Oneal lying in front of a building in the 1400 block of Conti Street, police spokeswoman Officer Jonette Williams said.

05/14/07 - 2 murders

68) Police found the unidentified man dead Monday morning in eastern New Orleans with gunshot wounds to the head. Officers responding to a call to the intersection of Venice Boulevard and Wales Street about 4 a.m. found the man on the ground, officer Jonette Williams said.

***

Corey Coleman, 21, of New Orleans, was found dead Monday about 6:30 a.m. at Venice and Wales streets. He died sometime early Monday, the coroner's office estimated.

69) And Emanuel Gardner, 17, of New Orleans, was shot in Central City.

***

In an unrelated incident, Gardner was shot in the chest Monday afternoon in Central City. The shooting occurred shortly before 4 p.m. near the intersection of 7th and Freret streets, police said. The victim was taken to University Hospital, where he died at 9:32 p.m., Gagliano said. An autopsy will be performed today.

05/16/07 – 1 murder

70) A 42-year-old Terrytown man was shot to death early Wednesday, New Orleans police reported.

The incident happened about 1:20 a.m. in the rear parking area of an apartment complex in the 3500 block of Garden Oaks Drive, police said.

The name of the victim is being withheld pending notification of family members
According to investigators, Fourth District officers responded to a call of a man shot inside a vehicle. When the officers arrived, they found the man inside a white four-door Hyundai Sonata with several gunshot wounds to the body.

***

Two days later, Edward Charles Balser, 42, of Terrytown, was shot dead in a car in the 3500 block of Garden Oaks Drive.

05/25/07 – 2 murders

71) A young man riding a bicycle was gunned down Friday afternoon in Central City, putting the city's homicide total this year at 72, police said.

Police, following a report of gunshots, found the victim around 2:25 p.m. face down on the ground near the corner of Second and South Miro streets, officer Sabrina Richardson said.

Arthur Dowell, 18, of New Orleans died at the scene, said John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish coroner's office. Dowell was shot multiple times and fell in a patch of grass alongside the street. He was dressed in a collared white shirt, jeans and basketball shoes. Police said they found a .44-caliber Magnum handgun next to his body.

72) A bar shooting episode in New Orleans left one man dead and another wounded in the leg late Friday night, police said.

The shootings occurred at the Daiquiris Island Bar in the 7900 block of Earhart Boulevard, according to the New Orleans Police Department.

Second District police arrived on the scene shortly after 11 p.m. and found a 22-year-old New Orleans man lying on the sidewalk with multiple gunshot wounds to the head and body.

05/27/05 – 2 murders

73) A 17-year-old boy was shot and killed near the route of today's Super Sunday Mardi Gras Indians parade, authorities said.

The slaying happened in the 800 block of N. Dupre, just a block off the parade's Orleans Avenue route.

74) The first shooting happened in the 1200 block of Clouet Street, according to police. Officers from the 5th District received a call around 11 p.m. and found Ernest Williams, of Marrero, suffering from several gunshot wounds to the head and body, according to police. Williams, 24, later died at University Hospital, according to coroner's office.

05/28/07 – 1 murder

75) The second shooting death happened shortly after 1:30 a.m. in the 6400 block of North Villere Street, according to police. A Chalmette man, whose identity has not been released, was shot in an apparent drug buy gone wrong, New Orleans police said.

Officers in the 5th District responded to a call that a man had been shot but he left the scene for a St. Bernard Parish residence. New Orleans detectives met with St. Bernard Parish sheriff's deputies who had just gotten a call from Fourth and Chalmette streets that a man who had been shot arrived at that location, police said. Police arrived to find the victim suffering from several gunshots. He died at a Chalmette emergency medical facility, police said.

05/29/07 – 1 murder

76) A 38-year-old New Orleans man was fatally shot in the head Tuesday morning in the 7th Ward, the latest in a string of fatal shootings across the city.

Shortly before 8 a.m., officers responding to a call of a man down found the victim on the ground in a park near the corner of North Claiborne and St. Bernard avenues, New Orleans police officer Jonette Williams said.

Tuesday's homicide marked the sixth killing in New Orleans since Friday afternoon.
Robert Billiot, 38, of New Orleans, was dead at the scene, said John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish coroner's office. Billiot had been shot once in the head.

05/30/07 – 1 murder

77) A New Orleans cab driver was found shot to death in Algiers this morning.

New Orleans Police said the incident happened around 6:50 this morning in the 3100 block of Rose Lane in the Christopher Homes development.

The 60-year-old Yellow Cab driver died on the scene from a single gunshot wound to the chest, police said.

A Google map of the murders.

State of the Nagin Address

2007-05-31T01:05:00.000-05:00

What he said:

"It's not our fault."

What he meant:

“It’s not my fault.”

What’s not his fault? Oyster elaborates:

Re-electing Ray Nagin was an awful, horrible blunder for New Orleans-- for myriad reasons-- but Nagin's commitment to a Police Chief who can't control crime is at the top of the list.

Yes, can’t control crime. Mr. Nagin, you and your appointee can’t control crime. Especially violent crime. Nor can you explain it away:

On the issue of public safety, Nagin said "crime stats are trending in a positive direction comparing first quarter of 2007 to the last quarter of 2006." He said the city has installed 87 cameras in crime hot spots and is on pace to reach its goal of 200 by year's end.

***

Nevertheless, the mayor admitted that the murder problem is not under complete control. He referred to spikes in the body count as "blips" and noted that "we had one this weekend."

A blip? This weekend’s blip included five murders from Friday afternoon to Sunday night.

Mr. Nagin continues to mention blips or upticks when discussing our incredibly high murder rate. Let me express these blips and upticks in a different way.

May 30, 2007, the day Nagin gave his State of the City address, was 150 days into the year. As of that day, 77 people were murdered (by my count) on the streets of New Orleans. That is an average of one murder every 1.94 days. A murder every other day.

The “blips” are not anomalies. They are analogous to a murder every other day in the city of New Orleans. Is that trending in a positive direction?

We have a little more than half the pre-Katrina population in the city but 3/4 the pre-Katrina violent crime. Is that trending in a positive direction?

Wait... Wait... I know what you're going to say.

Hey, man. It’s not my fault.

Crazy Man Tries to Fill Post-Katrina Leadership Void in NOLA

2007-05-22T10:49:00.000-05:00

No, not Nagin:

A fashion writer accused of sexually abusing a former co-worker while dressed as a firefighter hoped to go to New Orleans and lead a gang of angry Hurricane Katrina survivors, a psychologist testified Monday.

***

"He talked about going to New Orleans because he thought there were a lot of angry people down there and he could provide them some kind of leadership," Barr testified.

Even an insane sexual abuser can tell we've got leadership problems down here.

Crime Numbers

2007-05-22T02:30:00.000-05:00

In March 2007, the NOPD released crime statistics for 2006 and lauded them for showing a reduction in crime compared to the year before:

The uniform crime report statistics show a 22 percent reduction in violent crime when compared to 2005 statistics, according to NOPD spokesman Sgt. Joe Narcisse.

Nonviolent crime dropped about 25 percent.

"In most categories you see a reduction in crime," Narcisse said.

Asked whether the statistics offer a fair assessment considering the post-storm chaos and radical reduction in population, Narcisse said the numbers speak for themselves.

"It is what it is," he said. "We may be able to (attribute) some of the reduction to Katrina."

It is what it is.

This week, the NOPD released their official crime stats for the first quarter of 2007. Compared with the same time period last year, there is no overall reduction to be lauded. In fact, violent crime is up 107 percent – more than double.

Hey NOPD, is it still what it is?

The NOPD did not return repeated requests for comment on the statistics Monday.

Wait, don’t tell me. Some of the increase in violent crime may be attributed to an increase in population, right?

Scharf, a frequent critic of the NOPD, called the city's murder rate alarming because it is a marked increase over the previous year without a corresponding increase in population.

A study recently released by GCR & Associates Inc. placed the city's population at 255,137 for March 2007. For January 2006, the start of the same quarter last year, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that 158,353 were living in New Orleans. That's a population increase of 62 percent.

"You are 182 percent higher (in murders) than last year with a population that hasn't grown at that rate," Scharf said.

What the NOPD said last year [scroll down] around this time:

Although crime in New Orleans has risen as the population grows, the city is still much safer than it was before Hurricane Katrina, police Superintendent Warren Riley announced Friday as he revealed the city's first-quarter crime statistics.

The number of violent crimes reported to police -- murders, rapes, robberies, shootings, stabbings and other serious assaults -- was down by 64 percent in the first three months of this year [2006], compared with the same period last year [2005], Riley said.

The number of murders and armed robberies was down, each by about 74 percent, and nonviolent crime was down about 52 percent, Riley said.

Anticipating the argument that the decrease was insignificant because population is dramatically down in the city, Riley produced figures that he said show that even adjusting for the lower population, violent crime is still down about 26 percent and nonviolent crime about 1 percent, compared with the first quarter of last year. The figures are based on crimes per every 100,000 residents.

Maybe the first three months of this year was one of those “upticks” Mayor Nagin told us about.

Here’s the scary part. Let’s compare the first quarter of 2007 to the first quarter of 2005, the last Jan-Feb-Mar period when the city was at full pre-Katrina population.

First Quarter 2007

Murder - 48
Rape - 14
Armed Robbery - 190
Simple Robbery - 54
Assault - 447

Total = 753

First Quarter 2005

Murder - 65
Rape - 44
Armed Robbery - 284
Simple Robbery - 85
Assault - 530

Total = 1008

In the first quarter of 2007, total violent crime was down 25 percent from the first quarter of 2005. The only thing is, there were *almost twice as many people* in New Orleans in 2005. With around 56 percent (255,000) of the pre-Katrina population (455,000), we had 75 percent of the *total* pre-Katrina violent crime.

Using the “per 100,000 residents” method that Riley used in May 2006 to claim a 26 percent reduction in violent crime in the first quarter of 2006 as compared with the first quarter of 2005, the numbers say that violent crime is up 33 percent in the first quarter of 2007 (295 violent crimes per 100,000 residents) as compared to the first quarter of 2005 (221 violent crimes per 100,000 residents).

Assuming a first quarter 2006 population of 200,000 residents in New Orleans, violent crime is up 62 percent per 100,000 residents in the first quarter of 2007 (295 violent crimes per 100,000 residents) as compared to the first quarter of 2006 (182 violent crimes per 100,000 residents).

These comparisons aren’t really good for anything except showing that violent crime is not going down in 2007 when compared to the same time period after the storm *or* before the storm - on a per resident basis. But look at how close we are to the pre-Katrina total numbers of violent crime with around half the population. No numbers or formulas can make that look good.

A Complete Exit

2007-05-14T01:09:00.000-05:00

In March, inspired by a Galveston County Daily News editorial, I wrote:

The next time an insurance company threatens a partial withdrawal from an Atlantic coastal region, every state on the East Coast and the Gulf Coast should invite the insurance company to make a complete exit. That includes 20 states with coastal counties or parishes, which make up over a third (134 million) of the United States' population (300 million).

That’s a sizable market to lose.

Via Mr. Homan, I see that Allstate will "stop selling new home insurance policies in California and would continue to seek a 12% rate increase for its 900,000 existing customers."

California's population in 2000 was over 33 million. Were California to join the similarly treated Gulf and Atlantic Coast States in asking Allstate to make a complete exit, the insurance company would be locked out of doing business with more than half (167 million) the population of the United States (300 million).

Now *that's* a sizable market to lose.

Keeping It Real

2007-05-14T00:48:00.000-05:00

Real transparent, that is:

When he promised transparency at the start of his second term, the mayor had clearly begun work on the new garbage contracts, yet he kept quiet about the contracts until the city council had no choice but to accept them. That's real transparency.

This in a series of posts at Moldy City concerning Mayor Nagin's opacity, as well as posts on the dearth of inspectors of electricity.

For some reason, those garbage contracts still really bother me.

When Good Enough Is Better than Nothing at All

2007-05-14T00:36:00.000-05:00

Just reopen the damn hospital:

Louisiana State University announced this month that the downtown medical campus it hopes to share with the Department of Veterans Affairs could ramble over more than 70 acres, consuming a neighborhood that includes empty buildings, weedy parking lots and a patchwork of viable and neglected homes.

As the state gears up to spend tens of millions buying this property -- in some cases invoking the power of eminent domain to force out unwilling owners -- the hospital where LSU cared for indigent patients and trained generations of doctors stands idle a few blocks away on Tulane Avenue.

It ain't state of the art. But it's there.

I guess there's not enough money to be made in "good enough."

Should We Be Worried?

2007-05-07T00:32:00.000-05:00

Last Friday’s storm was non-tropical, but the Sewerage and Water Board still had to switch over to back up power for the pumps in New Orleans:

And on Friday, the loss of 60-cycle commercial electricity also knocked out a compressor that increases the pressure of natural gas to operate the water board's 25-cycle power plant, causing it to shut down, too.

Water board officials scrambled to switch to diesel fuel to operate the power plant, but the failure led to most individual pump stations west of the Industrial Canal being knocked out for periods lasting from a few minutes to 45 minutes, St. Martin said.

The 60-cycle/25-cycle problem is explained in the article and is blamed for the loss of power to the pumps. While the explanation for why the pumps lost power is important, whatever the reason, we still had to switch to back up power (diesel generators) in a storm outside of hurricane season and non-tropical in nature.

Also, the London Avenue Canal exceeded its safe water level:

At the London Avenue Canal in New Orleans, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers requested the Sewerage & Water Board shut down Pump Station No. 3 at 1:30 p.m. because the water level in the canal reached 4.3 feet. While that would not seem particularly high in a canal where the floodwalls extend 14 feet above sea level, the Army Corps has set conservative limits for those drainage canals that suffered catastrophic floodwall failure during Katrina and allowed a swollen Lake Pontchartain to empty into the city.

The safe water level for the London Avenue Canal is 4 feet.

Once again, this was a storm outside of hurricane season and non-tropical in nature. Yet, we had to shut down one pumping station because an outfall canal reached the highest level of water the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is confident that the floodwalls they built can handle. And most of the other pumps were running on backup power.

Look, I don’t expect the city’s pumps to do the impossible. I don’t expect the city to stay completely dry when the rain is coming down hard.

But, I do expect an honest assessment of where we’re at heading into this hurricane season.

Sewerage & Water Board Executive Director Marcia St. Martin provides an assessment:

"But the real key to this afternoon is, irrespective to our problems, the rainfall event was greater than our capabilities with everything working perfect," she said.

Everything working perfect. Sounds like we should be worried.

[UPDATE] prytaniawaterline provides another assessment:

This tells me that the levees and the pumping system are not to pre-katrina levels. In the event of a large hurricane we would be in deep poo-poo at the very least deep water with poo-poo in it.

I Posted Something on Iraq

2007-05-03T13:43:00.000-05:00

And then deleted it because I don't know what the hell I am talking about.

"Ashamed of What You Thinks It's Worth"

2007-05-03T07:57:00.000-05:00

A sign at yesterday's teacher rally in Baton Rouge, as seen on the front page, above the fold, of my edition of the Times-Picayune.

I like how the "s" in "thinks" barely fits on the poster. I can see the creator thinking as he or she made it, "Whew, I almost didn't have enough room for the 's.' That would have looked bad."

Related: All of your calls is important to us.

Not the Answer I was Expecting

2007-05-01T23:52:00.000-05:00

The University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science asks the question:

Why Do Oysters Choose to Live Where They Could be Eaten?

The answer:

According to an article in the May edition of Ecological Monographs, a team of scientists has found that despite the risk of being eaten by cannibalistic adults, oyster larvae choose to settle in areas of high oyster concentrations to take advantage of future benefits of increased reproductive capacity when they mature.

Ohhhh, so, it’s “Why do oysters choose to live where they could be eaten by other oysters? - not by humans.

While I think the latter wording of the question would make for a more interesting experiment, it could not possibly make for a better title of the actual article: “Mechanisms reconciling gregarious larval settlement with adult cannibalism.”

Science!

World Class Education

2007-05-01T11:50:00.000-05:00

In Cuba:

When UNESCO gave math and language tests to third- and fourth-graders in 13 Latin American countries, researchers were stunned to find that pupils in Cuba's lowest-income schools outperformed most upper-middle-class students in the rest of the region. This test data confirmed years of anecdotal evidence that Cuba's primary schools are by far the best in Latin America, and maybe better than schools in neighboring Florida.

***

Our comparison of Cuba with Brazil and Chile draws other lessons for good schooling. Brazil has a highly decentralized education system: Each state and municipality runs its own elementary schools. Schools have a lot of autonomy and teachers are trained in universities that decide how to best train their teachers, with very little control from state governments. Everyone - parents, teachers, administrators - have many choices, and teachers have the freedom to teach they way they want, with almost no supervision by principals. Sound familiar? It's like our system, and, like ours, it works well for wealthier children and not very well for almost everyone else. Although we extol local control, many school principals and communities do not have the resources or organizational skills to assure high-quality education.

Chile has decentralized even farther, again with little success. Almost half of Chile's students go to private schools, most to private schools where students get vouchers equal to the amount spent on public school students. But like Brazilian students, Chileans don't perform nearly as well as Cubans. Our classroom videos and interviews showed why: When left to their own devices, schools - whether public or private - can't overcome low standards and expectations, inadequate teacher training, and their pupils' social environment.

Many analysts in this country think that vouchers and charter schools are going to make for great education. The Chile-Cuba comparison suggests that they will not, because they fail to address the question of who will change the social environment in which children grow up, who will set and enforce high standards in the classroom, and who will take responsibility for training the teachers to implement those high standards. Cuba's success tells us that only when government takes these tasks seriously does every child get a shot at good schooling.

Every child can be educated.

Via Left I.

Every One Hurts

2007-05-01T01:56:00.000-05:00

As of May 1, 2007, there have been 62 murders in New Orleans this year. With 120 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of one murder every 1.935 days – basically, a murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 188 murders. In a city of 223,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 84 murders per 100,000 residents.

If nothing changes, 126 more human beings will die a violent death on the streets of New Orleans this year. And most of those who die will be African-American men, often young, and almost always they will be shot.

I must agree with Slate. This post is becoming predictable.

January – 17 murders.

February – 13 murders.

March – 18 murders.

April – 14 murders

04/01/07 – 1 murder

49) In the third slaying of the weekend, a 20-year-old New Orleans man was fatally shot in a FEMA trailer early Sunday in the 3400 block of Touro Street in Gentilly after what appeared to be a drug deal gone bad, New Orleans police said.

Carl Anthony McLendon died of multiple gunshot wounds in the trailer where he apparently lived, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano, who released the identity.

04/02/07 – 4 murders

50) The violent beginning to the week started shortly before 4 a.m. in the 7th Ward. Gunshots rang out near The Duck Off nightcub in the 2300 block of A.P. Tureaud Avenue, police said.

Terry Brock, 22, of New Orleans was shot several times, said John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish Coroner.

51) Officers responded to a home in the 1200 block of Michael Street around 9:10 a.m., police said. Inside, Cleveland Daniels lay bloodied from several gunshot wounds, according to a spokesman for the coroner’s office. Daniels was taken to University Hospital, where he died shortly later.

Police said 17-year-old Westley Simmons, the son of Daniels’ girlfriend, shot Daniels following an argument.

52) The third homicide of the day took place in the middle of the afternoon in the middle of a busy Bywater street.

Police discovered the body of a 21-year-old man just after 2:40 p.m. He had been shot several times. Police said the slaying was drug-related. Alexander Williams, 21, of New Orleans, was pronounced dead less than an hour later at University Hospital, said a spokesman for the coroner’s office.

53) The victim, a 29-year-old man, lay streetside near the corner of Ransom and Dale Streets.

Officers responding to a call of gunshots found the man around 3:10 p.m., police said.

Terry Hall, of New Orleans, was pronounced dead at the scene, according to a coroner’s spokesman. He died from multiple gunshot wounds, including one to his head.

04/04/07 – 1 murder

54) The victim, Dominic Bell, 20, whose last know address was a FEMA trailer park in Baton Rouge, had a lengthy police record and was known in the neighborhood as “D-Block." He died at 6:16 p.m. at University Hospital, said John Gagliano, a spokesman for the Orleans Parish Coroner’s office.

The shooting took place around 5:30 p.m. inside Waad Discount Store on the corner of Governor Nicholls Street and North Johnson Street, police said.

04/06/07 – 1 murder

55) New Orleans Police are investigating the shooting death of a 40-year-old man this morning in Algiers.

The shooting occurred shortly before 5:45 a.m. at 431 Whitney Ave.

