With
chief political handler Karl Rove heading the Administration’s
post-Katrina response team, President Bush has finally started
saying some of the right things. He admits responsibility
for the fouled up response. He pledges to rebuild New Orleans
and the Gulf coast, in one of the largest reconstruction projects
ever. He vows federal assistance to the storms’ victims,
and to the states that are now sheltering them. He calls for
a special effort to redress poverty, so much a product of
racial exclusion. He even adopts a liberal thrust, pledging
to offer federal land for free to those who build homes there.
But
in this White House, it is always vital to watch performance,
not promise. This is a president who enforces discipline about
what is said, but is divorced or indifferent to what is actually
done.
What
did the White House do to gear up reconstruction? The
president issued an order lowering the prevailing wage
in construction contracts. The administration gave Halliburton
and Fluor, large Republican contributors, no-bid contracts
to start the rebuilding. And the president ruled out
any tax increases or shared sacrifice in Katrina’s
wake.
Katrina’s
victims may get abandoned once more. Katrina revealed
the two Americas that this administration likes to ignore.
"Rich and poor alike, they found themselves starting
over,” David von Drehle and Jacqueline Salmon
wrote in the Washington Post, “The former began
buying new houses and leasing new office space. The
latter waited in lines for a bar of soap or a peanut
butter sandwich." Bush pledged to redress that
poverty, but he acted to spread it by lowering the wage
paid for construction workers. He offers federal land
for the displaced to build homes on, but increases the
number who won’t be able to afford a mortgage.
Bush
called for making the Gulf Coast an enterprise zone,
slashing corporate regulation and taxes to encourage
investment. That sounds good. But rebuilding New Orleans
will require more government regulation and monitoring
– monitoring environmental hazards and cleanup,
better zoning for flood areas, planning and building
modern infrastructure, often from scratch. This isn’t
an inner city neighborhood that needs capital; it’s
a region that needs rebuilding from the ground up.
If
those that suffered the most in the storm – the
poor, the elderly, the sick, the vulnerable –
are to be part of the recovery, real plans must be made
for them. They need a chance to go to work to rebuild
their towns and homes. That requires temporary housing
close to the rebuilding zones, training, job placement,
and public investment in affordable housing and mass
transit so that they can find a place in the new New
Orleans.
If
this is left to the private market, the poor are likely
to be abandoned again. Billions are already being spent.
The lobbyists and corporate predators are already on
the hunt. Without public presence and planning, private
profiteers are likely to turn New Orleans into a theme
park – with high priced condos, floating casinos,
and tourist venues untroubled by working or poor people.
This
week, the Washington Post reported on FEMA City, a trailer
city of 1500 people outside of Punta Gorda, Florida.
FEMA created the city to house some of those left homeless
in the wake of Hurricane Charley last fall. Now, most
are still there, increasingly angry and desperate. Punta
Gorda has begun to rebuild, but they are being left
out of the mix.
The
hurricane destroyed hundreds of small homes and low
rent apartments along the Peace River, and almost all
of the town’s public housing. As the rebuilding
began, landlords found that they could substantially
increase their rents and upgrade their properties. The
result, as the Post reports: “the low-income working
people most likely to have been displaced by the hurricane
and now most likely to be displaced by the recovery
too.” And now the emergency shelter provided by
FEMA City is scheduled to shut down in February.
FEMA
is now talking about arranging some 300,000 trailers
as emergency shelter in the Gulf Coast. Poor families
have been dispersed to some forty states with no idea
how to get back to their region, find shelter and jobs.
The
president pledged that local and state officials would
have a large role in reconstruction plans. But what
is needed is for the leaders of the poor communities
in the region – the church leaders, community
activists, educators – to be at the table. Without
that, we may spend billions on no-bid contracts to politically
connected firms, while the most vulnerable have their
hopes dashed once again.
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