Bush's Czar to Rebuild Gulf Coast Is Resigning - New York Times:
The White House said Friday that the administration's Gulf Coast reconstruction czar, Donald E. Powell, was resigning to return to his family in Texas. ...
Despite the billions of dollars spent, much of the city remains vacant and crumbling....
Some New Orleans officials noted that he was not a constant presence, appearing and dropping out of sight.
Mr. Powell said: "I've been doing this two years, and I think I have spent in excess of 200 some-odd nights in New Orleans. My wife says I live in New Orleans."
I'm stunned by that last line, the sheer audacity of any suggestion that the person responsible for rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast might actually live in New Orleans. Not 200 out of 730 nights, but 700 out of 730 (we'll give him a vacation, a luxury many people who live in New Orleans probably don't get). If Mr. Powell were succeeding, one would hope that his wife wouldn't mind coming down and staying with him in the rebuilt New Orleans. Before Katrina, a lot of people who didn't live there would have given anything for a chance to relocate to the Big Easy for a little while.
It's been over two years since Katrina made landfall. Two years after 9/11, lower Manhattan was largely back to business. The rubble was cleared out of Ground Zero, subterranean train stations where back in business, and while people still paused when a plane flew overhead, life was largely back to normal. People were back in their apartments, office space was being rented. In New Orleans, people are still struggling to deal with vast, empty neighborhoods. People are trying to figure out how to move back home, and finding that they can't, because the jobs still haven't moved back.
America lost a treasure of a city to Katrina, and the residents of the Gulf Coast lost so much more. It split up families, and broke up communities that had long histories and oral traditions. It's no small insult for Mr. Powell to use his desire to spend more time with his family as an excuse to duck out.
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{sarcasm} Hey, why be so hard on the man? I mean, he did spend a total of 27% (of two years) of his time in the city. That is more than a person would spend working full-time (40 hrs) at his office (23% of an entire week). He should be paid overtime for the extra 4% (!) he put in!{/sarcasm}
Is this type of attitude really a surprise for anyone?
"Before Katrina, a lot of people who didn't live there would have given anything for a chance to relocate to the Big Easy for a little while."
No farging way. Parts of the city are nice, but it's piss-poor in most other areas. Crime and endemic corruption? I'll pass. In terms of physical situation, much of New Orleans is like Holland, but without competent engineering and worse storms.
Other parts of the Gulf Coast are much more appealing.