Why are They Making New Orleans a Ghost Town? (1000 evic, a day)

[donsu]

http://www.counterpunch.com/quigley11012005.html


On Halloween night, New Orleans was very, very dark. Well over half the homes on the east bank of New Orleans sit vacant because they still do not have electricity. More do not have natural gas or running water. Most stoplights still do not work. Most street lights remain out.

Fully armed National Guard troops refuse to allow over ten thousand people to even physically visit their property in the Lower Ninth Ward neighborhood. Despite the fact that people cannot come back, tens of thousands of people face eviction from their homes. A local judge told me that their court expects to process a thousand evictions a day for weeks.

Renters still in shelters or temporary homes across the country will never see the court notice taped to the door of their home. Because they will not show up for the eviction hearing that they do not know about, their possessions will be tossed out in the street. In the street their possessions will sit alongside an estimated 3 million truck loads of downed trees, piles of mud, fiberglass insulation, crushed sheetrock, abandoned cars, spoiled mattresses, wet rugs, and horrifyingly smelly refrigerators full of food from August.

There are also New Orleans renters facing evictions from landlords who want to renovate and charge higher rents to the out of town workers who populate the city. Some renters have offered to pay their rent and are still being evicted. Others question why they should have to pay rent for September when they were not allowed to return to New Orleans.
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N.O. citizens have been gang raped by the bushgang

[SheilaT]

1. On one hand

many of the homes truly are damaged beyond any hope of repair, and the entire contents are un-salvageable. On the other, clearing out the city entirely accomplishes at least two ends: 1)It can now be rebuilt however the Evil Overlords want it rebuilt. 2)It's a valuable exercise in seeing if this government can move people around on a mass basis, somewhat like Stalin did in the Soviet era.

[msongs]

2. what is your proposal to solve this horrible problem? nt

[donsu]

6. protest in the 9th ward - notify N.O. residents where ever they are

so they can protest - pay for them to go to the hearings

send spys into the 9th ward

drag the bushgang out of the W.H. and into prison

protest in the streets

protest in the Media's lobby

act up, act out

protest in the offices of congress

make Sen. and Rep. life unbearable until they do right. follow them around, catcall

put up signs

do everything

or sit on the couch and say 'what a shame'

[Fridays Child]

3. This cannot rest solely on the head of the federal government.

Don't misunderstand, I think the feds have gang raped N.O. residents but these evictions are being adjudicated in municipal or parish courts. Maybe FEMA should step in and reimburse landlords for some part of the income they're losing, while their tenants are unable to pay the rent or until tenants who have chosen to relocate can come back for their salvageable personal property. But, if eviction cases are simply processed without any attempt to mitigate the losses to tenants, local judges need to take the blame.

[DBoon]

4. ethnic cleansing?

the real estate is too good for 'those people" to live there?

[mestup]

5. Bush "...we'll build higher and better."

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/09/20050915-8.html

Tonight I propose the creation of a Gulf Opportunity Zone, encompassing the region of the disaster in Louisiana and Mississippi and Alabama. Within this zone, we should provide immediate incentives for job-creating investment, tax relief for small businesses, incentives to companies that create jobs, and loans and loan guarantees for small businesses, including minority-owned enterprises, to get them up and running again. It is entrepreneurship that creates jobs and opportunity; it is entrepreneurship that helps break the cycle of poverty; and we will take the side of entrepreneurs as they lead the economic revival of the Gulf region.

I propose the creation of Worker Recovery Accounts to help those evacuees who need extra help finding work. Under this plan, the federal government would provide accounts of up to $5,000, which these evacuees could draw upon for job training and education to help them get a good job, and for child care expenses during their job search.

And to help lower-income citizens in the hurricane region build new and better lives, I also propose that Congress pass an Urban Homesteading Act. Under this approach, we will identify property in the region owned by the federal government, and provide building sites to low-income citizens free of charge, through a lottery. In return, they would pledge to build on the lot, with either a mortgage or help from a charitable organization like Habitat for Humanity. Home ownership is one of the great strengths of any community, and it must be a central part of our vision for the revival of this region.


Vulnerable Senate Seats by State http://www.removerepublicans.com
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