04/07/07 – 2 murders

56) A 31-year-old man was murdered Saturday afternoon in the Faubourg Marigny, New Orleans Police said. The victim’s name has been withheld, pending notification of family members.

According to Officer Garry G. Flot, an NOPD spokesman, the incident took place at 12:15 p.m. in the 1300 block of Marigny Street.

Fifth District officers responded to calls of a shooting and found the victim lying on the sidewalk with a gunshot wound to his body, Flot said.

57) Police also are investigating a shooting death late Saturday in the 9100 block of Fig Street.

Shortly before midnight, Second District officers responded to a call and found man lying on the sidewalk with several gunshot wounds to the body.

04/08/07 – 1 murder

58) A woman was found dead inside a FEMA trailer near the temporary campus of Southern University at New Orleans on Sunday morning, the third murder victim in New Orleans over the Easter weekend.

A man has been arrested in connection with the beating death of Artherine Williams, 69, of Dallas, authorities said.

04/10/07 – 1 murder

59) The son of New Orleans music legend Deacon John was fatally shot in his car on an Uptown street Tuesday afternoon, and police quickly arrested a suspect, police said.

Keith Moore, 43, who also goes by the name Deacon Johnson, was shot behind the wheel of his car at or near the intersection of Austerlitz and Annunciation streets, less than a block from Tchoupitoulas Street, about 3:20 p.m., New Orleans police said.

04/17/07 - 1 murder

60) A 16-year-old boy, whose brother and three cousins have died from violence in New Orleans over the past seven years, was shot to death Tuesday night on Bayou Road near Esplanade Ridge.

His father identified the victim as Nicholas Smith, a sophomore at John McDonogh High School and resident of Arts Street in the 8th Ward.

Police responding to a report of a shooting found the boy lying face down in the 1800 block of Bayou Road about 8:20 p.m.

04/22/07 – 1 murder

61) Shortly after 6 p.m., New Orleans police responded to a call about a "male down" in the 4800 block of Alsace Street, and they found the victim lying on the ground. The area is a block east of Alcee Fortier Boulevard, between Peltier Street and Saigon Drive.

The man had apparent gunshot wounds to the body, said Jonette Williams, a police public information officer.

He died Sunday at 7 p.m. at University Hospital, John Gagliano, chief coroner's investigator, said. He said the man was believed to be 30 to 40 years old. An autopsy will be performed today.

04/27/07 – 1 murder

62) A 22-year-old New Orleans man was shot to death and a second man wounded within two blocks of St. Charles Avenue in Central City Friday evening.

The dead man was identified as Curtis Helms Jr. of New Orleans, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano.

New Orleans police said both lived in the neighborhood where they were found wounded, on Fourth Street, between Carondelet and Baronne streets. An assault rifle was recovered on the scene by police, police spokesman officer Garry Flot said.

Here’s a map of the 62 murders in New Orleans in 2007.

As always, NOLA-dishu has better crime maps with more information.

More information is exactly what we need.

Highlight Text, Ctrl C, Ctrl V

2007-04-30T23:51:00.000-05:00

Hey, I can do that:

When the Army Corps of Engineers solicited bids for drainage pumps for New Orleans, it copied the specifications - typos and all - from the catalog of the manufacturer that ultimately won the $32 million contract, a review of documents by The Associated Press found.

The pumps, supplied by Moving Water Industries Corp. of Deerfield Beach, Fla., and installed at canals before the start of the 2006 hurricane season, proved to be defective, as the AP reported in March. The matter is under investigation by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress.

We’ve seen this before:

Two other recent deals where MWI received work as a subcontractor also drew controversy.

In both projects, district officials discounted complaints from MWI rivals, who said they suspected that pump specifications were skewed to favor MWI.

Last year [2001], when the agency [the South Florida Water Management District] put out a thick volume of requirements for a federally funded flood-control project near Miami International Airport, an engineer for Flowserve, a global pump manufacturer, questioned them. He asked why the district would require contractors to use a costly pump with an unconventional type of motor.

"Flowserve pump division . . . will not be able to bid the project, since the specs as written limit the pump suppliers to 1-2 bidders," Flowserve's John Ondrejack wrote.

On May 10, 2001, the water board handed the $3.1-million project to Murphy Construction Co. of Palm Beach, which named MWI as the pump supplier for the job. The payday for MWI: at least $492,655.14, invoices show.

Last month, it happened again. The water board commissioned a $3.5-million flood protection project in Miami-Dade County with some very specific pump requirements.

One potential bidder, Skip Dorton of Tampa-based Custom Pump & Controls, wrote: "The specification, if left the way it reads, will be, in a sense, a sole source specification that no other manufacturer will be able to compete with."

Another complaint came from FPI, a Pompano Beach pump manufacturer, which called some of the requirements gimmicky and a waste of money.

"It is blatantly obvious to us that the specification has been crafted verbatim by and for one favored pump manufacturer," wrote Robert Purcell, FPI's marketing director. "Your engineering staff has done everything but name their favored supplier."

Purcell is the former MWI vice president who blew the whistle on the company in the Nigeria deal, prompting the U.S. Justice Department to intervene.

When he complained, district engineers countered that all the specifications were appropriate. They awarded the contract to Widell Inc. of Fort Lauderdale -- which then hired MWI to supply the pumps.

When Taylor asked his staff why they repeatedly pushed MWI for various projects, he said the reply was, "These are the people we work with all the time."

Emphasis mine.

Now, these are not US Army Corps of Engineers contracts, although one does use federal funds. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if, right after Katrina, someone from the USACE got a email from Jeb Bush recommending his old friend David Eller and MWI for the job.

We’ve seen that before.

Interestingly, FEMA did something else we’ve seen before in the Carnival Cruise Lines deal. From Rep. Waxman’s letter to Jeb Bush [PDF]:

The Military Sealift Command took over the issuance of the contracts on September 1 and insisted that the contracts be competitively bid. FEMA, however, specified the contract requirements, which included that each ship have enough berths to house 1,000 or more passengers and be available for delivery by September 10. These requirements effectively excluded all bidders except Carnival Cruise Lines and the operators of the Scotia Prince, a ferry ship docked in North Carolina. Out of 13 proposals submitted to the Military Sealift Command, only two met the requirements: the Carnival proposal involving three Carnival ships and the Scotia Prince proposal. Both proposals were accepted.

Happy National Charter Schools Week!

2007-04-30T23:18:00.000-05:00

By proclamation of our President:

My Administration is dedicated to providing parents with more choices so that their children will have the best opportunity to gain the skills necessary to compete and succeed in the global economy. Through the No Child Left Behind Act, we are setting high standards, expanding parents' options, and closing the achievement gap. Charter schools are getting results and helping guide children across the country on the path to a better life.

***

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim April 29 through May 5, 2007, as National Charter Schools Week.

Now here’s your present:

Most New Orleans public school students may be enrolled in charter schools these days, but many charters are avoiding taking special education students, particularly those with profound disabilities, a violation of state and federal law, critics charge.

While Algiers Charter Schools serve a substantial portion of special-needs children, their unique eight-school bloc is an exception. Eleven of 22 east bank charter schools have special-ed populations under 5 percent, according to the latest state data. By comparison, just three of the other 30 schools open in the city on Feb. 1, when the data were collected, had special ed populations of less than 5 percent.

***

State data also show that most east bank charters have disproportionately fewer special education students with what experts call the most challenging disabilities.

For example, only 59 percent of east bank charters are serving students with mental disabilities, such as Down syndrome, or emotional problems, such as bipolar disorder. By contrast, virtually every other school in the city includes these students; similarly, only 23 percent of non-Algiers charters served autistic students, compared with 53 percent in the Recovery District and more than 75 percent in Algiers and the five run by the local School Board. Charters outside of Algiers served no students with multiple disabilities, such as a learning disability combined with a physical disability, whereas every other system in the city had at least one school serving those students.

So, East Bank charter schools have less special ed students than RSD schools. And, those less special ed students at the East Bank charter schools have less challenging disabilities.

I wonder how that will affect test scores…

I wonder if people will consider this when evaluating the success of the charter schools…

“…we are setting high standards, expanding parents' options, and closing the achievement gap. Charter schools are getting results and helping guide children across the country on the path to a better life.”

The Gulf Coast Embargo

2007-04-30T12:40:00.000-05:00

Foreign aid after Katrina refused, misused, or continues to go unused (WaPo):

Allies offered $854 million in cash and in oil that was to be sold for cash. But only $40 million has been used so far for disaster victims or reconstruction, according to U.S. officials and contractors. Most of the aid went uncollected, including $400 million worth of oil. Some offers were withdrawn or redirected to private groups such as the Red Cross. The rest has been delayed by red tape and bureaucratic limits on how it can be spent.

Opinion from Dambala:

Katrina exposed this country's dirty little secret...we're not so super. For that, New Orleans must be isolated in this country's collective consciousness as an anomaly.

New Orleans was such an embarrassment that the Bush administration couldn't accept the nearly 1 billion dollars in aid being offered by other countries.

I don’t disagree with this assessment. But I would add that even if it was not seen as an embarrassment to the Bush administration, his State Department was incapable of accepting and using the aid.

This is the result of one-way relations with foreign countries. We are no longer able to participate in the world community as a member. We know how to give, but not receive. We have isolated ourselves and can only “receive” by forcibly taking with our superior military and economic might.

Opinion from Oyster:

We pour hundreds of millions of tax dollars into Iraqi nation-building projects that quickly become inoperable, all in the name of reconstructing a divided country that views us as occupiers, wants us to leave, and thinks its ok to kill our troops.

And then we refuse hundreds of millions of international donations to Americans on the Gulf Coast, who suffered from devastating hurricanes and a Federal Flood.

The Iraq conflict is another example of our one-way relations with the rest of the world. A preemptive attack on a country which could not attack us or our interests, and would not be able to in at least my generation, possibly never. Not much to preempt there. But plenty to take. And that’s what we did.

And, as Oyster points out, it affects us back home. This is most evident when our President will sign a bill if it has $90 billion to be spent in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he will veto that bill if it also includes another $3.5 billion to be spent on the Gulf Coast for hurricane recovery.

So, the Gulf Coast Embargo stretches from no foreign aid easily entering our borders to no domestic aid easily entering our borders. And it is enforced by that which is stronger than the sword: the President’s pen - which could, with deft swipes, sign off on the supplemental spending bill that will further fund our recovery and also eliminate the 10 percent match that has stalled many a local project along the Gulf Coast.

One aspect of the refused foreign aid aggravates me more than any other:

In another instance, the Department of Homeland Security accepted an offer from Greece on Sept. 3, 2005, to dispatch two cruise ships that could be used free as hotels or hospitals for displaced residents. The deal was rescinded Sept. 15 after it became clear a ship would not arrive before Oct. 10. The U.S. eventually paid $249 million to use Carnival Cruise Lines vessels.

Did the Bush administration think that the recovery effort would be wrapped up by October 10, 2005? This demonstrates a lack of comprehension of how long the recovery would take and what would be needed to do what it takes.

Interesting thing about that Canival Cruise Line contract. In February 2006, then ranking minority member Henry Waxman on the Committee of Government Reform wanted an explanation for why a familiar name popped up when the contract was being negotiated:

A top House Democrat released e-mails Tuesday detailing Florida Gov. Jeb Bush's role in pushing a $236 million federal contract for Carnival Cruise Lines to house Hurricane Katrina victims.

In a letter, Rep. Henry Waxman of California called on Bush to explain his role in the award of the "lucrative contract," which was given to the Florida-based company without a full competitive bid process.

***

According to Waxman, Bush forwarded to Brown, then the FEMA director, an e-mail from a Carnival advertising executive proposing that the company's ships be used for housing two days after the Aug. 29 storm.

The Carnival official, Ric Cooper, has been a major political donor to the Florida and national Republican parties, including $65,000 to the state GOP in 2002, and $50,00 to the RNC in 2004, Waxman said.

Less than three hours later, Brown replied to Cooper, saying he thought it was a "great idea."

"One of my HQ folks working the housing issue is going to contact you directly," Brown wrote. "If you haven't heard from them by close of business tomorrow, please call me on my cell phone ...Thanks. MDB"

The correspondence was a little more intimate than the AP article demonstrated. That last paragraph from Waxman’s actual letter (PDF), emphasis mine:

Ric, thanks for the note that Jeb sent. I personally think this is a great idea. One of my HQ folks working the housing issue…

Apparently, the Gulf Coast Embargo does not extend to well-connected Florida Republicans.

Guns Don’t Kill People

2007-04-23T10:12:00.000-05:00

13-year-olds with guns attempt to kill people:

A 13-year-old boy was booked with attempted murder after he allegedly shot a man in the stomach a week ago, Kenner police said Friday.

The boy, who is not being identified by police because he is a juvenile, also was booked with attempted armed robbery in an incident involving the same victim. A 15-year-old boy was booked with being a principal to attempted second-degree murder.

Both the 13-year-old and the 15-year-old had guns:

Police said that on April 14 the boys approached two men at 8 p.m. on Phoenix Street. Each boy pointed a handgun within inches of the men's faces and demanded money, said James Gallagher, Kenner Police Department spokesman.

The brother of one of the men, standing a short distance away, threw a bottle at the boys and they ran off, police said.

Three hours later, the two boys again approached Phoenix Street, where one of the attempted-robbery victims was standing outside his residence talking with friends. Police said the 13-year-old boy shot him in the stomach, from across the street. The boys then ran away.

The two boys came back to shoot the man. And the 13-year-old allegedly pulled the trigger.

13 and 15. And they both had guns.

Doing What It Takes

2007-04-18T12:10:00.000-05:00

On April 16, 2007, the President spoke about the emergency supplemental spending bill that Congress plans to pass and the President plans to veto:

We must give our men and women in uniform the tools and resources they need to prevail. Providing these resources is the responsibility of the United States Congress. And that is why, 70 days ago, I sent Congress an emergency war spending bill that would provide the vital funds our troops urgently need. But instead of approving this funding, Democrats in Congress have spent the past 70 days pushing legislation that would undercut our troops. They passed bills in the House and the Senate that would impose restrictions on our military commanders. They set an arbitrary date for withdrawal from Iraq. And they spend billions of dollars on domestic projects that have nothing to do with the war.

President Bush wants to do what it takes to prevail in Iraq. We all remember another pledge to do what it takes:

And tonight I also offer this pledge of the American people: Throughout the area hit by the hurricane, we will do what it takes. We will stay as long as it takes to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives.

It appears that doing what it takes in Iraq is at odds with doing what it takes to rebuild communities and lives on the Gulf Coast.

The President plans to veto the emergency supplemental spending bill in its current form because it will “impose restrictions on our military commanders” and “spend billions of dollars on domestic projects that have nothing to do with the war.”

One of those domestic projects that have nothing to do with the war is a $1.3 billion allocation to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to make up for a $1.3 billion dollar hole in the levee building funding on the East and West Banks.

To make up for the lack of funding on the West Bank, the USACE proposed to shift money from East Bank projects over to the West Bank, leaving a hole in the East Bank funding:

If approved, the plan has the potential to slow new levee work on the East Bank, where most of New Orleans is situated, and pit the city's residents against those on the West Bank.

***

The corps says projects on the East Bank will continue and that the levee system is as good now as it was before Katrina. Plans to further improve that system are tied up in technical reviews, according to the corps.

Whether or not the East Bank projects will be slowed by diverting the funds now, at some point the money *will be needed* and will have to be allocated.

The President says the levee funds should not be tied to his “emergency war spending bill,” what I call the emergency supplemental spending bill.

Mary Landrieu, at her committee meeting last week, explained why it *must* be:

We are 1.3 billion short and we can not get this money if it is moved out of the regular appropriations, and I will tell you why.

The total appropriations for the entire United States of America for new construction for the Corps of Engineers is only 1.5 billion. So I most certainly can not be put in the position as the appropriator representing Louisiana to go ask the committee for all the money they have for this levee project. And I’m not going to do it.

So, I need you to take this message back to the President. This money has to come to us through emergency supplemental, it can come in this emergency supplemental or another one. I can not fund this through regular appropriations and he needs to ask for it. And if he doesn’t, we will put it in supplemental.

That’s my transcript from the committee’s video about 58 minutes and 33 seconds in.

In his fiscal year 2008 budget proposal, President Bush asked for $1.523 billion for new construction projects other than specifically allocated projects. Bush didn’t ask for the $1.3 billion needed to fully fund the levee projects already on the books (i.e. “do what it takes”) in his regular budget request. He doesn’t want the $1.3 billion added to the supplemental bill. That means another supplemental bill would have to be passed. And that takes time.

When the President made his budget request the USACE said we have time:

Woodley denied suggestions that "reallocating" the money would put residents at risk. He said designs have to be completed -- -- a process that can take many months -- before pumping stations can be built, levees raised or floodgates erected.

How much time?

My full transcript of Mary Landrieu and Federal Coordinator for Gulf Coast Rebuilding Donald Powell at the Ad Hoc Subcommittee on Disaster Recovery hearing on 4/12/07 talking about President Bush’s commitment to the Gulf Coast, the shifting $1.3 billion, and – strangely enough – the Saints:

MARY LANDRIEU: You say in your testimony, quote, “The President Bush promised a better and stronger hurricane protection system.” This statement seems inconsistent, however, with the administration’s recent request to shift $1.3 billion previously allocated between levee projects instead of authorizing and additional 1.3.

Um…

This Congress has put the 1.3 back in the budget. The President says he’s issued a veto threat saying it is neither necessary… and it’s extraneous…uh, it’s not, um… it’s not cost effective.

I know you have to carry the President’s message. But, what would you say if I argued with you that his words are not matching his budget documents?

DONALD POWELL: Senator, let the record also reflect that I am a New Orleans Saints fan. [mumble…laugh]

ML: Do not try to divert… [crosstalk…laughter]

***

DP: I spend a lot of time briefing the President on the Gulf Coast area. Without question there is no reservation in my mind that he’s committed to building the levee system better and stronger than it has ever been. And there’s no question in my mind that he’s committed to spending the necessary money to protect the people against a one hundred year flood. No question in my mind.

The vehicle… as I understand it, the reason for transferring the 1.3 billion from one supplemental to another supplemental – and I’m not a legislative person and I don’t understand the mechanics of that; but I do understand his commitment – was to make sure that work did not cease, and make sure that work would continue and would not stop because, as I understand it, when Congress appropriates it, it appropriates it for specific issues. The way I describe it, in my simple mind, you’ve got five or six check books. And you can only write a check out of that account for specific areas. So, when that checkbook has a zero balance and this one has money in it, we want to transfer from that checkbook to that checkbook in order for that work to continue.

But, there’s no question in my mind about his commitment. 58.10

ML: You have described the process, but I have to get on the record that that checkbook system only works if you’ve got someone actually filling in when all the checkbooks actually go down to zero with the appropriate amount of money.

Now, if you start of short a billion dollars, it doesn’t matter how much is in each checkbook because at the end you’re still going to be a billion short. And that’s my problem. And that’s our problem.

We are 1.3 billion short and we can not get this money if it is moved out of the regular appropriations, and I will tell you why.

The total appropriations for the entire United States of America for new construction for the Corps of Engineers is only 1.5 billion. So I most certainly can not be put in the position as the appropriator representing Louisiana to go ask the committee for all the money they have for this levee project. And I’m not going to do it.

So, I need you to take this message back to the President. This money has to come to us through emergency supplemental, it can come in this emergency supplemental or another one. I can not fund this through regular appropriations and he needs to ask for it. And if he doesn’t, we will put it in supplemental.

Global Warming Builds Hurricanes Up to Knock Them Down

2007-04-18T00:42:00.000-05:00

This is one I haven't heard before:

Study: Global warming may diminish Atlantic hurricane activity

***

Vecchi and Soden used 18 complex computer climate models to anticipate the effects of warming in the years 2001-2020 and 2018-2100.

Included in the results were an increase in vertical wind shear over the tropical Atlantic and eastern Pacific oceans.

Vertical wind shear is a difference in wind speed or direction at different altitudes. When a hurricane encounters vertical wind shear the hurricane can weaken when the heat of rising air dissipates over a larger area.

So, warmer water fuels hurricanes, but can also create more hurricane-weakening wind shear.

We really don't know what's going to happen in the future, do we?

The History of the Pumps

2007-04-17T11:56:00.000-05:00

Government issued:

In January 2006, the Corps placed an order for 34 60-inch temporary pumps -- 12 for 17th Street Canal, 12 for London Avenue Canal, and 10 for Orleans Avenue Canal. The new pumps began arriving in New Orleans in late spring, before the 2006 hurricane season.

As soon as the pumps arrived, they were immediately installed by construction crews working 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In addition, the contract was modified in early summer to add six more pumps to the 17th Street Canal, bringing the total for all three canals to 40 pumps, with 18 of those for 17th Street.

