George, if I'm not mistaken, I think the Army Corps of Engineers is in charge of the levees. It certainly is in charge of making sure the Mississippi stays in it's current course. Building the city there was stupid. But it happened 300 years ago and the builders were French. Because of its location at the mouth of the Mississippi, its growth into a huge population and commerce center was inevitable, unless some government agency forceably prevented its growth.
Once a major population center was located 6-10 feet below sea level and that pop center was located right between the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain (both of which are much higher than the city), and subject to periodic hurricanes, this disaster was inevitable. Folks have been writing about it for 50 years. It was only a question of when. Building higher levees would just put the disaster off for a while. The only really naive thing was thinking that we could make everything work out just fine there if we were just smart enough.