No, I don't live in Dade County, but I work there in the banking business, and three generations of my wife's family live and work there. I know something about what's happening there economically. Dade has one of the strongest economies in the country. I expect that with increased Latin American trade it will continue to prosper.
Would Dade be better off if Andrew had never happened? Of course. But to assert that it has not recovered and never will is not reality.
In spite of your remarks about New Orleans, I hope you came through Katrina OK. I hope the same for my many friends in New Orleans.
Now, 13 years afterward, it's probably on the road to what could be construed as progress and, arguably maybe better, but it will never be the same... it's completely different.
30% of the population never came back after Andrew, and the Latin, Haitiian, and Central American ethnic groups and poured in, making the downtown area too risky for shops and shoppers. The demographics shifted dramatically afterward.
Farmers didn't hang on, and ultimately sold that fertile land, with all the great produce that was supplied to the country in the winter .. and to us in the U-Pick fields ... to developers.
I understand real estate and business is booming, on and east of the US#1 ..I'll bet they flooded badly in the Katrina deluge .. they always flooded out there. I don't know how the heart of downtown Krome Ave. is doing, but I suspect it probably won't compete with the shopping centers and outlets on the highway.
It was a small-town friendly, easy, country/suburb blend, a botanically lush place, and a wonderful place to raise kids in the 70's and 80's. Andrew decimated tons of 60-80' trees and acres of groves that were integral to that ambiance. I know ... things change, and we'll never know what it may have exactly evolved to in these 13 years, but Homestead will never be the same as it was before the life-altering and traumatic wound it suffered in 1992.