"We installed the new temporary pumps as fast as we received them," said Mr. Jim St. Germain, a senior project manager in the Hurricane Protection Office. "We had crews working at the outfall canals around the clock; they were even doing some of the work at night, under lights. We were determined to make our pre-hurricane season goal, and we did."

That is not the usual means for manufacturing and installing massive equipment like these pumps. Under normal circumstances, whether for government or private industry, performance tests would be done on the equipment at the factory by the manufacturer before delivery, without observation by the government. Any operational problems would be repaired or adjusted there, and the equipment would be tested and re-tested until it meets performance expectations. When the performance is satisfactory, then the equipment would be installed in its intended location.

That's what happens under normal circumstances.

But following Katrina, the Corps did not have the luxury of working under normal circumstances. To quickly reduce the public risk, Corps personnel were placed at the factory to document manufacturer's tests, resulting in a series of reports regarding the pumps' capabilities.

"When we installed the new pumps, we knew they weren't operating to full effectiveness," said Col. Jeffrey Bedey, Hurricane Protection Office commander. "We had numerous engineering reports which told us that. But if we had done this in the traditional manner, it would have taken four to five years to get the pumps in place. Instead, we put the pumps in at the sites in a matter of months. To reduce the risk to the community for the next hurricane season, we wanted the pumps on the ground. We decided we would work out the final testing on the pumps in place."

It was reported that the new pumps vibrated when first tested at the outfall canals.

"Some of them did, but we did not see failure when the pumps vibrated," Col. Bedey said. "They would not have operated perfectly, but they would have provided pumping if we had needed it in 2006."

Col. Bedey compared the pump situation to an automobile. "When you know your car engine has a problem, you would prefer to repair it rather than drive it. But if you're in an emergency situation, you'll go ahead and drive it and get where you need to be, and then fix it when you can. That's basically what we did with the pumps."

There you go.

Overheard on Local Talk Radio Today

2007-04-17T11:42:00.000-05:00

“That’s our God-given right to have guns in this country.”

Mary Landrieu Asked about the $110 Billion

2007-04-16T02:29:00.000-05:00

The U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Ad Hoc Subcommittee on Disaster Recovery held a hearing last Thursday entitled “GAO’s Analysis of the Gulf Coast Recovery: A Dialogue on Removing Obstacles to the Recovery Effort.”

Mary Landrieu, as Chairwoman of the subcommittee, asked the first question, which she addressed to Stanley Czerwinski, the Director of Strategic Issues, U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). There’s a link on this page to the video of the entire hearing. Here’s my transcript of Landrieu’s question about 36 minutes and 16 seconds in:

MARY LANDRIEU: You mentioned the $110 billion, and that’s a number that’s thrown around here a lot for different reasons. But, we’ll leave those aside.

I’d like to get just clear for the record. If you could, say, break down the 110 billion as you did in your testimony, but, repeat it, how much has gone for immediate short term, individual assistance, how much for the insurance, which people paid premiums for, although the program came up. And what has been basically the remaining for the rebuilding effort?

You said most of the money has gone for the short term… smaller amount for the long term. And could you be a little more clear about those numbers.

STANLEY CZERWINSKI: Sure thing, Landrieu. Um…

When is comes to disasters, it’s very difficult to come up with precise accounting funds because of the way that it’s budgeted.

Czerwinksi begins his answer by saying it is hard to answer. He goes on to say that about $16 billion has gone to rebuilding through Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) and a “segment” of the public assistance money has gone to rebuilding. He does not give the exact number of that segment, but says in is not more than the CDBG money.

He starts to address insurance, but Landrieu interrupts him. Here’s my transcript of what is said about 38 minutes in:

MARY LANDRIEU: Well, it’s very important for the country to understand this. So, if you want to present this testimony to the committee in a different way, then you can.

But, it’s very important for us to have on the record of this committee, as much as we can, where this $110 billion has gone to, to date, so we can arrive at whether we’ve spent enough or not spent enough for what it’s going to.

That’s it. That’s really all I’ve been trying to get at all this time. If the Gulf Coast has gotten $110 billion to rebuild, where is it? How can we know if it is enough to rebuild if we don’t know how much has gone to rebuilding?

That’s all I want to know. And, now that we have a Congress controlled by Democrats, it looks like we will finally find out. When Democrats took over Congress, this subcommittee was created, and Mary Landrieu got the chair and the chance to ask the GAO about the $110 billion we’ve heard so much about from the White House.

Chairwoman Landrieu continues:

MARY LANDRIEU: So, I think, for the purposes here, we can say that not much more than 16 billion has gone to the long term recovery. It could be another half of that amount or…

STANLEY CZERWINSKI: That’s probably fair.

ML: …would that be near. I don’t want to lead you here.

SC: That’s probably fair. Rough magnitude.

Money given to the Gulf Coast for long term recovery after the hurricanes: “not much more than $16 billion.”

$110 billion my ass.

Mary Landrieu, Democrat-LA, continues:

ML: We know that 23 billion went to flood… flood. And Chairman Powell, if you have these numbers. 23 billion went to flood. The rest of it basically went to immediate emergency shelter, individual temporary assistance in the direct aftermath of the disaster because of the multitude, millions of people involved in that evacuation, resheltering effort, etc.

Is that accurate?

SC: That’s correct Madam Chair.

Landrieu mentioned the flood insurance payments. Earlier, she mentioned that we paid premiums for that flood insurance.

Finally, someone mentioned that we paid premiums for that flood insurance. Yes, almost $21 billion that goes to paying those flood claims had to be borrowed from the U.S. Treasury (the other $2 billion comes from premiums).

But that $23 billion is not rebuilding money. It is holding-up-the-federal-government’s-side-of-the-contract money:

You can count on your claim being paid in the event of a flood loss because NFIP flood insurance is backed by the Federal government.

You can count on your federal government. But can your federal government count?

Someone Murdered a New Orleanian and Was Caught, Convicted, and Sentenced

2007-04-13T10:31:00.000-05:00

In Houston:

Christopher Devon Jackson heard his death sentence Thursday, and wept.

***

Jackson, 22, was convicted of capital murder two weeks ago for carjacking Eric James Smith and killing him with a sawed-off shotgun as Smith talked on the phone with a 911 operator.

***

Smith, 34, had come to Houston after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in late August 2005. He was refueling his rented sport utility vehicle at a gas station in the 6700 block of West Airport when Jackson took it at gunpoint before dawn on Dec. 5.

The death sentence is abhorrent. But that’s not why I point this out.

How many convictions have we had in New Orleans for murders that happened after Katrina? We’ve had at least 230 murders in New Orleans since the storm. How many convictions?

How many convictions for *any* murders have we had?

I know it takes a while to get a conviction. The Houston case happened in December 2005, and a conviction came just two weeks ago. We are behind because the courts shut down after Katrina, evidence was lost in the federal flood, and we don’t have the resources to fully investigate murders after the storm.

But it would be nice to have some examples that the criminal justice system is working after the storm when it comes to violent crime. That is, if it is working…

"they would then have to settle"

2007-04-12T10:46:00.000-05:00

And we wouldn’t want that:

E-mails sent by officials of an engineering firm that assessed Hurricane Katrina claims suggest that State Farm Insurance Co. wanted engineers to blame damage on flooding so that it could make minimum settlements with policyholders.

***

In a reply dated Oct. 18, 2005, Down [an engineering firm official] questioned the insurer's motivations and questioned if there was an ethical problem with State Farm telling the firm what to put in reports. He also suggested that on another occasion, State Farm asked the firm to remove information from a report because "they would then have to settle."

And then there’s this from Allstate. Less conclusive, but just as sketchy:

An engineer who testified Tuesday at the trial for a Louisiana couple’s lawsuit against Allstate Insurance Co. said he wrote a report on the plaintiffs’ storm-damaged home without inspecting the property after Hurricane Katrina.

***

Rogers [the engineer who testified] said he didn’t have any contact with anyone from the Northbrook, Ill.-based insurer before he rewrote Neva’s report.

Rogers, who testified Tuesday during the second day of the trial in federal court, said he wrote reports on several hundred Gulf Coast properties after the Aug. 29, 2005, storm without conducting site inspections for more than half of them.

Allstate attorney Judy Barrasso asked Rogers if it’s “perfectly proper” to write a report on a home without inspecting the property.

“It’s common,” said Rogers, who acknowledged, “Ideally, you want to be able to go out there.”

Someone did visit the house:

James Neva, an engineer who inspected the Weisses' Slidell home, initially told the couple that he believed a hurricane-spawned tornado destroyed the house.

But Neva, who worked for Rimkus Consulting Group, later backed away from that conclusion and deferred to another Rimkus engineer who wrote the final report on the Weisses' home. The other engineer, Craig Rogers, concluded that Katrina's storm surge was responsible for the majority of the damage.

Rogers’ conclusion may be correct. It just doesn’t look good when the engineer who visited the house defers to an engineer who didn’t, and the end result is Allstate pays out much less.

New Orleans: the Place to Be for Criminals

2007-04-12T01:38:00.000-05:00

Going by the picture painted by our leaders:

"My office is a FEMA trailer," Police Superintendent Warren Riley told three members of Congress who presided over a four-hour hearing on the city's criminal justice system Tuesday at Dillard University.

***

In 2005, the police force rose to a roster of 1,741, Riley said, but today is short 482 officers while the homicide rate is at pre-Katrina levels while only about half the population has returned.

"As of April 5, 2007, we've lost another 49 officers," said Riley…

***

"We have one firearms examiner and one fingerprint examiner left," Riley said. The crime lab's backlog includes more than 200 guns and about 2,000 narcotics, all awaiting forensic tests.

***

"I'm asking for very specific things," Nagin said, ticking off a $17 million request for vehicles and equipment, $4 million to provide jobs for 2,000 young people, and $10 million for substance abuse treatment. "We need immediate help. We just don't have the resources at this time."

***

Jordan said his office is at its third temporary location since the district's attorney's office building on South White Street flooded after the levees failed. His lawyers work on card tables, he said, and deal with victims and witnesses who fear testifying because, it seems to them, criminals don't stay in jail very long.

"We desperately need additional prosecutors to screen violent crime in particular," Jordan said. "We need funding for a victim and witness program because of the very real fear victims of violent crime have in this city of New Orleans."

A criminal justice system without offices. A police force hemorrhaging officers. A crime lab that can’t keep up with the number of cases. A mayor saying we need immediate help because we don’t have the resources to fight crime. A district attorney saying he needs funding because violent crime witnesses have a “very real fear” of criminals who, it “seems,” don’t stay in jail very long.

What…. Are we trying to recruit criminals?

If we don’t have the resources for the New Orleans we want, we might have to accept the New Orleans we have. While that might seem like common sense to many of you, that’s a pretty big leap for me. Different conclusions can be made from that premise than I have previously made.

When it comes to crime, particularly violent crime, post-Katrina New Orleans can’t cope. And fighting for more funds from an unwilling federal government for various recovery goals might be taking us away from actually recovering.

I am not giving up. The federal government bears much responsibility for the federal flood and slow response after the federal flood. But, Uncle Sam is not going to buy a brand new, shiny New Orleans for us all.

I just need to rethink my strategy a little.

Taking Years Off My Life

2007-04-06T12:22:00.000-05:00

I know. I know. He’s Michael Brown. I shouldn’t pay attention to what he has to say. It’s bad for my health.

But I just can’t stop myself and he just keeps opening his mouth:

But Brown also accepted some blame for FEMA's slow response to the disaster, and said he lied about what FEMA was doing in response to the hurricane.

He said it was "meaningless" when he said FEMA was moving more cots, food, blankets and rescuers into the Gulf Coast than it had for any other disaster in the United States because there weren't enough supplies and people to meet the victims' needs and the supplies weren't going where they needed to.

"I should not have lied," he said.

When asked why he lied, Brown said, "People get fired for telling the truth."

He said lying is a "systemic problem" in Washington, but "when it comes to life and death issues, you should really tell the truth."

Is it too late to call the police and have him arrested?

ADDED: The link above does not cite a source for the article. This link cites the AP.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar Day

2007-04-06T00:39:00.000-05:00

My ignorance prevents me from knowing what to make of this:

The city of New Orleans has celebrated a day in honour of Indian spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, in recognition of his distinguished services to humanity.

The New Orleans city council declared April 3 as 'His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar Day' and the Art of Living founder was presented with the 'key to the city' by Mayor Ray Nagin at a function in the city hall Wednesday, according to a press release.

Apparently, he has an extensive collection of days in his name.

It’s Like When Buffy the Vampire Slayer Was On the Air

2007-04-05T02:02:00.000-05:00

I can’t wait for the next episode.

The latest from Fix the Pumps: the pipes are all rusty.

Previous episodes: the pipes are not thick enough; duct tape and other things that should not be on submerged pipes; the Corps wants to test a weak spot on the London Avenue Canal; testing pumps in the dark; and a memo with the title “DEFECTIVE PUMPING EQUIPMENT.”

It would make a great soap opera if it weren't real.

FEMA – New and Old

2007-04-05T01:17:00.000-05:00

The New FEMA:

"We're going into the hurricane season as a stronger organization, as a more nimble organization, and as a more forward-leaning organization," David Paulison said at the National Hurricane Conference, vowing that the agency will focus on people instead of bureaucracy.

"We want a FEMA that is much more sensitive, that has a heart," he said.

The Old FEMA:

"Shame on those people if they don't evacuate and put into place plans they have to evacuate. It's bold for someone to go against the mayor and say we need to get out of here. I think the president should have gone on TV and said the same thing," said [Michael] Brown.

The New FEMA:

Paulison, who was confirmed by the Senate last year and did not lead the agency when Katrina struck, said last year's mild hurricane season gave his agency some time to refocus and reorganize. Politics is being taken out of top assignments, he said, as regional directors are hired based on their experience as career staffers.

The Old FEMA:

"People knew what I meant when I wrote those e-mails and I'm not going to take them back. I don't want to," said Brown. "People think I just showed up one day and became FEMA director. I worked my way up."

The History of the Levees

2007-04-04T12:04:00.000-05:00

As written by the victors.

In this US Army Corps of Engineers response [PDF] “to speculation and concern about temporary pumps,” the USACE provides a history of the levees. Some of it can be read as “We told you so”:

In 1965, when the Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Protection Project was originally authorized, it did not require flood protection improvements along the 17th Street, London Avenue or Orleans Avenue Canals. The reason for this was that the proposed barriers at the Rigolets and Chef Passes were intended to keep the design storm surge out of Lake Pontchartrain.

Implication: If the barriers at the passes had been built, the floodwalls at the outfall canals would have held.

Why weren’t the barriers at the passes built? According to the USACE, the environmentalists shut them down:

In response to the 1977 injunction (due to a lawsuit by Save Our Wetlands) challenging the Corps’ Environmental Impact Statement, the Lake Pontchartrain and Vicinity Hurricane Protection Project was re-evaluated. The 1985 Reevaluation Report by the Corps eliminated the Rigolets and Chef Barriers from the project and, instead, recommended higher levees along the southern lakeshore of Lake Pontchartrain.

And the outfall canal levees were then deemed inadequate, leading to the inadequate construction of floodwalls on the 17th Street Canal and London Avenue Canal.

This version of the history of the levees is accurate, but (surprise, surprise) inadequate. It leaves out an interesting detail that the Government Accountability Office included [PDF]in its history:

In fact, Corps staff believe that flooding would have been worse if the original proposed design had been built because the storm surge would likely have gone over the top of the barrier and floodgates, flooded Lake Pontchartain, and gone over the original lower levees planned for the lakefront area as part of the barrier plan.

More official UASCE history [PDF]:

In the mid to late 1980s, the Corps of Engineers recommended the construction of storm surge gates at the London Avenue and Orleans Avenue outfall canals to block the design storm surge from entering the canals.

The gates, of course, are being built now, along with gates at the 17th Street Canal.

Continuing the history lesson:

Ultimately, for the 17th Street Canal, the Corps agreed to and recommended construction of the locally preferred plan which consisted of floodwalls instead of a structure at the mouth of the canal. The Corps agreement was based on the fact that the estimated cost for each alternative was almost equal.

The cost for the gated structures at London Avenue and Orleans Avenue outfall canals was far less expensive than the locally preferred floodwalls. Therefore, the Corps maintained that the additional costs for construction of those floodwalls would have to be paid by the local sponsor. The local sponsor, the Orleans Levee District, did not want to pay those additional costs.

Finally, Congress passed the Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act (EWDAA) of 1992 that directed the Corps of Engineers to construct floodwalls along London Avenue and Orleans Avenue outfall canals, the locally-preferred plan.

Implication: Politicians forced the USACE to build floodwalls on the London Avenue and Orleans Avenue Canals instead of what they wanted to do, build gates, which they are now building.

My opinion: the USACE public relations strategy is “We didn’t build a defective levee system. We were forced by local interests to build a levee system we didn’t want to build, which ultimately failed. We are now building the levee system we had originally planned to build. We hate to say it; but, we told you so.”

Of course, my opinion doesn't get written into the history books.

More Than Numbers

2007-04-03T12:37:00.000-05:00

April 3, 2007, is 93 days into the year. In that period, New Orleans has seen 53 murders. That’s an average of one murder every 1.75 days. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 208 murders. In a population of 223,000, that comes to a murder rate of 93 per 100,000 residents.

I use numbers like that on this blog all the time. I like numbers. Depending on how you look at them, they can tell all kinds of stories.

But, when it comes to murders, these are more than numbers. Look at the average. If it stays the same, 155 more people will die in New Orleans this year.

If something doesn’t change, 155 more people will die a violent death on the streets of New Orleans this year.

The good thing about these numbers (if there is a good thing) is that it is an average. We will not necessarily have a murder every 1.75 days for the rest of the year. We can change that.

The bad thing is anything we change will be too late for 53 people – both good and bad people. And I am not so optimistic that any change will come quickly.

I am also not optimistic that the current leadership *can* change anything. Look at the last 12 months’ murder statistics by quarters, from the NOPD and my count:

39 murders (April – May – June 2006)
53 murders (July – August – September 2006)
53 murders (October – November – December 2006)
48 murders (January – February – March 2007)

193 murders in the last four quarters.

If you include the last two days, the total is 198 murders in the last four quarters plus April 1 and 2, 2007.

When not a lot has changed, why should we expect anything to change?

No Conspiracy Here

2007-04-02T09:31:00.000-05:00

Google Maps back to, umm... normal?

The Mayor Who Wasn’t There

2007-04-01T23:44:00.000-05:00

I am sure he had a good reason. And it wasn’t the most important announcement in the world.

But this is the way the story was told:

At a Tuesday morning event kicking off the one-month countdown to Jazzfest, Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu cracked jokes and talked up economic development.

City Council President Oliver Thomas second-lined.

Jazzfest producer Quint Davis predicted the best fest ever.

And Mayor Ray Nagin was nowhere to be found.

Nothing unusual there.

Is that fair? Is Nagin the mayor who wasn’t there?

What's Going On?

2007-04-01T10:28:00.000-05:00

As of April 1, 2007, there have been 48 murders in New Orleans this year. With 90 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of one murder every 1.875 days – basically, a murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 194 murders. In a city of 223,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 87 murders per 100,000 residents.

The NOPD released their 2006 crime statistics. The headline: “Cops say violent crime fell 22%.” The NOPD is comparing 2005 stats, when the city was evacuated for much of the last half of the year, and 2006 stats, when citizens were slowly moving back throughout the year.

NOPD spokesman Sgt. Joe Narcisse on how Katrina affected the crime stats:

"It is what it is," he said. "We may be able to (attribute) some of the reduction to Katrina."

Yeah, maybe.

In the first quarter of 2005 (Jan-Feb-Mar), there were 65 murders. In the first quarter of 2006, there were 17 murders. Maybe – just maybe – the NOPD can attribute some of that reduction to Katrina.

In the first quarter of 2007, there were 48 murders. Compared to 17 murders last year during the same period, that’s a large increase. I guess, if we think like the NOPD, maybe – just maybe – we can attribute some of that increase to the absence of a Katrina-like event. April fools.

Not an April fool:

January – 17 murders.

February – 13 murders.

March – 18 murders.

03/02/07 – 1 murder, victim died 03/17/07

31) In an unrelated case, a man shot on March 2 near Canal Street and North Claiborne Avenue died Saturday at University Hospital, Gagliano said.

Josh Rodrique was found in the 2000 block of Iberville Street, near North Prieur street, on March 2 shortly before 7 p.m., police said. He had been shot once in the neck, police and the coroner's office said.

