Returning to Live in New Orleans

"Will you return to the New Orleans area?" In a webpoll this is the question being asked of people who have been displaced by Hurricane Katrina. The website of New Orleans' channel 4 WWL-TV has been offering excellent local coverage of the disaster at www.wwltv.com. The response so far has been running about 75% in favor of returning, with the rest opposed or unsure. As discussed previously in Should New Orleans Be Rebuilt?, the city has inherent problems due to the fact that 80% of it lies below sea level in an area bordered by major bodies of water that are actually a few feet or more above sea level. The enormous cost of rebuilding New Orleans will fuel some debate as to what to actually do with the place. Should people again inhabit areas that are known to be flood and disaster prone? Most of the housing that was seriously submerged in the flooding will have to be demolished. Buildings in the higher parts of town, including the French Quarter and Central Business District, have fared somewhat better, and there is no doubt these areas will be quickly restored to their former status.

It's quite interesting to read the comments of the individual citizens who were uprooted by the disaster. Here follows a selection of comments from WWL's webpoll reflecting a cross-section of the sentiments being expressed. There is a strong tendency to want to return to the area that they called home, many sentimental feelings about New Orleans, but also plenty of negative comments and doubts about the future of the city.

--I seriously doubt anything will change; this city has never been about change. Even my alcoholic father and prescription pill addicted mother-in-law fell right back into old habits in a new city after losing everything. People of New Orleans don't want to change; they love their incompetence, laziness, and apathy as much as they love their music, food, and ghettos. In a city where the same song writes itself every night through its decimated street tops, skinny and hugely outdated interstate system, nasty little run down dumps called houses, busted and broken public schools attended and managed by criminals and imbeciles, ignorant and thieving politicians, 12-19 year old black males who regularly feel it necessary to kill one another to protect they're "pride", undercover racism which to the contrary is black on white (trust me I'm white and live in an all black neighborhood), deplorable public service system oozing with ignorance i.e. city hall, life draining humidity and energy robbing heat, COMPLETE lack of jobs and commerce, non-livable wages coupled with a high cost of living, pathetic city infrastructure, abundant $5.15 an hour jobs, health care system that leaves gunshot victims doubled over for hours in the waiting room....who would want to go back to that? The hell on earth I call home, the hell on earth I grew up in that raised me to maturity beyond my years and gave me the strength and street wisdom to survive any of the darkest places in this world will always call me back to the place I call home. I miss the unique architecture, I miss the food, I miss my black folk, I miss my culture, I miss my streets. Will I return to New Orleans?...my mind says I wont, my heart says I must.
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Article Author: Frank Waldron

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