03/03/07 – 1 murder

32) Tonight, members of the New Orleans Police Department are investigating the shooting death of a local male, whose identity is being withheld pending notification of family members. The offense occurred shortly before 11:00 p.m., in the 1100 block of North Prieur Street.

According to investigators, First District officers responded to a call of “ shots fired” and, upon their arrival, found the victim lying in the street suffering from multiple gunshot wounds to his head and body. Emergency medical technicians arrived on the scene and pronounced the victim dead.

03/04/07 – 2 murders

33) A lover's spat turned deadly early Sunday in the Lower Garden District when a 43-year-old woman fatally plunged a kitchen knife into her boyfriend's chest, police said.

Yolanda Anderson stabbed her live-in boyfriend shortly after 12:30 a.m. in the 1800 block of Chippewa Street, police said.

Byron Love, 46, was pronounced dead upon arrival at University Hospital, said John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish coroner's office. He died from a stab wound to the chest.

34) A man was shot and killed Sunday night in Central City, New Orleans police said.

The shooting happened about 9:05 p.m. in the 1400 block of Magnolia Street between Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Thalia Street, in the area of the Guste public housing complex.

03/05/07 – 1 murder

35) A security guard at a FEMA trailer park was shot to death Monday in the latest violence to wrack the city still struggling to recover from Hurricane Katrina, police said.

The shooting, around 5:15 a.m., was at a trailer park in Gentilly, a section of the city that flooded during Katrina. A few hours earlier, another man was shot and killed near the Guste public housing complex.

03/09/07 – 1 murder

36) A 25-year-old man identified by relatives as Kevin Pham was shot dead inside his family's house in the 1300 block of N. Lemans Street.
Police responded the the shooting in the Village D'lest neighborhood in eastern New Orleans shortly before 10 a.m. Wednesday. The victim died at the scene. His car was in the driveway, still running, with hazard lights on.

03/10/07 – 3 murders

37) A 22-year-old woman was shot to death in Treme early Saturday and her 25-year-old friend wounded in the ankle, according to New Orleans police.
The double shooting took place just after 5 a.m. at the intersection of Gov. Nicholls and North Roman streets while the couple was walking, said New Orleans Police Department spokesman Sgt. Joe Narcisse.

38) Around 11 a.m., police received word of a shooting in the 7800 block of Venice Blvd, Narcisse said. Seventh District Officers found the victim lying in the street with gunshot wounds to his head and arm. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

39) The latest murder occurred in Mid-City, near the intersection of Esplanade Avenue and Columbus Street, shortly after 2 p.m., according to Joe Narcisse, an NOPD spokesman. A 23-year-old man was killed at that location. Police found shell casings covering a two block area and an AK-47.

03/18/07 – 1 murder

40) A man shot several times Sunday afternoon in a yard in the 9th Ward died about six hours later at a hospital, the Orleans Parish coroner's office said Monday night.

Sean Robinson, 31, was shot shortly before 4 p.m. in a yard next to a house in the 1200 block of Piety Street, police said.

03/24/07 – 1 murder

41) A New Orleans teenager was killed during a drive-by shooting early Saturday that left three other people wounded, New Orleans police said.
Larry Ramee III, 16, died at North Broad Street and Orleans Avenue from gunshot wounds, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said.

03/25/07 – 2 murders, (02/27/07 victim dies)

42) In the other case, Warren Simpson, 22, who recently returned to New Orleans from Houston, was shot along with a second man Sunday about 6 p.m. in the 1500 block of North Roman Street in the 7th Ward.

Simpson was sitting in the passenger side of a car when another man approached and shot Simpson and a man standing nearby.

Simpson got out of the car and ran a few steps before dying between Laharpe and Lapeyrouse streets.

43) Antoine Williams, 17, of New Orleans was found shot to death Sunday about 7 p.m. in a vacant residence in Central City, New Orleans police said.

Police said they were called about a "male down" in a house and found Williams shot in the head at 2510 Freret St. Williams was not supposed to be in the house, which is between Second and Third streets, police said.

03/26/07 – 1 murder

44) A New Orleans man shot in the drive-through of an Algiers fastfood business Monday died Tuesday morning from his wounds, New Orleans Police said.

Terry Despenza, 23, died at local hospital after receiving several gunshot wounds to the body while he waiting at a McDonalds near the intersection of General DeGaulle and Cypress Acres drives.

03/27/07 – 1 murder

45) A 31-year-old New Orleans man was fatally shot late Tuesday night in eastern New Orleans, police said.

A National Guard unit on patrol around 11:10 p.m. discovered a red Dodge Charger in a wooded area in the 7800 block of Paris Road, according to a news release from the New Orleans Police Department.

Inside the vehicle, the guardsmen found a man slumped over with a gunshot wound to the body, police said.

03/28/07 – 1 murder

46) A 32-year-old Algiers man was killed at his home Wednesday afternoon and New Orleans police were questioning a man they believe might have been involved.

Travis Johnson, of 1644 Shirley Drive, died at a hospital after being shot once in the face with a handgun shortly before 11:30 a.m. Capt. D.J. Kirsch, commander of the New Orleans Police Department's Fourth District, said that Johnson was the third homicide in Algiers this year.

03/31/07 – 2 murders

47) A 21-year-old New Orleans man was gunned down overnight in the 6000 block of Chef Menteur Highway, police said.

Seventh District officers found the unidentified man riddled with bullets, including one to the head, inside a blue Chevrolet Tahoe, shortly before 3 a.m. The victim was pronounced dead on the scene.

48) Fourth District officers were called about 7 p.m. to the 1100 block of Horace Street in Algiers, where they found the teenager lying dead on a lawn from gunshot wounds to the body.

Here's a map of the 2007 murders:

What’s going on in that corner of New Orleans East?

I mean, what's going on?

UPDATE: NOLA-dishu's detailed crime maps.

U.S. Representative Questions Google about Using Pre-Katrina Images

2007-03-30T23:39:00.000-06:00

Seriously:

Rep. Brad Miller, Chairman of the Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee of the House Science & Technology Committee, today asked Google Chairman Eric Schmidt to explain why Google had changed its satellite maps of the New Orleans region to pre-Hurricane Katrina images.

“If current Google Maps satellite imagery is to be believed, Hurricane Katrina never struck New Orleans, there was never any flooding and thousands of people do not need to be living in trailers because their homes are still habitable,” Miller wrote.

Rep. Miller asked the Google chairman about the Google Conspiracy in a letter, which included these questions [pdf]:

1. What criteria were used by Google to determine that pre-Katrina satellite images would replace post Katrina images on the Google website? Who made that decision?

2. Was there any communication between Google employees and/or officials of the city of New Orleans or any other representative of the city before making this change?

***

5. In the article, Mr. Ohazama stated that he personally received no request for a change in the imagery, but “he added that Google gets many requests from users and governments to update and change its imagery.” How does Google deal with such requests, and how do such requests affect Google’s decision to update imagery?

6. Was Google contacted by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the United States Geological Survey or any other entity of the federal government concerning any changes or revisions of the satellite imagers [sic] for the New Orleans region? If so, when were those requests received, and from whom?

Okay, the fact that a Congressional committee (albeit a House subcommittee) is investigating the Google Conspiracy is weird – and I love weird. But if the answer to questions #2 and #6 turns out to be yes, then things get even weirder – and I love weirder even more.

Question #5, for what it’s worth, was first considered by Jeffrey at Library Chronicles, who also finds all this – in a word – weird.

On the local level, I can’t see Ray “My Google hits probably went up a million that week” Nagin asking Google to change the images. Ed Blakely, maybe. Anyone from the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau, possibly.

But probably not. As I have said before, I don’t think there is a conspiracy here. There is only inaccuracy here. Pre-Katrina satellite images of the flooded areas of the city present an inaccurate map of New Orleans. You use the Satellite or Hybrid function to enhance your comprehension of the Google map you are viewing. Pre-Katrina satellite images distort the viewer’s comprehension by providing inaccurate information, such as multiple houses where there are no houses anymore.

However, to go back to the immediate post-Katrina satellite images would be equally as inaccurate. If I remember correctly, parts of the Lower 9th were flooded in those pics. New Orleans is no longer flooded. And the landscape of the Lower 9th, Lakeview, and Gentilly by the breaches has changed quite a bit.

If there is a conspiracy, though, I can’t wait to find out.

As an example of how inaccurate (and weird) it is to see pre-Katrina satellite pics, look at this July 2006 Metroblogging New Orleans post. The descriptions of what you should see are eerie compared to what you do see.

The Google Conspiracy

2007-03-30T08:37:00.000-06:00

This was bothering me the other day:

Only a few mouse clicks away, a total revision of the recent history of the Big Easy is on offer from Google Inc's popular map portal.

The company has replaced post-Hurricane Katrina satellite imagery of New Orleans with pictures taken before the storm, leaving locals feeling they are in a time loop.

Some people interviewed in the article suggest this is a conspiracy:

The virtual Potemkin village is fuelling the imagination of frustrated locals.

"I think a lot of stuff they're doing right now is smoke and mirrors because tourism is so off," Gerica said. "It might be somebody's weird spin on things looking better."

"Is Google part of the conspiracy?" Henry asked, alluding to widespread feelings among many New Orleans blacks that they are being neglected in the rebuilding.

"Why these images of pre-Katrina? Seems mighty curious."

I don’t know about a conspiracy, but it is inaccurate to have old satellite images of New Orleans. The Lower 9th north of Claiborne doesn’t look like this anymore:

[UPDATE]

Or Lakeview. Or Mid-City. Gentilly. Etc.

If Google were to update its satellite pics of New Orleans and the area, it would be a useful tool for residents here and everywhere to follow the rebuilding process. The nation could see how all their billions upon billions upon billions in tax dollars is being spent in this part of the world. Or not spent.

Of course, Google can do whatever they want with their websites. My big issue is the inaccuracy of the images. They might as well put up an artist’s rendering of the way places like Lakeview and the Lower 9th used to look near the breaches.

Then again, rather than a virtual tour, you could always come and see the real thing.

No War, No Money

2007-03-29T23:33:00.000-06:00

President Bush:

Yesterday I gave a speech, making it clear that I'll veto a bill that restricts our commanders on the ground in Iraq, a bill that doesn't fund our troops, a bill that's got too much spending on it. I made that clear to the members.

We stand united in saying loud and clear that when we've got a troop in harm's way, we expect that troop to be fully funded; and we've got commanders making tough decisions on the ground, we expect there to be no strings on our commanders; and that we expect the Congress to be wise about how they spend the people's money.

Emphasis mine.

How Congress would like to spend the people’s money:

The war spending bill that the U.S. House has passed - which calls for a pullout of troops from Iraq by March of 2008 - could mean some $7.7 billion for areas hit by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, House Democrats said Thursday.

***

The House version of the bill could bring $6.4 billion in cash and almost $1.3 billion more in forgiven loans to the region.

A Senate version passed Thursday included more than $3 billion for hurricane recovery and other projects in Louisiana, Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said in a news release.

But both bills include target deadlines for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq, and Bush has said he will veto any bill with such a requirement. He also has criticized both bills for including domestic projects.

White House spokesperson Dana Perino elaborates on the President's position:

Our troops are in harm's way and engaged with the enemy, and they need the funds. Just this morning the Department of Defense notified Congress that in order to meet the force protection needs of the Marine Corps and the Army we are borrowing funds from other important Marine and Army procurement programs. That is taking funding intended for medium tactical vehicle replacement, Humvees and Humvee equipment, the tactical communications modernization program, and upgrades to other vehicles.

***

This reprogramming of funds is only necessary because Congress has failed to act in a timely manner on the President's emergency funding request. And so this, again, underscores the need to get this show on the road, get the bill to the President, he will veto it, and then we'll take it from there.

Reprogramming funds… you mean like what the Army Corps of Engineers wants to do with the West Bank levees?

The Army Corps of Engineers is proposing to divert up to $1.3 billion for levee repairs from the Mississippi River's East Bank, which was ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, to the West Bank, where tens of thousands of people have resettled.

***

If approved, the plan has the potential to slow new levee work on the East Bank, where most of New Orleans is situated, and pit the city's residents against those on the West Bank.

Why doesn’t Congress act in a timely manner and pass a bill funding both projects so one doesn’t have to steal money from the other?

Oh, wait. That’s what they are trying to do in the bill Bush says he will veto:

Both bills [House and Senate version] include $1.3 billion for levee work.

Early in March, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said it wanted to move that amount from work on east bank levees to shore up dangerously low levees on the west bank, which remained largely free of floods after Hurricane Katrina.

Let’s get this show on the road!

Fun with Road Home Stats

2007-03-29T11:56:00.000-06:00

All together, 4,591 closings. But that is less than hoped:

Louisiana's Road Home program won't hit its March goal for doling out 6,200 grants, partially because hundreds of homeowners are canceling appointments amid confusion about federally backed changes to the hurricane housing grant program.

The Road Home website has a download with all closings by parish, as well as total number of applications per parish.

As of March 22, 2007, in the five southeastern parishes with the most applications:

2.88 percent of Orleans applicants have closed (1360 out of 47,199)

5.65 percent of Jefferson applicants have closed (994 out of 17,577)

1.93 percent of St. Bernard applicants have closed (271 out of 14,034)

5.43 percent of St. Tammany applicants have closed (516 out of 9,488)

0.44 percent of Plaquemines applicants have closed (16 out of 3,600)

The site also has closings by zip code.

Overpricing?!? Overpricing?!?

2007-03-29T01:03:00.000-06:00

What do you mean insurance companies are charging too much for homeowners insurance?

State Farm spokesman Dick Luedke said the insurer pays what it owes, whether the company makes billions of dollars, as it did this year, or losing billions, as it did in 2001.

“Overpricing? Our auto rates declined in 2006 by 2.2 percent,” Luedke said. “That was the third year in a row that our auto rates have gone down.”

I have been a fool all this time to criticize the insurance industry. Oh, benevolent industry experts, enlighten me:

Industry experts argue that the property-casualty insurers did amazingly well in handling Katrina — the most costly catastrophic event ever in the United States — and the other hurricanes in 2004 and 2005.

Robert Hartwig, president and chief economist with the New York-based Insurance Information Institute, points out that the industry has so far “paid $41 billion on 1.74 million claims for Katrina alone — and for the combined 2004-2005 hurricane season, we paid about $81 billion in insured hurricane-related losses.”

The industry’s profits rose in 2006 in part because there were far fewer storms, Hartwig said.

And, he added: “But the good results have more to do with the fact that insurers saw good results in auto insurance, workers comp and a variety of other areas and in states that don’t have a coastline.”

[emphasis mine]

The logical conclusion for the insurance industry: Stop insuring homes in states with a coastline.

Stop writing policies. Refuse to renew existing policies less than three years old. Try to cancel as many policies as possible for other reasons.

Abandon the coast.

But, hey… I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance!

RELATED: Eee vil and “meeting criticism with an arrogant self of entitlement.”

GAO Investigators “Meet” with USACE Officials

2007-03-29T00:03:00.000-06:00

Because that’s what investigators do. They “meet” with you:

Government Accountability Office investigators are meeting with Army Corps of Engineers officials here and in Washington, D.C., to discuss drainage pumps that were installed before the start of last year's hurricane season even though they apparently were defective.

***

Anu Mittal, the GAO's director for water resources, said a large team of investigators has been assembled "to get it done expeditiously" to satisfy a request by U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu to have a report in hand by the middle of May.

In a March 15 letter, Landrieu, D-La., asked the GAO, Congress' investigative and auditing arm, to look into "disturbing suggestions of possible improper influence" in how the job was awarded and handled.

Middle of May. Mark your calendars.

From "Texas’ Oldest Paper"

2007-03-20T09:04:00.000-06:00

The associate editor of the Galveston County Daily News has an opinion:

Texas insurance companies have been in full pout recently about consumers and lawmakers questioning industry profits.

To hear the industry and its associations, you’d think they were being beaten every time they banked a nickel.

The anger and resentment among consumers, and the legislative attention they’ve inspired, are not about simple profit, however.

They are about massive, perhaps historical, profits booked at exactly the time insurers declared the world to be especially risky and began dropping coastal policyholders, seeking rate increases and demanding fundamental regulatory changes.

Sure, it’s been said before. But I like the way he worded that last paragraph. A brief and concise statement of the Gulf Coast consumer’s ire.

I like the way he worded this, too:

Insurers are in the habit of making threats when consumers, through their elected representatives, attempt to arrange the world a little more to their own benefit.

The threats sometimes are veiled and sometimes overt but they always warn: Push back too much and we’ll leave.

Everybody would suffer if major insurers left the Texas market, but everybody includes the companies, as well as the consumers.

Perhaps the next time a company threatens a partial withdrawal from Texas, we should invite it to make a complete exit.

If nothing else, it would be enlightening to see how much crafty marketing and old-fashioned hustle it takes to recoup Texas in the vast markets of Idaho and Wyoming.

I like the way Michael A. Smith thinks. The next time an insurance company threatens a partial withdrawal from an Atlantic coastal region, every state on the East Coast and the Gulf Coast should invite the insurance company to make a complete exit. That includes 20 states with coastal counties or parishes, which make up over a third (134 million) of the United States' population (300 million).

That’s a sizable market to lose.

Today’s insurance company frustration post was inspired by this letter I received from my agent, caps and italics in original letter:

AFTER MUCH DELIBERATION AND ALONG WITH MANY OTHER MAJOR INSURANCE COMPANIES, ******** ******** HAS FOUND IT NECESSARY TO EXERCISE A REGULATION THAT ALLOWS INSURANCE COMPANIES TO NON-RENEW ANY EXISTING HOMEOWNER POLICY THAT HAS BEEN IN FORCE THREE YEARS OR LESS.

When I received this letter, I had held the policy for two years and 10 months.

I do appreciate the candor expressed in the letter, however:

THE COMPANY FEELS THAT THIS WILL ALLOW THEM TO REDUCE THEIR PROPERTY EXPOSURE IN SOUTHERN LOUISIANA, WHICH THEY FEEL WILL ALLOW THEM TO CONTINUE TO OPERATE IN OUR STATE.

Cue Michael A. Smith’s idea.

I will be okay. I will go get homeowners insurance from someone else. But not everyone will do that:

Facing soaring premiums or feeling shortchanged by their insurers, a growing number of homeowners and businesses in Louisiana and Mississippi are "going bare," or dropping their coverage altogether, insurance agents and consumer advocates say. Many more are drastically reducing their coverage.

"I have every belief that it's going to be more and more common," said Amy Bach, executive director of the United Policyholders advocacy group. "If it's a choice between eating or paying their insurance bills, of course they're going to eat."

Of course.

If A. Baldwin Wood Were Still Around…

2007-03-19T00:29:00.000-06:00

… would he have allowed a Florida company to give us pumps that one engineer described as defective? Pumps that still aren’t all installed nine months after the original deadline? Pumps that can’t pump water out of the canal as fast as the city’s pumps can pump water in?

I don’t think so. I think if A.B. Wood were still around, 18 months after Katrina, we would be well on our way to having pump stations at the canal closures capable of keeping New Orleans dry.

We’ve heard much about the memo by USACE mechanical Engineer Maria Garzino describing the performance of MWI’s pumps after being tested:

Put simply, if the intent of the contract requirements is to have pump equipment capable of being turned on and used for prolonged periods of time in the event of a hurricane, then I believe the pump equipment will not function as intended. In fact, without extensive follow on supplemental operation of the pumping equipment after installation, and subsequent likely follow on repair of failed pumping equipment components (hydraulic pumps, hydraulic pump motors, failed high pressure hydraulic lines, etc.), I believe significant failure of the pump equipment can be expected.

Here’s a memo by Professor W. H. Creighton (pdf), Dean of the Department of Technology at Tulane University, written in 1915 describing the performance of A.B. Wood’s pumps after being tested:

He summed up “that while the pump surpasses in efficiency, under normal conditions, those of previous installations, the superiority is much greater just when the greatest service is required. Emergency service is probably the weak point of the old pumps. It is the forte of the new. Results show that the pumps easily answer all requirements and that they are the largest and most efficient low-lift pumps in the world.

***

His report showed the pumps to have such remarkable efficiency and revealed features so superior to previous pumps that a complete description was included for the information of other engineers who would have to deal with massive pumping problems.

World Class pumps for a World Class city. Is that too much to ask?

Sniff… Sniff…

2007-03-18T19:42:00.000-06:00

This smells funny:

Ceeon Quiett, who succeeded Forman as Nagin's communications director, would not answer direct questions about the nature of Goodson's duties. She stated flatly in an e-mail that "city officials do not have bodyguards or drivers."

Via e-mail, Quiett also declined to answer a number of specific questions, instead offering a response suggesting that asking questions about payments to city contractors slows the city's progress: "Issues relating to former employees and disgruntled vendors does nothing to advance our recovery mission," she wrote. "Further, having our one newspaper focus on rumors and innuendo also does not help citizens seeking critical information to rebuild their lives."

If the Mayor’s office feels the Times-Picayune is wasting its time investigating why a city official’s bodyguard/driver – a position which the Mayor’s spokesperson flat out stated “city officials do not have” – received more taxpayers’ money in salary than the city’s Police Superintendent, then it seems a straight answer would clear everything up. Refusing to answer “direct questions about the nature of Goodson's duties,” on the other hand, would force the paper to continue working to find answers rather than focusing on ways “to advance our recovery mission.”

Suggesting what stories the media should do is not the role of the Mayor’s communications director. It is also a fallacy to suggest that the Times-Picayune can not cover information critical for citizens to rebuild their lives *as well as* issues relating to former employees and disgruntled vendors.

I wonder how the Mayor’s office feels about the Times-Picayune’s continued practice of dedicating an entire section to sports. Basketball box scores aren’t necessarily critical for citizens to rebuild their lives.

They did, however, get rid of the weekly Food Section. Sorry, Jeffery.

This article and Gordon Russell’s other articles – the yacht story, the camera contract change, the state stopping all camera sales – seem to be leading somewhere. We even got a cliffhanger this time:

Early last year, Goodson also played a role in NetMethods' installation of 58 wireless surveillance cameras in Baton Rouge, St. Pierre said. As the Baton Rouge system was being deployed, around March 2006, Goodson was being paid for 40-hour work weeks by New Orleans taxpayers, city invoices show. In fact, the invoices show, Goodson billed for 40-hour weeks from January until his departure in September.

In response to an e-mail asking for an explanation of that discrepancy, St. Pierre replied: "Your information as to the timing of any potentially relevant work in connection with the BR camera network is inaccurate, as are the other implications in your e-mail."

He did not reply to a follow-up asking precisely when Goodson did the Baton Rouge work.

I can’t wait until the next episode. I’ll tune in to American Zombie for a preview.

Why is It Always Nigeria?

2007-03-17T20:28:00.000-06:00

… a friend asked me after I explained the Jeb Bush/MWI/Nigeria connection. Good question.

The Jeb Bush/MWI/Nigeria connection:

Jeb Bush's former business partner, prominent Republican contributor J. David Eller, twice flew suitcases of cash to offshore tax havens to hide his assets, the U.S. Justice Department contends in a lawsuit.

The lawsuit also says Eller's MWI Corp., a Deerfield Beach water pump manufacturer, improperly used more than one-third of a $74.3-million U.S. loan to pay a Nigerian agent for the company. In turn, that agent and other company officials paid Nigerian government officials involved in buying MWI's pumps, the lawsuit says.

***

The governor has said he made $648,250 from Bush-El, the company he and Eller formed in 1988 to promote MWI products abroad. He has repeatedly said, however, that none of that came from the Nigerian sales. To avoid possible conflicts of interest since his father was in the White House, he has said, he accepted no commissions on deals financed through U.S. agencies. Nor did he contact any government officials about the loans.

Twice while his father was in the White House, however, Jeb Bush visited Nigeria on behalf of MWI. In 1989, he was treated to a parade of 1,300 horses and tens of thousands of people lined the road to welcome the American president's son.

Hmm… Nigeria… Where have we heard about Nigeria and alleged corruption before?

Oh, yeah. William Jefferson:

A congressman under investigation for bribery was caught on videotape accepting $100,000 in $100 bills from an FBI informant whose conversations with the lawmaker also were recorded, according to a court document released Sunday. Agents later found the cash hidden in his freezer.

***

The affidavit says Jefferson is caught on videotape at the Ritz-Carlton as he takes a reddish-brown briefcase from the trunk of the informant's car, slips it into a cloth bag, puts the bag into his 1990 Lincoln Town Car and drives away.

The $100 bills in the suitcase had the same serial numbers as those found in Jefferson's freezer.

While the name of the intended recipient of the $100,000 is blacked out, other details in the affidavit indicate he is Abubakar Atiku, Nigeria's vice president. He owns a home in Potomac, Md., that authorities have searched as part of the Jefferson investigation.

Hmm… Nigerian Vice President Abubakar Atiku… I saw his name while playing Spocko’s Brain’s game of "pay attention to the people":

Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar has praised U.S. business for standing by his country during its darkest days of military dictatorship and economic mismanagement.

***

CCA President Steve Hayes introduced Abubakar at the reception, which included representatives from such firms as Africa One Ltd, ExxonMobil, Manchester Trade Ltd, and Conoco Inc. He said, "The large crowd we have here tonight to honor Vice President Abubakar reflects the U.S. business community’s strong interest in the Nigerian marketplace."

***

William Bucknam, Vice President and General Counsel of Moving Waters Industries (MWI) corporation, a CCA member firm headquartered in Florida, told a Washington File reporter that his company has been selling water pumps in Nigeria for years. As head of a foundation that pushed for passage of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) last year, Bucknam said, "We have good prospects and look forward to a lot of business" in Nigeria.

Yes, we’ve heard all about MWI selling pumps to Nigeria:

The U.S. Justice Department sued MWI in 2002, accusing it of fraudulently helping Nigeria obtain $74 million in taxpayer-backed loans for overpriced and unnecessary water-pump equipment. The case has yet to be resolved.

Although the Corps was aware of "an ongoing investigation" into MWI in relation to the suit, Bedey said federal contracting laws prohibits the Corps from excluding MWI from the bidding process so long as the company has a clean record.

So, the results of today’s round of Spocko’s Brain’s “paying attention to the people,” which I have modified to "pay attention to the players":

Jeb Bush to David Eller to MWI to Nigeria to William Jefferson to Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar back to William Bucknam and MWI

Then there's this, with Vice President and General Counsel of Moving Waters Industries William (Bill) Bucknam:

BILL BUCKNAM is in the enviable position of having a job that allows him to help bring improved economic circumstances and better living to countless numbers of people in some of the world’s poorest countries as well as right here in the U.S.

His job title — vice president and general counsel — reveals nothing of his fortunate circumstances. But there’s a clue in his employer’s name: Moving Water Industries (MWI) Corporation…

***

One of MWI’s Ex-Im-supported sales in 1997 — the sale of their patented Hydraflo pumps to Zimbabwe using a $23 million Ex-Im direct loan — is notable for its origins. “I had the opportunity to spend a few minutes with Zimbabwe President Mugabe at a 1995 event in Washington,” Bucknam recounts. “I handed him our brochure called ‘War on Drought’ and began to explain it. He interrupted, saying, ‘We need you badly. We need this technology. When can you come to Africa?’

“I went to Zimbabwe soon after, with a $50 mil-lion expression-of-interest letter from Ex-Im that — to everyone’s good fortune — they were able to generate almost overnight. Things proceeded from there to finalizing the deal and getting our people and some of those hundreds of our suppliers to work on it in 1997.”

Hmm… Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe…

Under the Authority of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the National Emergencies Act, the President has issued an Executive Order targeting the assets of Robert Mugabe and 76 Zimbabwean Government officials who have formulated, implemented, or supported policies that have undermined Zimbabwe's democratic institutions.

The order blocks all property and economic assets of the targeted individuals. It also prohibits United States citizens or residents from engaging in any transaction or dealing with the targeted individuals.

That’s from a 2003 White House press release. I think the sanctions against U.S. citizens doing business with Mugabe are still in effect, judging by recent events.

The sanctions were not in effect in 1995 when the Bucknam-Mugabe meeting took place. I am not alleging anything illegal happened. I am just paying attention to the players, and the players here were MWI, an African country, and Ex-Im loans.

Sound familiar?

Nigeria has been MWI's key customer since the 1980s, thanks in large part to the Ex-Im bank. Before Bush joined Eller's team in 1989, MWI received nearly $90-million in Ex-Im backing for pump sales to Nigeria.

The country's problems paying back those loans prompted Ex-Im to tighten its loan policies for Nigeria. But by 1990, MWI was working on persuading Ex-Im officials to back more pumps sales to Nigeria. They approved eight separate loans to Nigeria totaling $74.3-million.

Those Ex-Im loans to Nigeria were the reason for the 2002 U.S. Justice Department lawsuit.

Is it always *only* Nigeria? I'm just asking the question.

By the way, props to the St. Petersburg Times.

[ADDED] I forgot about the BFF.

Saved by the Weather

2007-03-15T23:06:00.000-06:00

The 17th Street Canal didn’t have the pumping capacity we wanted and were expecting for last hurricane season. That’s all we really need to know.

The US Army Corps of Engineers wasn’t happy with the pumps. That’s why they kept testing them.

A memo written before the pumps were installed concluded they would not work as intended.

The company that made them, MWI, says “Our pumps did, do and will work.” Of course, we don’t know if they would have worked in the tropical storm conditions we need them to work in. We had no such weather in 2006 and the pumps didn’t have to work. Lucky for MWI.

Lucky for us.

This reminds of that time, in South Florida, when weather conditions were bad, and they really needed some pumps, and they needed them to work for a certain time, but…

By September 2000, the drought was especially severe in South Florida. Lake Okeechobee, the hub of most of South Florida's water supply, had dropped to 11 feet, 3 feet below normal. If it fell much more, the lake would be too low to flow into the canals that feed the area's insatiable thirst.

To avert a potential crisis, the water management district's top executives decided to do something that had never been attempted before. They decided to install big electric pumps that could be hooked up underwater to make sure the lake would keep flowing into the canals.

***

Frank Finch, then-executive director of the water agency, recommended that the district's governing board waive its competitive bidding rules so the pumps could be in place by Dec. 31, before the lake level fell too low.

***

Although the main reason for waiving the bid requirements was to get the pumps in place by the end of December, MWI's contract required the company to deliver only half the shipment by Dec. 15, and the other half by the end of February.

MWI missed both deadlines. The first set of pumps arrived in mid-January, the rest in March.

But it’s okay. There is a happy ending:

MWI suffered no penalty, Taylor said, because enough rain fell to soften the drought's impact, buying the water district some time.

"We were in the mode of having the pumps when we needed them," he said. "That was our primary concern." Strict adherence to contract deadlines "was secondary."

Saved by the rain.

I don’t know if the federal government used MWI for political reasons for the 17th Street Canal closure pumps. But, read the entire St. Petersburg Times article where the above story came from. The process looked set up to give MWI the Lake Okeechobee contract.

[ADDED] The South Florida Water Management District, which was in charge of the Lake Okeechobee contract, is a state agency.

Defective Pumps

2007-03-14T10:05:00.000-06:00

And the engineers that love them:

The Army Corps of Engineers, rushing to meet President Bush's promise to protect New Orleans by the start of the 2006 hurricane season, installed defective flood-control pumps last year despite warnings from its own expert that the equipment would fail during a storm, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

***

Misgivings about the pumps were chronicled in a May 2006 memo provided to the AP by Matt McBride, a mechanical engineer and flooded-out Katrina victim who, like many in New Orleans, has been closely watching the rebuilding of the city's flood defenses.

Matt McBride got this story going and has posted some of the documents on his blog, Fix the Pumps, along with some background information.

[UPDATE] He has the complete memo now.

The title of one memorandum: “DEFECTIVE PUMPING EQUIPMENT.”

I particularly like this part:

Put simply, if the intent of the contract requirements is to have pump equipment capable of being turned on and used for prolonged periods of time in the event of a hurricane, then I believe the pump equipment will not function as intended.

At least four of those pumps do work today. They passed a test on Saturday:

Four pumps ran without vibration or pulsation during tests Saturday at the 17th Street Canal, leading an Army Corps of Engineers official to declare enough pumps will be functioning on all three New Orleans outfall canals when the 2007 hurricane season begins June 1.

These were the first pumps to be tested since the devices were pulled from the canals at the end of hurricane season last fall to try to fix a serious vibration problem.

They didn’t work almost a year ago. They do work today. So, what’s the problem?

The problem is we never knew there was a problem.

The pumps were promised to work by June 1, 2006, along with the entire levee system being up to pre-Katrina level or better. They didn’t work in June. They didn’t work in July. By September 2006, they still weren’t working to acceptable levels.

But that’s not really the issue. The US Army Corps of Engineers has been honest about *when* the pumps would be working going back to June 2006:

It won't be possible to provide the maximum promised pumping capacity at the new floodgates on the 17th Street and London Avenue canals during what are usually the most active months of hurricane season this year, and perhaps not until the start of the 2007 season, Army Corps of Engineers officials confirmed Wednesday.

***

Under normal circumstances, Young and St. Germain said, computers are used to design large pumping facilities and solve potential problems before construction begins. But because this was an emergency situation triggered by the failure of canal floodwalls during Katrina, there was no time to model the system beforehand.

Instead, the problems were discovered as the first pumps -- the ones that will provide 2,400 to 2,800 cfs -- were installed and tested in the past few weeks.

Emphasis mine.

We get it. It’s hard work building these pumps, made even harder by the time pressures. We can deal with delays in order to get the job done right.

But make sure you are doing the job right. That last statement – “the problems were discovered as the first pumps… were installed and tested in the past few weeks” – seems to be at odds with the documents, dated May 3 and 4, that Matt McBride has:

It is the opinion of the undersigned that pump equipment supplied by the above cited contract, specifically the pump assemblies and drive units, that are arriving in the field and being installed daily, are not capable of fulfilling their function as intended by the original contract requirements - are defective - and will experience failure should they be tasked to run, under normal use, as would be required in the event of a hurricane.

***

This opinion is derived from events transpiring during continuous and diligent observance by the undersigned of full sized testing of these pump assemblies and drive units at the manufacturer's Deerfield Beach, Florida facility from the period April 7, 2006 thru May 01, 2006.

Emphasis mine.

The USACE *knew* they were installing pumps that were defective. They didn’t find it out *after* they installed them. They already knew.

The USACE’s Col. Jeffrey Bedey explains why the corps installed pumps they knew were defective:

Although the corps engineering team knew there were vibration problems before the pumps were delivered last year, Bedey said it was better to have the pumps in place in the event of a hurricane than to have no pumps. And despite the vibrations, he said, he would have run the pumps last hurricane season had it been necessary to close the floodgates. Engineers said the pumps probably would have performed below capacity due to the vibration problem.

"There was a certain amount of risk in that, but we figured we were better off putting them in the water and trying to work out the kinks here than not having had them if they were needed," he said.

Defective pumps are better than no pumps. True. But, does anyone remember the corps saying last year that they "knew there were vibration problems before the pumps were delivered"? I don't remember hearing that. That seems like important information.

But, as far as I know, last Saturday was the first time the pumps worked at acceptable levels. Also, I haven’t seen any evidence that they have been tested in the tropical storm conditions they are expected to work under or tested for prolonged use. Maybe that happened in a testing facility somewhere. But I haven’t heard anything.

That’s the problem. I haven’t heard anything. I didn’t hear about the defective pumps last June. I probably would have never heard about them if Matt McBride hadn’t provided the AP with those documents, or put it on his blog. Absent these tests, why should I believe that the USACE has been able to “work out the kinks” in all the pumps?

The funny thing is, I don’t blame the USACE for this. They were given defective pumps by the company that made them. The USACE chose to install them anyway so that the city would have some, if not optimal, pumping capacity if a storm hit. If they installed them or not, we still would have had diminished pump capacity at the 17th Street Canal closure.

We all want an improved levee system fast. But we want the system to work as a system and up to specifications. The 17th Street Canal closure and these pumps are an important part of that system.

Just tell us next time something is defective. We can take it. After all, it’s not the first time a USACE project didn’t work.

More On the Murder Rate

2007-03-12T11:08:00.000-06:00

Somebody who actually knows what they are talking about weighs in:

A new study by a Tulane University professor puts New Orleans' murder rate as the highest in the country.

The study estimates the city's 2006 murder rate at 96 per every 100,000 people.

***

The new study, by demographer Mark VanLandingham, aims to fix the main flaw in previous per capita murder estimates for 2006: It takes into account the large change in New Orleans' population during the year, with far fewer people in the city at the beginning of 2006 than at the end. That change raises the murder rate substantially.

For instance, using the highest static population estimate VanLandingham found in his research, 201,000, would produce a murder rate of about 80 per 100,000 people, still significantly lower than the new study's conclusion.

Apparently, I was being optimistic when I used a population of 200,000 New Orleans residents.

VanLandingham’s and my conclusions are about the same. The New Orleans murder rate is really high.

I don’t think it is fair to count the first quarter of 2006 because the city’s population was changing so much. That’s why I think it gives us a better view of how bad the problem is and how it continues to be a problem by counting from the second quarter of 2006 to today. In that (almost) 12-month period, I calculated a murder rate of 91 per 100,000 residents (based on a New Orleans population of 200,000, which VanLandingham views as on the high end of the estimates). Of course, my number also assumes that no more murders will happen in March.

I was surprised when I read the T-P article and found that my assumption of a New Orleans population of 200,000 was optimistic:

The New Orleans Emergency Operations Center conducted three separate estimates, with the most recent theorizing that about 181,000 people resided in New Orleans at the end of January 2006, Stone said.

Other estimates have varied greatly. The U.S. Census Bureau's population estimate for Jan. 1, 2006, was 158,000. The Louisiana Public Health Institute estimated that the city boasted a population of about 201,000 between June and October.

Several demographers interviewed said the number is likely lower. Conservative estimates put the population under 200,000.

If New Orleans population today is 180,000, then our murder rate so far in 2007 (37 murders in 71 days) is 105 per 100,000 residents. Wow.

As I said in my last post on the murder rate, we are trending high. That is what worries me. It is possible to have a spate of violent incidents that could be considered an aberration, which would skew the numbers higher making the city seem more violent than it is.

Looking over the past four quarters of violent crime statistics, the number of murders per population is consistently high. There are no aberrations. For her population, New Orleans is a very violent city.

That, and about a hundred other things, is what worries me.

The Time Machine

2007-03-11T01:43:00.000-06:00

While researching the previous post, I came across this webpage with a January 1, 2000, article written in press-release style entitled New Orleans Murder Count Hits 14 Year Low - Chief Pennington's Promise Becomes Reality:

Superintendent Richard J. Pennington announced that New Orleans recorded 162 murders during the year 1999, the first time since 1985 that the murder count has dropped below 200, and the lowest murder count since 1985's murder count of 152. The 162 murders were a drop of 30% from the previous year and marked the fifth consecutive year that murder has declined in the city.

***

New Orleans murder rate, the number of people murdered per 100,000 residents, stands at 33 for 1999, compared with almost 87 in 1994, the year Pennington was appointed Superintendent of Police. Nationally, the murder rate is between 6.0 and 7.0 murders per 100,000 people, meaning that New Orleans still has many more murders than the national average.

Notice that a couple of past numbers converge with present numbers. We had 162 murders last year, but in 1999 that number was a success story. And we are back to the murder rate of 87 per 100,000 people for the first 70 days of 2007, the same number that Pennington started with and lowered to 33.

What could have been…

One Day, Three Murders

2007-03-11T01:10:00.000-06:00

And three other people shot.

The latest murder occurred in Mid-City, near the intersection of Esplanade Avenue and Columbus Street, shortly after 2 p.m., according to Joe Narcisse, an NOPD spokesman.

***

A short time after that shooting, police were on the scene of another shooting near the intersection of Foucher and S. Saratoga streets, Narcisse said.

Around 11 a.m., police received word of a shooting in the 7800 block of Venice Blvd, Narcisse said. Seventh District Officers found the victim lying in the street with gunshot wounds to his head and arm. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

***

The first shootings of the day took place around 5 a.m. as a 22-year-old woman and her male companion were shot while walking in a Treme neighborhood, Narcisse said. The woman was shot twice in the chest and died later at a hospital.

***

Detectives were called out to a sixth shooting in Hollygrove just before 6 p.m.

There are violent days like Saturday. But then there are days when nothing violent happens. One violent day does not mean the sky is falling.

However, on those days when there is an unacceptable level of violence in a city of 200,000 people, this troubles me:

A spokesman for Mayor Ray Nagin did not immediately comment.

Three murders. Three other people shot in the city. In one day. On a weekend, when residents are out and about. A woman and man are walking in Treme, both are shot, one fatally. A man is shot multiple times in his car in Mid-City. On the street. In the afternoon. A man is killed in New Orleans East marking the third murder in that neighborhood in less than three weeks (first, second).

Where’s Ray? Still in D.C.?

He came out to a murder scene right before Mardi Gras. I wonder what was special about that day. But on a day like yesterday, not even his spokesperson has a comment.

I know it was a Saturday, and we here in the alternative European civilization don’t work hard and all – especially on the weekends. But, the Mayor can’t show up on the news saying something? Anything? At least on the phone? Or an email statement?

He says nothing about a violent day that the NOPD describes thusly:

"The only thing unique about today is the overwhelming violence," said Sgt. Joe Narcisse, a police spokesman.

Overwhelming violence doesn’t deserve immediate mayoral comment?

Sgt. Narcisse also had this to say:

Narcisse said people shouldn't read the latest killings as a sign the initiatives are not working. Much of the crime in the city is fueled by the drug trade and "social issues" the [sic] are out of the police department's hands, he said.

True, a single violent incident can’t determine that "initiatives" aren’t working. Even six violent incidents in one day are still six single incidents.

However, the trends over time are not looking great. 37 murders in 70 days so far in 2007 translate into a murder rate of 96 per 100,000 residents, if you assume the population of New Orleans is 200,000 (my preferred choice), or 87 per 100,000 residents, assuming the population of New Orleans is 220,000. Both rates are really high.

At the end of March, we finish the first quarter of the year. Let’s assume (and hope) that there are no more murders for the rest of the month. That would give us a murder count in the first quarter of 2007 of 37.

Looking at the NOPD’s 2006 statistics and using a population of 200,000 in New Orleans (because that’s the one I like and if there are more than 200,000 now, there was certainly less a year ago, so it’s like an average over the past year), from the end of March 2006 to my optimistic hypothetical end of March 2007, there would be 182 murders. That’s a murder rate of 91 per 100,000 residents over the last 12 months. That’s really high.

Here’s the last four quarters individually, assuming a population of 200,000:

2006 second quarter: 39 murders; murder rate = 78 per 100,000 people
2006 third quarter: 53 murders; 105 per 100,000
2006 fourth quarter: 53 murders; 105 per 100,000
2007 first quarter: 37 murders in 70 days; 96 per 100,000

The NOPD stats don’t give 2006 fourth quarter numbers. But, I know 162 murders occurred in 2006. That number minus the total murders in the first three quarters gives me 53. Also, I used a population of 200,000 when calculating the 2006 second quarter murder rate. I think the population of the city was actually less than that at the time, which would bump up the murder rate. For example, if I figure in 180,000 as the population, it changes the murder rate to 88 per 100,000 residents.

Conversely, there are probably (hopefully?) more than 200,000 people in New Orleans for the first quarter of 2007, which would lower the murder rate. For example, with 220,000 residents, the rate 70 days into the first quarter would be 87 per 100,000 residents, not 96. But that’s still too high.

And that’s what the trends are saying. The murder rate is still too high. I don’t know if the “initiatives” are working or not. But I know a murder rate of 87 to 96 is scary. While I do not feel scared for my life, I know I’m scared by what those numbers say about the future of the city.

Maybe that’s why the Mayor gave no comment. Maybe he’s scared, too.

Still Being Stored

2007-03-10T10:26:00.000-06:00

For lack of a better, and more respectful, word:

Orleans Parish Coroner Dr. Frank Minyard is seeking a final resting place for unidentified or unclaimed victims of Hurricane Katrina. He said about 100 bodies are still being stored from the approximately 1,500 left in his care after the Aug. 29, 2005, hurricane.

Laws

2007-03-09T12:09:00.000-06:00

What are they good for?

Zoning laws:

In a hurricane-ravaged city desperately lacking health services for the poor, the primary-care clinics that arrived in New Orleans last summer looked to be just what the doctor ordered.

The six double-wide trailers from FEMA, each equipped with eight exam rooms, were supposed to be strategically deployed around the city and provide checkups and other nonemergency health services for the city's poor and uninsured.

But nearly nine months after they were first delivered, the trailers are still in the parking lot of University Hospital waiting to be deployed, and Louisiana State University officials are angrily asking how the seemingly simple process of bringing them into service got delayed by red tape and political foot-dragging.

***

Councilman James Carter, whose district would house five of the clinics, attributed the delay to "a lot of research in dealing with the zoning laws that we have." Since current law does not allow for health clinics to be located on school property, which is zoned residential, Carter at first thought the city might have to change its zoning law, a process that can take up to a year.

The Stafford Act:

Democratic U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, the state’s senior senator, recently fired off a letter asking President Bush to waive the 10 percent local government match on federal disaster money. The match, which in this case could cost the state up to $1 billion, is required under federal Stafford Act rules.

Such waivers have been granted in 32 disasters since 1985, including the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Andrew and the San Francisco earthquakes.

Powell said the Bush administration fronted Louisiana the money — about $775 million — for the payments as part of the $10.4 billion in federal Community Development Block Grant funds earmarked last year for rebuilding flood-damaged houses.

This law, whatever it’s called (from previous article):

In a separate matter, Landrieu wants to get an increase for the state in CDGB funding. Congress put a 54 percent cap on available CDBG funding going to any one state in the last supplemental bill, a restraint not put on Mississippi. Landrieu contends Louisiana should get $8 billion to $32 billion more.

“That is law,’’ Powell said of the cap.

And this interpretation of age discrimination, also tied to the Stafford Act (also from previous article):

On yet another funding issue, the Louisiana Recovery Authority wants to use nearly $1.2 billion in Hazard Mitigation Grant Program money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for the “Road Home’’ program. The $7.5 billion program includes $6.3 billion in CDBG funds and the nearly $1.2 billion in hazard-mitigation funds. The latter funds would be used to elevate flood-prone homes or buy them out.

FEMA is refusing to approve the move, saying Louisiana discriminates against younger people.

That allegation is based on the fact that the LRA waived the 40 percent buyout penalty for seniors aged 65 and older. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has told Congress that it has no problem with what the state proposes to do with the $1.1 billion. So the LRA is urging Congress to move the funds to HUD for implementation.

Again, Powell said the issue is one of law.

Emphasises mine.

I have what I think is an uncommon opinion about the worthiness of laws: Any law that needs to be enforced is not a good law.

I prefer universal laws, like gravity. When was the last time someone broke the law of gravity? And we don’t need Gravity Police to enforce the law. That’s a good law.

Laws that make it harder for the Gulf Coast to recover are not good laws.

Franco America

2007-03-08T10:26:00.000-06:00

A follow-up to the Current Events Quiz.

President Bush on current trip to Latin America:

But this is a long trip, and the reason why is I want to remind people throughout our neighborhood that America cares about them.

President Bush during his recent trip to New Orleans:

And so I've come back to New Orleans, Louisiana, to remind people that the federal government still knows you exist, still knows you have issues, and wants to work with your leadership to address those issues.

Bush on aid to Latin America:

I don't know if you know this or not, but since I've been the President, our bilateral aid to Latin America has increased from $800 million to $1.6 billion. And the reason I say that is the American taxpayer has been very generous about providing aid in our neighborhood, and most of that aid is social justice money -- in other words, it's money for education and health.

And yet, we don't get much credit for it.

This next quote is not so current, but I remember hearing the talking point about the generous taxpayer before:

White House aides suggest that this criticism is unfair, noting that millions of dollars have been spent on school vouchers and on helping homeowners rebuild their property.

“The city of New Orleans will see their schools come back stronger, and in fact there will be an explosion of charter schools that can help the region come back quickly,” said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. “Of course, we would have liked to do more in many areas, but the president believes the American taxpayer has been generous.”

Emphasises mine.

Hurricane aid is not the same as foreign aid. And, despite my rants, the Gulf Coast is still part of America.

While the American public has been generous with its own money in charitable donations, we on the Gulf Coast are taxpayers too. We have paid into the account that we are now attempting to withdraw from. We are not asking for charity from the federal government. We are asking for what we are due as Americans.

Please, Mr. President, stop talking about us like we are another country. Unless, of course, you are willing to grant us sovereignty and we can use our bountiful natural resources and our position at the mouth of the Mississippi River for our own people’s benefit and not to enrich a nation of 300,000,000 generous taxpayers.

Quiz on Current Events

2007-03-07T00:20:00.000-06:00

Read the following text and answer the question:

Press Briefing on the President's Trip to _____ ______

MR. HADLEY: Good morning. In a few hours the President will deliver remarks in advance of his upcoming trip to _____ ______. In his speech today, the President will announce new initiatives to benefit the people of _____ ______. He will announce additional money to be committed for better health care in _____ ______, an innovative education initiative to benefit disadvantaged youth, and initiatives to make it easier to start and grow small businesses, and help lower-income citizens of _____ ______be able to purchase a home.

***

But the benefits of democracy, free markets and economic integration have been slow in reaching many in the region, especially the poor, the disadvantaged and the indigenous. Poverty, inequality and social exclusion in _____ ______ is unacceptably high.

***

Too many have inadequate access to education, health care, and housing and jobs. And the President is committed to further efforts to address these issues.

What part of the world will the President be visiting this week?

a) New Orleans

b) Latin America

c) all of the above

Correct answer: b) Latin America

How do you know it’s not New Orleans? This statement gives it away:

And the President is committed to further efforts to address these issues.

We all know there will be no “further efforts” down in this part of the world. That’s what the “$110 billion check” was for.

Time Passes

2007-03-05T12:43:00.000-06:00

The T-P’s series on coastal wetland loss is knocking me down. Knocking. Me. Down.

Article One: Last Chance.

Article Two: Losing Ground.

[UPDATE] Article Three: Laying the Groundwork.

From the first article:

"Ten years is how much time we have left -- if that."

It’s one of those things that I knew already, but didn’t get. Knowledge and understanding don’t always go together.

I’ve seen dire – but supported by evidence – predictions about coastal wetland loss from various sources and various viewpoints. But I have never seen it in one place, on my table, reading it at breakfast in an article on the front page of my newspaper, complemented by graphics and moving internet timelines.

I remember at Jesuit in the early 90s learning and worrying about coastal wetland loss. But then, I didn't do anything. What could a high school student do? I was too young.

I remember at Loyola in the mid 90s worrying about coastal wetland loss. But I was too busy trying to get my degree to do anything. I didn't have time.

I remember worrying about it after I graduated. But I needed a job. How can I do anything without any money? Getting a job was more important.

Then I got married. Then a kid came. Then I moved out of the country. Then I moved back. Then I needed a job again. Family comes first.

Then I decided to try to save up enough money to by a house Uptown. I was almost there.

Then Katrina came. Then I was worrying about my family, my friends, and my city recovering and rebuilding – both short term and long term. It's been a long 18 months.

And now I see that I have ten years. If that.

I need to rethink things. I need to do something.

Meanwhile, time passes…

A Matter of Policy

2007-03-01T10:55:00.000-06:00

Two posts ago, regarding the $20.8 billion that the NFIP had to borrow to pay flood claims from 2005, I wrote:

The NFIP must borrow the money from the U.S. Treasury because it was poorly managed. This is the federal government bailing *itself* out, not the people of the Gulf Coast who paid for flood insurance.

Actually, maybe it was the federal government bailing the private insurance companies out:

"I have no knowledge of any claims paid by the program that should have been paid by wind policies, which is administered by the private sector," David Maurstad, of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told a House panel.

Maurstad said under questioning that when both wind and water damage occurred, FEMA paid the damages as a matter of policy.

Note that last sentence: “when both wind and water damage occurred, FEMA paid the damages as a matter of policy.”

In that sentence are two examples of how the NFIP is poorly managed.

First, “when both wind and water damage occurred,” only FEMA paid claims. Flood insurance does not cover wind damage. If wind damage occurred, homeowners insurance should pay for that damage. The NFIP borrowed money from the U.S. Treasury (American citizens) to pay what should have been covered by private insurance companies.

Second, “as a matter of policy.” Not only did FEMA pay for wind damage it should not have paid for, it did it as a rule. That’s not good policy.

Actually, it might not be the right policy at all:

Rep. Gene Taylor, D-Miss., demanded that Maurstad provide the legal basis for the federal government paying claims of wind and water damage.

***

"You guys are literally the puppets of the insurance industry," Taylor said at the hearing of the House Financial Services Committee's Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee.

"What concerns me is the total lack of oversight of taxpayers' money."

Along the coast, you can not deny that there was wind damage as well as flood damage. The winds were too strong.

State Farm released a statement saying, “State Farm sent a memo to its claims adjusters, but it encouraged them to look for evidence of wind damage.” When nothing but a slab is left like on the Mississippi coast, it is hard to find evidence of anything. At that point, private and federal insurance should work together to pay for damage. It shouldn’t be one or the other. I am sure there is some equation that can be devised to estimate how much wind damage may have occurred versus flood damage. And, even if it is not a perfect estimate, insurance companies can not deny that some wind damage did happen.

Before 2005, the NFIP paid all its claims from what it got in premiums. When it borrowed money, it had to pay the U.S. Treasury back. It can not pay back $20.8 billion. And, guess what. There was no disaster reserve.

So, now the NFIP is stuck with a debt it will never pay back. Private insurance companies failing to pay for wind damage increased that debt.

If the NFIP can’t pay back the Treasury, then the debt must be forgiven. That means all taxpayers wind up paying.

Maybe the private insurance companies who failed to pay for wind damage when both wind and flood occurred can be held liable. Then, the federal government can make them pay off the NFIP’s debt as part of the punishment.

Every One Hurts

2007-03-01T09:54:00.000-06:00

As of March 1, 2007, there have been 29 murders in New Orleans this year. With 59 days in the year completed, that comes to an average of about one murder every other day. If that average stays the same all year, we will end 2007 with 182 murders. In a city of 200,000 people, that comes to a murder rate of 91 murders per 100,000 residents.

Those are numbers. These are people.

January – 17 murders.

February – ~~12 murders.~~ 13 murders. [See update]

02/03/07 – 2 murders (one a child)

18) Someone flagged down police Saturday morning and led them to a man who had been shot dead in his Central City home, making him at least the 18th murder victim of the year in Orleans Parish.

Police found the body of Daniel Allen, 28, on the floor of his home in the 1900 block of Jackson Avenue shortly after 9 a.m., said Garry Flot, a police spokesman.

Allen, who had a gunshot wound to the head, was pronounced dead at the scene, which is between Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard and Danneel Street. Flot said police consider the case a homicide.

19) New Orleans, LA - Today, the New Orleans Police Department announced the arrest of 21-year-old George Lewis, a local male, and booked him with 2nd degree murder of his girlfriend’s two year-old daughter. The offense occurred yesterday at approximately 4:00 p.m,. in the 1400 block of South Lawn Street.

According to investigators, Fourth District officers received a call of a child with trauma to the body that died at Oschner Hospital.

The Orleans Parish Coroners autopsy revealed the child suffered internal and external trauma to the body as the cause of death. Detective Raymond Ambose, conducted an investigation and arrested George Lewis and booked him with 2nd degree murder.

02/04/07 – 1 murder, 1 shot

20) Two New Orleans residents were shot, one fatally, in a sport utility vehicle parked beside a large oak tree in front of a 7th Ward home Sunday minutes before sunrise.

Tamara Gabriel, 27, of Algiers, died later Sunday. She and a 22-year-old man were shot multiple times in the 2700 block of George "Nick" Connor Drive, formerly Havana Street, police spokesman Garry Flot said. The man drove the Porsche Cayenne to a hospital and "collapsed at the entrance to the hospital's emergency room," Flot said.

The man was reported in stable condition. Gabriel died Sunday at 4 p.m. at Touro Infirmary, said chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano, who released the identity. He said she had a gunshot wound to the head.

02/06/07 – 1 murder

21) A fistfight between two 17-year-old boys led one of the teen to kill the other one with a gun his mother gave him, police said Tuesday.

According to Sgt. Joe Narcisse, an NOPD spokesman, the shooting took place shortly after 7 p.m. near the intersection of Clio and Simon Bolivar streets, in Central City. The victim, a 17-year-old New Orleans boy, got into a fistfight with Clarence Johnson earlier in the evening, with both individuals walking away after the conflict.

Narcisse said Johnson went home and gave details of the fight to his mom, 44-year-old Vanessa Johnson. She gave her son a handgun and told him to get revenge because he had apparently lost the fight.

Johnson took the handgun, located the victim a short time later and fired several shots, striking him once in the stomach, Narcisse said. The victim was rushed to Elmwood Medical Center, where he later died.

02/11/07 – 1 murder

22) Members of the New Orleans Police Department are investigating the shooting death of Michael Dunbar a 43-year-old local male. The incident occurred at 3420 Indiana Street in Algiers at approximately 8:43 p.m.

According to investigators, Fourth District officers responded to a call of a “male shot” inside of a home. When officers arrived, they found the victim suffering from a gunshot wound to the body. Emergency medical technicians arrived on the scene and pronounced him dead.

02/15/07 – 2 murders

23) and 24) Two men were shot to death and a third critically wounded shortly inside a park car in the 9th Ward shortly before 6:30 p.m. Thursday, police said.

The names of the two men killed were not known to police. Police were able to interview the wounded man but did not release his name.

Fifth District officers responded to reports of a shooting and found the three men inside a sedan with Texas license plates in the 1000 block of Kentucky Street, near the Industrial Canal in the 9th Ward.

The men in the front passenger seat and the rear seat were dead on the scene. The wounded man was behind the wheel. He was taken to a local hospital, said officer Sabrina Richardson, NOPD public information officer.

02/16/07 – 1 murder, victim died on 02/17/07

25) One of six people wounded in a shooting rampage in a Mid-City bar early Friday died Saturday, the Orleans Parish coroner's office said.

Alden Wright, 20, of New Orleans, died at 11:40 a.m. at the Charity Hospital trauma unit at Elmwood Medical Center, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said.

02/20/07 – 1 murder, 2 shot

26) Around 9 p.m. Tuesday, police responded to shots fired in the 900 block of North Claiborne Avenue, near Dumaine Street, police said. Officers found a man with mutliple gunshot wounds lying on a wooden platform underneath Interstate 10. Investigators also discovered two handguns in the unidentified man’s possession. The victim was transported to a local hospital in critical condition and later died, police said.

02/21/07 – 2 murders

27) A 40-year-old New Orleans man was fatally shot early Wednesday in the Gert Town neighborhood, in the third shooting in less than 12 hours.

Several unrelated violent incidents, including a stabbing, marked the end of what had been a relatively low-crime Mardi Gras. Two of the shootings and the stabbing happened late on Fat Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, three people were dead, and two others, were seriously injured, police said.

Most recently, police discovered the 40-year-old man lying on the ground in the 7900 block of Olive Street with multiple gunshot wounds, police said. The man was pronounced dead around 7 a.m., shortly after officers arrived.

28) In broad daylight Wednesday afternoon, a 33-year-old man was fatally shot in an eastern New Orleans street, behind a row of one-story brick houses. The man, whose identity has not been released, was shot at 1 p.m. in the 14000 block of Morrison Road, police said. Officers found the man in the street, shot several times.

The man fell in the middle of the two-lane street that runs along a canal, between a murky brown puddle and the yellow dotted line.

02/25/07 – 1 murder

29) New Orleans authorities have released the identity of a man who was shot to death Sunday night in eastern New Orleans.

Lionel Ware III, 23, of New Orleans, was shot about 8:25 p.m. in the 14700 block of Curran Road, near Bass Street. Ware died in the middle of the roadway several blocks southwest of Paris Road and Lake Pontchartrain, said Garry Flot, a police public information officer.

An autopsy showed Ware suffered multiple gunshot wounds, chief coroner's investigator John Gagliano said.

UPDATE: 02/27/07 – 1 murder, victim died on 03/25/07

30) February shooting victim dies; Sunday shooting near Fair Grounds
A New Orleans shooting victim died Sunday, nearly a month after he suffered mltiple wounds in the Hollygrove neighborhood, the Orleans Parish coroner’s office said.

Aaron Allen, 43, was shot on Feb. 27 about 7:30 a.m. at Hollygrove and Oleander streets, chief coroner’s investigator John Gagliano said. An autopsy will be performed today.

Mr. Bush, Is that $110 Billion in Your Pocket?

2007-03-01T01:03:00.000-06:00

Or… not?

The President visits today. Get ready to hear a lot about the $110 billion.

Every article written will say something like this:

The government has dedicated about $110 billion to the Gulf Coast since the 2005 hurricanes, and Bush remains committed to the region, Donald Powell, the federal coordinator for Gulf Coast Rebuilding, said.

I am not writing the same post over and over again about the $110 billion number to say that we aren’t getting enough federal funding. I keep mentioning the $110 billion number because it is WRONG. $110 billion is NOT how much money that has been dedicated, appropriated, allocated, sent, or given to the Gulf Coast to rebuild.

Once again, I cite the GAO:

About $88 billion has been appropriated to 23 different federal agencies through four emergency supplemental appropriations acts.

As I have stated before, the President is adding $20.8 billion – the borrowing limit for the National Flood Insurance Program, which pays flood claims to those who have *paid for* flood insurance. And of that money, the whole $20.8 billion has not been paid out.

The NFIP must borrow the money from the U.S. Treasury because it was poorly managed. This is the federal government bailing *itself* out, not the people of the Gulf Coast who paid for flood insurance.

I can hear you saying, “Enough already, po’ boy. The number is not correct. We get it. What’s your point?”

My point is the White House is through with us. They want to wash their hands of this Katrina mess. And they are using their trumped up $110 billion number to do it:

Q Back to Katrina. The President took a lot of flak for not mentioning Katrina in the State of the Union speech. In hindsight, was that a mistake?

MR. SNOW: It's not -- you know what? "In hindsight," I'm just not going to play the "hindsight" game.

Q Well, but, plenty of people thought it meant he was downgrading the issue.

MR. SNOW: Yes, but he wasn't. It's hard to argue that somebody who has put on a push to spend $110 billion on a problem, as ever downgrading it; who gets very regular briefings on it as downgrading it; and somebody who has people report to him directly as downgrading it.

We understand that somebody can take a non-mention in a speech and try to use it for their own political purposes. But the fact is that the President is committed and he's done it. I mean, $110 billion, it speaks for itself.

And it is speaking irony.

[above emphasis mine]

da po’ blog is an angry blog

2007-02-28T11:41:00.000-06:00

And that is against my original intent for this blog.

Reading some of the latest – actually, most – posts on da po’ blog, I don’t see a lot of constructive criticism. I *do* see a lot of negative vibes being sent. I don’t want that to be the contribution of this blog.

Having said that, sending negative vibes seems to be where I am right now. But I’m working on it.

When I get lost on my mission, I like to read over Edward R. Murrow’s address to the 1958 RTNDA Convention. Particularly this comment:

This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful.

For the NOLA blogging community and its friends, our instrument is the internet.

Let us inspire.

C’mon, NBA. Seriously.

2007-02-27T12:49:00.000-06:00

You’re not that big:

Reports of crime and violence in Las Vegas during All-Star weekend have NBA Players Association executive director Billy Hunter concerned about New Orleans' ability to host the NBA's midseason party next season.

Reports of crime and violence in Las Vegas during All-Star weekend have NBA Players Association executive director Billy Hunter concerned about New Orleans' ability to host the NBA's midseason party next season.

On Monday, Hunter told Newsday that he'll take the NBA to court to try and move the game if New Orleans, still recovering from Hurricane Katrina, can't prove it's ready to handle the event.

We just got finished with Mardi Gras, and the NBA Players Association is worried we won’t be able to handle the NBA All-Star game a year from now.

"If the union is not convinced that the city can accommodate the All-Star Game, it's an issue that will be subject to litigation between the union and the league," Hunter said.

Hunter is concerned that post-Katrina New Orleans does not have a big enough police force or enough resources to handle the crowd that comes with an NBA All-Star Game.

"First of all, their police force is dissipated. They're probably dealing with half the force they had before," Hunter told Newsday. "They don't have all the resources that we will need to properly police the city. They've got a serious crime problem as it is. And so what are they going to do?"

I am not going to say that we are walking on rose petals down here. But, I think the NBA Players Association executive director’s concerns say more about the NBA’s problems than NOLA’s problems.

Cliff’s Crib links to a couple of stories on the NBA’s issues. The author of the stories, Jason Whitlock, also addresses some greater issues in the African-American community. For New Orleans’ purpose, here’s the relevant point:

This was not a byproduct of the game being held in Vegas. All-Star Weekend has been on this path for the past five or six years. Every year the event becomes more and more a destination for troublemakers.

Of course, Whitlock also wrote:

NBA All-Star Weekend in Vegas was an unmitigated failure, and any thoughts of taking the extravaganza to New Orleans in 2008 are total lunacy.

***

Without a full-scale military occupation, New Orleans will not survive All-Star Weekend 2008.

***

If something isn't done, next year's All-Star Weekend will surpass the deceased Freaknik, a weekend-long party in Atlanta, in terms of lawlessness. Wide-spread looting and a rape killed the Freaknik in 1999.

The NBA's image cannot survive bedlam in the French Quarter. And I'm not sure it can survive the embarrassment of a New Orleans standoff between its fans and the National Guard, either.

I have a little more confidence than Whitlock in our city’s ability to host major events without problems. It’s the day-to-day operation of the city that we can’t handle.

Et tu, Shaq Fu?

"I'm not sure if the city of New Orleans is ready for something like that," Shaquille O'Neal, who played at LSU, told Newsday. "I don't know what New Orleans' situation is, but from watching the Spike Lee special and watching the news, it doesn't look like it's ready for something like that."

At least he is watching the news.

I am no longer a fan.

"An alternative European civilization"

2007-02-25T15:47:00.001-06:00

I finally got to see the American Experience episode about New Orleans thanks to Schroeder’s heads up. From it, I got the impression that while pre-American New Orleans was no utopia when it came to race relations, it was American values that brought the chaos that lead to institutional racism becoming a way of life in this part of the world:

Raphael Cassimere, Jr., Historian: The amalgamation of the Africans and whites created basically one culture where everybody was accepted, belonged. It worked well because people kind of understood class structure. I mean even though you lived next door to somebody didn't necessarily mean that you are socially their equal. But free blacks as well as slaves had a place in society.

Narrator: Into this century-old city of some 7,000 people had come the Americans -- English-speaking, Protestant and accustomed to a rigid line between black and white. They had come pouring south from the eastern seaboard and the Kentucky hill country -- most of them bent on making money, and doing so in the American way.

Lawrence N. Powell, Historian: We came in and we wanted to impose our ways on an alternative European civilization. We wanted to impose the English language. We wanted to get rid of the local culture. So there was this struggle for the soul of New Orleans.

That’s what is happening now. A struggle for the soul of New Orleans. The Americans have seen their opportunity to do what they couldn’t do 200 years ago. They want to impose their ways on us and get rid of our local culture.

American values have been creeping down here ever since the Louisiana Purchase. The rigid race line. The 40-hour work week. The suburbs. The deterioration of the inner city and the public school system. Everything that makes us less a community and more a group of individuals. Everything that separates us from our family, our friends, our culture. Our tribe is in danger.

From the program:

Narrator: "In a few years," one observer concluded, "this will be an American town ... and everything French will in time disappear." It was a prediction that never quite came true.

It didn’t come true because the pre-American New Orleanians fought it. And the post-American New Orleanians who got it joined the fight. Can we still be the alternative civilization to the American Industrial Empire?

Inspiration, sometimes, comes from unlikely places. And, I found myself inspired this morning by an urban planner whose motives and opinions I had questioned in the past. Andres Duany:

Apart from the misconceptions of the tourist, I had also been predisposed by the media to think of New Orleans as a charming but lackadaisical and fundamentally mismanaged place that had been subjected to unwarranted devastation, with a great deal of anger and resentment as a result. That is indeed what I found at first. But as I engaged in the planning process I came to realize that the anger I witnessed was relative. It was much less, for example, than the bitterness one encounters in the typical California city plagued with traffic. The people of New Orleans have an underlying sweetness and a sense of humor, irony, and graciousness that is never far below the surface. These are not hard people.

Pondering this one day, I had an additional insight. I remember specifically when on a street in the Marigny I came upon a colorful little house framed by banana trees. I thought, “This is Cuba.” (I am Cuban.) I realized at that instant that New Orleans is not really an American city, but rather a Caribbean one. I understood that, when seen through the lens of the Caribbean, New Orleans is not among the most haphazard, poorest, or misgoverned American cities, but rather the most organized, wealthiest, cleanest, and competently governed of the Caribbean cities. This insight was fundamental because from that moment I understood New Orleans and truly began to sympathize. But the government? Like everyone, I found the city government to be a bit random; then I thought that if New Orleans were to be governed as efficiently as, say, Minneapolis, it would be a different place—and not one that I could care for. Let me work with the government the way it is. It is the human flaws that make New Orleans the most human of American cities. (New Orleans came to feel so much like Cuba that I was driven to buy a house in the Marigny as a surrogate for my inaccessible Santiago de Cuba.)

Emphasis mine.

More:

There was time to create the fabulously complex Creole dishes that simmer forever; there was time to practice music, to play it live rather than from recordings, and to listen to it. There was time to make costumes and to parade; there was time to party and to tell stories; there was time to spend all day marking the passing of friends. One way to leisure time is to have a low financial carry. With a little work, a little help from the government, and a little help from family and friends, life could be good! This is a typically Caribbean social contract: not one to be understood as laziness or poverty—but as a way of life.

This ease, which has been so misunderstood in the national scrutiny following the hurricane, is the Caribbean way. It is a lifestyle choice, and there is nothing intrinsically wrong with it. In fact, it is the envy of some of us who work all our lives to attain the condition of leisure only after retirement. It is this way of living that will disappear. Even with the federal funds for housing, there is little chance that new or renovated houses will be owned without debt. It is too expensive to build now. The higher standards of the new International Building Code are superb but also very expensive. There must be an alternative or there will be very few “paid-off” houses. Everyone will have a mortgage that will need to be sustained by hard work—and this will undermine the culture of New Orleans.

Emphasis mine.

America wants to own us. They want New Orleans to be an American town. We must fight.

Another Long Insurance Post

2007-02-25T02:30:00.000-06:00

Allstate is canceling or not renewing policies in New Orleans:

Halvorsen is one of scores of local Allstate customers who contend that their homeowners insurance coverage is being improperly dropped at the conclusion of a temporary state rule that has kept insurance policies in place since the storm.

In recent days, the Louisiana Department of Insurance has received 100 complaints from customers who are being terminated at the end of Emergency Rule 23, which allows insurance companies to begin canceling customers March 1, after proper notification, if there's no indication that they plan to repair.

So far, all of the complaints have been about Allstate.

…and New York:

Allstate has determined the eight counties of New York along the Atlantic coastline to be at particularly high risk for damage from hurricanes and flooding. In light of recent hurricane destruction in other parts of the U.S., Allstate feels it has to limit its exposure.

Reilly is one of as many as 28,000 homeowners in the coastal counties to receive notices of non-renewal at the anniversary of their three-year policy.

… raising rates in Florida:

Allstate Floridian, for instance, intends to continue plans to shed another 106,000 Florida customers. Those policyholders will get new notices, and another 100 days to find other coverage, said Allstate Floridian General Counsel George Grawe.

…and Connecticut:

Allstate is going ahead with a delayed plan to stop writing new homeowners' policies statewide in Connecticut and is expected to raise rates around the state -- including some substantial increases near the coast.

…and California:

Allstate Corp., California's third-largest homeowners' insurer, is signaling it soon might cut back or stop writing such policies altogether in the state.

***

While most of the state's major homeowners' insurance companies are cutting rates, Allstate is pointing to the state's potential for natural disasters and seeking a 12.2 percent rate increase from its policyholders. Allstate insures about one of every seven homeowners in California.

…and planning to stop new policies in Maryland:

Allstate Insurance Co. has agreed to back off from its plans to stop issuing new homeowner policies in some Maryland coastal areas, but only until it can supply adequate answers to questions posed by Maryland legislators.

The Maryland legislators have some good questions:

“I just don’t think it’s right, and a lot of other people don’t think it’s right either,” [State Sen. Norman] Stone said Monday of Allstate’s announcement, which had been scheduled to go into effect Feb. 14 before the company volunteered to hold off.

“What a great business if you could just pick and choose what you want to take — pick and choose where you’ll issue policies, only taking those you think will have few or no claims,” Stone said.

He said he understands why a company would either drastically raise premiums or refuse to insure a specific property with a bad history, “but to eliminate all properties on the water, it’s just wrong.”

***

[State Del. Joseph “Sonny”] Minnick said he’s concerned about the policy at a time when Allstate and other large insurers are enjoying record profits.

Alltstate made $1.8 billion last year and CEO Edward M. Liddy exercised stock options of nearly $40 million in December alone, according to Yahoo Finance online reports.

“But when I brought up Allstate’s profit over the last five or six years, the Allstate people told me this isn’t about money,” Minnick said. “Not about money? If this isn’t about money, then what’s it about?”

Back in 2006, former Allstate CEO and current chairman Ed Liddy addressed his company's profits:

Allstate CEO Ed Liddy makes no apologies. "This is a local business," he says. "Folks in Iowa don't pay for the people who live in Florida. Rates were too low for these fabulous homes in harm's way. Now we can see that, for years, rates in these coastal regions have been inadequate."

That’s why he and his cronies get paid the big bucks:

Allstate Corp. has approved 2007 base salaries for top officers, including $960,000 for Thomas Wilson, who became chief executive for the Northbrook-based insurer last month, according to a company regulatory filing Thursday.

Chief Financial Officer Danny Hale was awarded a base salary of $609,312, and Eric Simonson, president of Allstate Investments, was awarded a base salary of $625,248.

The base salary of Edward Liddy, the former CEO who remains chairman, remains unchanged at more than $1.1 million.

I am glad to see that making it harder to insure my “fabulous home” helps Allstate’s shareholders:

The Allstate Corporation (NYSE:ALL) today announced a quarterly dividend of thirty-eight cents ($0.38) on each outstanding share of the corporation’s common stock payable in cash on April 2, 2007 to stockholders of record at the close of business on March 9, 2007. This dividend is an 8.6 percent increase from the dividend declared in the previous quarter.

Allstate responded to Katrina and Rita, and still made a profit. Yet, the company asks for more money and less risk.

How much is enough?

An Insurance Broker in Hamburg, New York

2007-02-23T09:56:00.000-06:00

Gets it:

The answer to this mess is to add flood (and earthquake) peril to all homeowners' policies nationwide, with much more adequate limits on the home and its contents. This will also eliminate the impossible task of separating wind and water damage while adjusting the loss.

I have no illusions about the resistance that will be encountered to implementing a change of this sort. Regardless of the insurance companies' advertising slogans, the bottom line always trumps any notion of serving the public good.

The challenge is to develop a system to finance the very substantial losses that this will entail. Without federal government reinsurance, it would not seem possible to limit the exposure of the insurance companies to an acceptable level.

The House Financial Services Committee will soon hold hearings to look into the "failure of the insurance system" to deal appropriately with claims from Hurricane Katrina and Rita. The insurance industry will testify that within the "system" they were nothing short of heroes.

The problem is that the "system," which the industry largely created, is hopelessly inadequate to protect people's assets after catastrophic flooding. While this topic may not resonate in Western New York, eyes will open if we sustain an earthquake, as has been predicted. It will be interesting to follow the congressional hearings.

With heroes like the insurance companies, who needs villains?

Not Having Cable Saves Me from This

2007-02-21T12:01:00.000-06:00

Glenn Beck. Who is this dude?

Apparently, he is important enough to have radio show, a CNN Headline News show, and to comment on ABC News.

Past contributions to the Hurricane Katrina discussion:

But the second thought I had when I saw these people and they had to shut down the Astrodome and lock it down, I thought: I didn't think I could hate victims faster than the 9-11 victims. These guys -- you know it's really sad. We're not hearing anything about Mississippi. We're not hearing anything about Alabama. We're hearing about the victims in New Orleans. This is a 90,000-square-mile disaster site, New Orleans is 181 square miles. A hundred and -- 0.2 percent of the disaster area is New Orleans! And that's all we're hearing about, are the people in New Orleans. Those are the only ones we're seeing on television are the scumbags -- and again, it's not all the people in New Orleans. Most of the people in New Orleans got out! It's just a small percentage of those who were left in New Orleans, or who decided to stay in New Orleans, and they're getting all the attention. It's exactly like the 9-11 victims' families. There's about 10 of them that are spoiling it for everybody.

Scumbags? Anyway…

So, Scout Prime at First Draft posts a clip of an “interview” Glenn Beck did with Chris Cooper of Rising Tide Conference fame. I can not believe that this passes for journalism.

Beck starts of with a video clip from his radio show to introduce the topic:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I don`t want to kick a city when it`s down, but I just -- I mean, we`re not even rebuilding it properly.

I find it very difficult in some ways to feel bad for New Orleans, because you`ve voted your government in. It`s a bad government. You didn`t know that after Katrina, as you were sitting there and the buses were underwater, but the city of New Orleans would like to let you know that crime usually decreases during Mardi Gras.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

The problems caused by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans are great in both magnitude and complexity. “We`re not even rebuilding it properly” means nothing until “properly” is defined, which Beck does not do. Instead, he attacks the city government, pulling out “the buses were underwater” again.

Yes, they were. Eighty percent of the city was underwater. That would fall under the “great in magnitude” category.

Beck then delves into the “great in complexity” category:

Just a few blocks from the parties in the French Quarter, entire neighborhoods are still lying in ruin. Nearly 50 percent of New Orleans` population hasn`t come home.

On this day to eat, drink and be merry, you`ve got to face some sobering realities. Before Katrina there were more than 2,000 doctors serving in the city. Today, 500. Before Katrina, 128 public schools in operation. Today, 56. Four thousand businesses have closed, 100,000 jobs disappeared, 62,000 families still living in temporary trailers.

The murder rate is soaring. It has increased 90 percent in the past six months alone.

Rather than recognize that these are the obstacles we face as we rebuild, Beck cites these as evidence that we are not rebuilding “properly.”

We can infer from his radio-clip introduction that Beck wants to talk about how bad the city government is. While an inept city government doesn’t help, Hurricane Katrina presented us with problems, as I said before, that are great in both magnitude and complexity. Government on the city level, and even the state level, can not solve those problems alone.

Chris Cooper gets it:

CHRISTOPHER COOPER, "WALL STREET JOURNAL": Hey there, Glenn. The biggest problem is, frankly, the federal government. They`ve...

BECK: Really? How is that possible?

COOPER: I know. That comes as a big shock to you.

BECK: You would think that it would be, I don`t know, the local government that is completely corrupt.

COOPER: They`re partially to blame.

Not only does he get it, but he gets it with supporting evidence:

Congress appropriated the money. It`s not the $110 billion that you always hear about. It`s about $26 billion or so for Louisiana. But they only appropriated the money under the color of what`s called the Stafford Act, which requires every local government to come up with a matching amount of money before any of the federal money can be used.

Well, these local governments are broke as a choke. They can`t come up with the dough.

An incredulous Beck doesn’t agree:

BECK: OK. See, I think the problem in New Orleans is -- is about corruption first over the federal government.

I mean, don`t get me wrong. CSX, the railroad, has already rebuilt the bridges coming into New Orleans. Private industry got it done, because they had to. They`re still pricing out and taking bids, you know, for the freeway system in New Orleans.

You`re exactly right. The government is out of control.

Ok. See, WTF is Beck talking about? CSX? Railroads? And, I didn’t even know that “the freeway system in New Orleans” was one of our big problems. That must be a conservative talking point that I missed.

And what does “You`re exactly right. The government is out of control” mean? Cooper just refuted Beck’s claim that the city government is the number one problem. Beck stood by his claim making it even clearer that he thinks the city government is the problem “first over the federal government.” Yet, he then says to Cooper “You`re exactly right.”

If Cooper is right, then Beck is wrong. My head hurts.

Beck changes the subject:

But when you`ve got crime and murder rate going through the roof, a 90 percent increase in the murder rate in the last six months, and people are walking from it. Everybody knows there`s a 60-day rule going around now. People know. I can kill somebody and serve 60 days and be done.

Once again, this simple statement completely ignores the magnitude and complexity of our problems. Cooper does a good job of trying to add some intelligence to the discussion by pointing out the lack of a crime lab. But, in this format, neither can really address the problems in the New Orleans criminal justice system. It’s too complex for a two-minute discussion.

I promise Beck one thing, though. If he kills someone in New Orleans, he will not serve 60 days and get out. I will make sure of that.

Beck then asks for help:

BECK: You see, I mean here -- Chris, I mean, just help me understand this because I -- I just fail to understand it. I read a story out of New Orleans today about a 17-year-old boy who came home, had been beaten up, and his mom says, "What happened to you?"

And he says, "I was beaten up by so and so."

She hands him a gun and says, "Go get revenge." He goes. He kills the other kid. The police grab him, take him home. Mom is there. On the mantle of the house is a picture of the kid with a gun in one hand, a fist full of cash in the other. This -- this family has glorified violence.

What does the police chief say? His response was, "We`ve got to fix the educational system here." What?

COOPER: I mean, clearly that`s a troubled mom. I don`t think that`s a...

BECK: No, that`s a -- that is a troubled police chief that says, "We have to fix the educational system." We`ve got problems with families here.

If Beck is ignorant of the need for better social conditions, like a better educational system, to attack violent crime at the root, then he needs more help than even a well-informed Chris Cooper can give him.

Cooper yet again responds with an intelligent answer, but Beck – no doubt running out of time – abruptly ends the interview.

Is that what passes for a news show interview nowadays? I miss Ted Koppel and Nightline.

Bob Marley Sunday

2007-02-18T10:47:00.000-06:00

... make that Ziggy Marley Sunday.

People Get Ready.

Not to be confused with People Get Ready. Although, with a post title like Our Stoned Mayor, I see where confusion can occur.

Good Hands, Good Neighbors, and Not-So-Good Faith

2007-02-18T02:05:00.000-06:00

This is a long post. But if you make it to the end, you get a prize.

CNN investigated how insurance companies handled minor car accidents:

Since the mid-1990s, most of the major insurance companies -- led by the two largest, Allstate and State Farm -- have adopted a tough take-it-or-leave-it strategy when dealing with such cases.

***

In an affidavit in a New Mexico case where Allstate is being sued, one of the company's former attorneys said the strategy is to make fighting the company "so expensive and so time-consuming that lawyers would start refusing to help clients."

Shannon Kmatz, a police officer and former Allstate claims agent, said company employees were encouraged to get rid of claims quickly and cheaply and even offered accident victims as little as $50, telling them to take it or leave it.

***

The strategy, according to former Allstate and State Farm employee Jim Mathis, relies on the three D's -- denying a claim, delaying settlement of the claim and defending against the claim in court.

Interesting strategy. Where did it come from?

For Allstate and State Farm, according to documents obtained by CNN, the strategy was developed in the mid-1990s with the assistance of consulting giant McKinsey & Co.

Looking for a way to boost profits, McKinsey focused on soft-tissue injuries incurred in minor crashes.

David Berardinelli provides an example of how the strategy can boost profits:

Berardinelli is the author of "From Good Hands to Boxing Gloves," a book based on some 12,500 PowerPoint slides that fell into his hands during a lawsuit against Allstate Insurance Co.

The slides had been presented to Allstate between 1992 and 1997 by management consultant McKinsey & Co. as part of an overhaul (the Claim Core Process Redesign) of the insurer's claims handling process. Much of the presentation encourages Allstate to adopt a hard-nosed approach to claims.

One typical slide picked from the book refers to taking a stricter stance on settlements: "Stand firm on final offer with no real negotiation."

Another - and the inspiration for the book's title - distinguishes between the treatment to be accorded to customers who hire a lawyer to press for a higher payout and those who don't: The unrepresented get the "good hands" approach (settlements within 200 days or so); the lawyered get "boxing gloves" (resolution that could take three years or longer).

Shannon Kmatz, also quoted in the previous article, shows that the recommendations from McKinsey were put into practice:

The strategy outlined in the slides sounds much like the marching orders Shannon Brady Kmatz says she got when she was an Allstate claims adjuster. Kmatz, who left Allstate in 2000, says she felt under constant pressure to "fast-track" claims - that is, settle quickly for as little as possible.

"We called it throwing them a bone," she said. "You offer $500 and hope they go away."

She said she was also evaluated on how successful she was at convincing people to accept the company's offer rather than try to get more money by hiring an attorney. Adjusters who excelled at these goals, Kmatz says, were rewarded with free dinners and bonuses that could add up to a few thousand dollars a year.

Berardinelli sums it up:

Claimants in the "good hands" category may get swift reimbursement, but they will end up with less than they're entitled to, he says. Those who hold out for more -- and retain a lawyer to help them get it -- face battering in the courts and potentially years of delay. "You can get your claims resolved promptly or fairly," he argues, "but not both."

CNN concluded that this strategy was used on car accident claims. But, if it was profitable in the car insurance division, why not in the homeowners division?

Gary T. Fye of Nevada, an expert in the analysis of disputed insurance claims, has testified for policyholders in insurance cases.

Fye said: "The ACE redesign [McKinsey’s strategy] is an example of a strategic initiative. A strategic initiative changes everything, including basic assumptions of claims handling. ACE has been very problematic for policyholders and their lawyers because it is so difficult to trace. The company has changed nomenclature and purged documentation to conceal the origins and scope of these strategies."

Fye said teachings from ACE filtered down to State Farm Fire and Casualty, a wholly owned subsidiary of State Farm Mutual, in 1997.

And it is hard not to see the “throw ‘em a bone” strategy and the “three D’s” being used in hurricane claims.

Throw ‘em a bone:

To date [Feb 10], State Farm says, it has paid an average of $25,030 for structural damage to 794 policyholders left with slabs or pilings. State Farm had been unwilling to release the figure before Friday.

If your house ain’t dere no more, I don’t think $25,030 is gonna get it back.

Denial is the biggest of the three D’s:

Where wind damage covered by State Farm and water damage covered by federal flood insurance could not be separated, the company denied claims, infuriating policyholders on the waterfront from state line to state line.

And this denial gem:

In September 2005, while Oklahoma City attorney Jeff Marr prepared his case against State Farm for using biased vendors to deny policyholder claims from a 1999 tornado, the company descended on the Mississippi Coast in response to Hurricane Katrina with the same cast in tow.

***

He [Marr] represents 70 Oklahomans whose homes were subjected to the most severe category of tornado, an F5, on May 3, 1999.

No matter what the catastrophe, he said, in one interview, "the objective is the same: You go find an expert that's bought and paid for and you go get them to give you a report that justifies denial of the claim. Period.

"They represented that these engineers came up here to do an objective and fair assessment of these homes. And they got quite the opposite. Not one report agrees with the policyholder on the nature and extent of the damage. They all sided with State Farm."

A jury found in May that State Farm "intentionally and with malice breached its duty to deal fairly and act in good faith" with policyholders through the use of Haag Engineering Co. and independent adjusting firm E.A. Renfroe.

Haag, one of the companies State Farm used when it "intentionally and with malice breached its duty to deal fairly and act in good faith," then sent employee Timothy P. Marshall to the Gulf Coast to author a survey that would be used to determine claims:

In the survey, Marshall estimated Katrina's peak wind gusts at 115 mph in Bay St. Louis, the hardest-hit area. He concluded the storm surge arrived before peak winds and that there was no tornado damage along the Coast.

Reports from other sources measured wind gusts of 140 miles per hour, found evidence of tornados or tornadic winds and of wind damage well in advance of Katrina's unprecedented surge.

State Farm, Nationwide, Allstate and USAA relied on site-specific Haag reports, along with those of other engineering firms, to assess damage, Marshall has said in sworn testimony.

Attorneys who oppose State Farm believe the initial Haag survey played into the policy language the company used to deny hundreds of claims for homes and businesses Katrina swept away. The language purports to say no wind coverage exists if storm surge ultimately caused the loss. A federal judge has found the language "ambiguous" and "unenforceable," but State Farm has appealed the decision.

From tornados to hurricanes, insurance companies are acting in bad faith. And they are doing it following similar not-so-consumer-friendly strategies, sometimes formulated by the same consulting firm for several insurance companies, and sharing industry favorable estimates from the same company.

So, consumers are paying more for policies and insurance companies are paying less for claims, resulting in billions of dollars of profit for the insurance companies despite record breaking disaster losses. The insurance industry looks like it can do whatever it wants – not unlike a monopoly. Unfortunately, insurance companies are exempt from anti-trust laws.

Then again:

Senate and House leaders, including Sen. Minority Whip Trent Lott, R-Miss., and Rep. Gene Taylor, D-Bay St. Louis, moved to rein in the insurance industry Thursday by introducing legislation repealing the industry's federal antitrust exemption.

Lott, a fierce critic of the insurance industry's response to Hurricane Katrina, joined Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and ranking member Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., on the Senate floor to introduce the bill, S 618. In the House, Taylor, Rep. Pete DeFazio, D-Ore., Rep. Bobby Jindal, R-La., Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., and others announced the introduction of identical legislation.

"Federal oversight would provide confidence that the industry is not engaging in the most egregious forms of anticompetitive conduct - price-fixing, agreements not to pay, and market allocations," said Leahy. "Insurers may object to being subject to the same antitrust laws as everyone else, but if they are operating in an honest and appropriate way, they should have nothing to fear."

And now, your prize. It’s my...

"We didn't know."

2007-02-17T09:30:00.000-06:00

No more comment necessary:

Orleans Parish District Attorney Eddie Jordan had a 20-year-old suspected killer within his grasp only a day ago, yet let him walk out of jail before he could bring the suspect to court on a felony gun charge.

***

But before Jordan's team can prosecute Treg on the gun charge, they have to find him. Because he had posted bond on the gun charge last year, he was able to walk out of jail not long after midnight Friday. The fact that Treg had been released from jail came as a surprise for prosecutors Friday.

"We didn't know," said Dalton Savwoir, Jordan's spokesman.

Setback?

2007-02-16T10:54:00.000-06:00

Why is this a setback?

In Setback for New Orleans, Fed-Up Residents Give Up

***

A year ago, Ms. Larsen, 36, and Mr. Langlois, 37, were hopeful New Orleanians eager to rebuild and improve the city they adored. But now they have joined hundreds of the city’s best and brightest who, as if finally acknowledging a lover’s destructive impulses, have made the wrenching decision to leave at a time when the population is supposed to be rebounding.

People are going to leave. Some of them will be of the “best and brightest” bunch. Let them leave in peace.

They will be replaced.

We fault our leaders for not making tough decisions. I will not fault residents who do make tough decisions, like leaving. It is far better for them to leave than to stay with one foot in and one foot out. That’s only good when you’re doing the hokey pokey.

Rebuilding the area will take two feet in.

And the NY Times article is the second time I saw leaving referred to as treason:

In battered but proud New Orleans, abandonment is a highly emotional subject, in part because many have made sacrifices to stay and rebuild. To some, leaving now is tantamount to treason.

The other day I read a NewsHour essay by Chris Rose:

One day we'll tell you we're making progress. And the next day, we're looking at want ads in Houston and Atlanta. Anyone who doesn't have a Plan B for the future here is crazy. Anyone who admits it is treated like a traitor.

You are not a traitor if you leave. You are making the decision that you think is right. Of course, you may be wrong. But you are not a traitor.

I will not put down another person’s decision to leave in order to make my decision to stay look better.

As the t-shirt says, "It's not beautiful being easy." And things won't be easy in the Big Easy for a while. Everyone must bear that burden. Even the "best and brightest."

In fact, I expect more out of the best and brightest. They are equipped to bear the biggest and heaviest burden, or at least pick up the slack.

Or pick up and go. Do whatcha wanna. Hang on the corner...

200 Strong

2007-02-16T09:47:00.000-06:00

Cliff’s Crib asked for “at least 100 black men that are positive, strong, and working hard to do the right thing” and received more than 200. No surprise, really.

And I bet those 200 plus black men had positive, strong, and hard-working-right-thing-doing black men and women as their role models. If they didn’t, then I am sure they will be that person for the next generation.

The goal is not to be perfect. The goal is to be good. I’m working on it.

More Than Just Numbers

2007-02-16T02:03:00.000-06:00

But if you are keeping count, murders number 23 and 24:

Two men were shot to death and a third critically wounded shortly inside a park car in the 9th Ward shortly before 6:30 p.m. Thursday, police said.

The Mayor showed up:

Mayor Ray Nagin was at the shooting scene and was seen comforting shaken residents who lived nearby.

I give the Mayor credit because he definitely had to go out of his way to get to this crime scene. It was tucked away in the 9th Ward before the Industrial Canal and behind the St. Claude bridge – no where near the parades or touristy areas.

UPDATE: WWL-TV headline - "Nine peope shot in less than seven hours," with a statement from the Mayor:

“Last month, I stated that one murder is too many in our community, our fragile city that is still on the journey to recovery. Tonight, I am deeply saddened that our young people continue dying in our streets.

“As I continue to work to address the systemic problems that have plagued our criminal justice system for decades, I cannot emphasize enough the importance of addressing educational and social problems that have plague our community for just as long.

“I commend the clergy for stepping up and working with the city to help our youth find a way out of a life of crime. We must all work together and unify as a community to save our children from violence.”

“This Ain’t Jerusalem”

2007-02-16T01:28:00.000-06:00

No, it’s New Orleans:

He [Mandell Duplessis] was a seventh-grade dropout who had been dealing drugs since he was a teenager.

***

So home he went, about two months after the storm, to his old turf, and his old career.

Months later, Duplessis was dead. He was found fatally shot Aug. 4 on the steps of a trailer in the working-class neighborhood of Gentilly. It made for a minor post-Katrina story, but a depressingly common one in a city with a homicide rate that was the highest in the nation in the last six months, and about 15 times the national average.

Like many of the residents swept up in New Orleans' latest wave of violence, Duplessis was young, black and versed in the drug trade.

So, too, was the man police accused of pulling the trigger, a convicted drug dealer named Garelle Smith. Though apparently strangers, their life stories were remarkably similar.

You can not brush this off as “bad guys killing bad guys.” Every murder hurts the community.

The “bad guys” are often the fathers of the next generation, either by influence:

Duplessis, in his songs, described a different kind of epiphany, one sparked by the sight of a friend from the 'hood who had acquired a slick new car.

It was "a whip [that] looked like a space shuttle," Duplessis rapped. "I knew right then my whole focus in life was to hustle."

Or biologically:

When he [Duplessis] moved into his own place, drugs paid his rent. They paid for expensive sneakers, a fancy GMC Yukon Denali truck, and for the upbringing of the daughter he had fathered with an estranged girlfriend.

Just as the “bad guys” were influenced by their previous generation:

His mother loved him, but she was too strung out to raise a child. So Duplessis moved in with his grandparents when he was in the second grade.

***

Duplessis' mother sent him to a Catholic grade school until her drug habit ate into her finances. So he started sixth grade in a public school system that was considered among the nation's worst. Two years later, he dropped out.

***

Neighbors said [Garelle] Smith's father wasn't around much. Nor was his mother, Lynette K. Smith. She was arrested numerous times, and sentenced, in 1994, to two years in prison for crack possession and theft, court records show. The task of raising Garelle and his two sisters fell to their grandmother, Theresa.

This excuses nothing. But it explains a lot.

Our problems span generations. Our solutions don’t. We are too caught up on catching the bad guys, rather than preventing the bad guys.

Sure, we catch them. Mandell Duplessis had been caught before. Here’s a mug shot from 2004. And Garelle Smith was caught before, at least twice for murder.

The thing is, in 2006 they were both still up to no good. Duplessis’ rap lyrics suggest he was dealing drugs. After beating two murder arrests, Smith was arrested a third time for Duplessis’ murder.

The criminal justice system gets the bad guys and gals off the street. Then, it either keeps them off the street for life or rehabilitates them. When it works, it is a deterrent and prevents the bad people from doing bad things. In the case of Mandell Duplessis and Garelle Smith, our criminal justice system did none of those.

Warren Riley, Eddie Jordan, and all the judges in New Orleans – federal, state, or municipal – can not solve our problems. They can only deal with the person before them, not the generations before or after that person.

That’s our job. But I don’t know how to do it. I just know I can’t do it alone.

None of us is the savior. This ain't Jerusalem.

A Real Tornado

2007-02-13T12:55:00.000-06:00

I was hoping that it wasn’t. But, as the aerial video comes in and people start telling their stories, I see that it was.

Where the po’ family is on the West Bank, we heard the hail smacking against our windows and thunder that sounded like explosions. But we were far from the damage.

What a hurricane is on the macro level, a tornado is on the micro level. While there were less people affected by this tornado than Katrina, they were no less affected. Their recovery begins today. For some of them, it begins again.

The po’ family sends good vibes.

The Posse Celebrates

2007-02-12T00:05:00.000-06:00

Happy Darwin Day.

There are various ways to celebrate. I celebrate by focusing on making decisions in my life based on theories which:

1) are supported by mounds of empirical evidence;
2) have been tested over time;
3) make valid predictions.

While these criteria are for scientific theories, they work pretty well in your non-scientific life also.

Sunday Bob Marley

2007-02-11T09:15:00.000-06:00

February 6 would have been Bob Marley's 62nd birthday.

"I feel so good in my neighborhood, so here I come again."

Two Sides to Every Story

2007-02-10T22:31:00.000-06:00

Sometimes there’s more.

From the Sun Herald, “State Farm tells its side”:

"You kind of step back from it and look over the last month or so and you see, at least I see, examples that sort of strike me as convenient amnesia or schizophrenia, whether we're looking at the political environment, whether we're looking at the legal environment or whether we're looking at the editorial environment," said Michael A. Fernandez, vice president of corporate communications and external relations at State Farm headquarters in Bloomington, Ill.

With all that “convenient amnesia or schizophrenia” going around, it’s a good thing that State Farm keeps records:

To date, State Farm says, it has paid an average of $25,030 for structural damage to 794 policyholders left with slabs or pilings. State Farm had been unwilling to release the figure before Friday.

This is the tough part. Was it the force of the wind which blew over the houses? Or was it a wall of water that knocked them over? Really, there should not be a difference. But we all signed a contract that says there is.

On the flood insurance side, the National Flood Insurance Program paid its claims, even though it didn’t have nearly enough money of its own to do so:

GAO placed the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) on its high-risk list in March 2006 because the NFIP will unlikely generate sufficient revenues to repay the billions borrowed from the Department of the Treasury to cover flood claims from the 2005 hurricanes.

***

From September 2005 to March 2006, Congress three times increased FEMA’s authority to borrow from Treasury—from $1.5 billion originally to $20.8 billion—to help pay for claims from the 2005 hurricane season. As of August 31, 2006, the NFIP has paid out $17.3 billion in claims for 2005 floods.

Perspective: the NFIP collects only $2 billion a year in premiums and had used up its meager reserves when the 2005 hurricanes hit. The NFIP will probably borrow all of that $20.8 billion to repay claims filed since 2005. But at least it pays claims.

And in the “wind or water” dispute, when the NFIP paid, State Farm didn’t:

Where wind damage covered by State Farm and water damage covered by federal flood insurance could not be separated, the company denied claims, infuriating policyholders on the waterfront from state line to state line.

Mississippi Representative Gene Taylor has a term for that:

He remains convinced insurers wrote off losses to the National Flood Insurance Program in "one of the biggest Katrina frauds of them all."

I guess that’s the other side.

Steel Courage

2007-02-08T10:28:00.000-06:00

Via the_velvet_rut, the 21st murder in New Orleans started as a fist fight and ended with the loser’s mother giving possibly the worst parental advice ever:

Narcisse said Johnson went home and gave details of the fight to his mom, 44-year-old Vanessa Johnson. She gave her son a handgun and told him to get revenge because he had apparently lost the fight.

Clarence Johnson is 17-years-old and still out there somewhere. The mother has been arrested.

This highlights how our violent crime problem spans more than just one generation. It took generations of neglect to arise and will take generations of effort to solve. But there must be a first generation brave enough to start it in order for there to be a next generation to finish it. Varg has some great points on that.

I count this as the 21st murder because this counts as a murder, too:

Today [February 4], the New Orleans Police Department announced the arrest of 21-year-old George Lewis, a local male, and booked him with 2nd degree murder of his girlfriend’s two year-old daughter. The offense occurred yesterday [February 3] at approximately 4:00 p.m,. in the 1400 block of South Lawn Street.

***

The Orleans Parish Coroners autopsy revealed the child suffered internal and external trauma to the body as the cause of death. Detective Raymond Ambose, conducted an investigation and arrested George Lewis and booked him with 2nd degree murder.

Shaking or beating a defenseless two-year-old child to death is as violent as a violent crime can get. It is just as cowardly as winning a fist fight with a gun.

So, in 39 days in 2007, we have had 21 murders. That’s about a murder every other day. It is also a murder rate of 98 murders per 100,000 residents. (My formula: 365 divided by 39 is approximately 9.36; 21 times 9.36 is approximately 196, which is the projection for the year-end total murders assuming the current rate stays the same; 200,000 divided by 100,000 equals 2, which assumes a population of 200,000; 196 divided by 2 equals 98, which is the projected murder rate assuming the current rate stays the same.)

What this also shows is the problem is not getting better. In the last half of 2006 (184 days), there were 106 murders (one of the 1/3/07 murders was classified as a 2006 murder). Using the above formula (365 divided by 106 is approximately 1.98; etc.), that comes to a murder rate of 105 per 100,000 residents in the last half of 2006. While 98 is lower than 105, it’s not much lower. And when the first 39 days of 2007 are added to the last half of 2006 numbers, the murder rate is 101 per 100,000 residents.

In light of the high murder rate and where the murders happen, I understand more why a Central City mother tells her child to use a gun to settle a dispute. I understand that it is both a cause of the problem and a reaction to it. Apparently, living in some parts of New Orleans requires courage of steel and, when that is lacking, steel courage.