I've never been down to your area. I realize the port & other features of the city are important for the country. I don't think this is any time to quibble, but...
Some communities never rebuilt after the 1993 flood. The feds prevented it for some of them, as the lesson from that flood was about rebuilding some of the natural floodplain, lost between the 1930's & the summer of 1993. Nine states were affected & the feds kicked in a *share* of what was lost.
http://www.e11th-hour.org/resources/timelines/floods.1993.html
For the record, my community wasn't flooded. My family took a trip via train through some of the affected areas that summer. We passed miles & miles of lakes, which had been farmer's planted fields before the rains came & stayed too long. It was kinda eerie to see the guys shoveling gravel under the tracks as we passed them. I think we were the first train to cross the Mississippi where we did, after the major flooding had stopped. You could tell by the waterline on the buildings in the area, the tracks had recently been underwater.
If the feds recommend relocating most of the residential units of NO elsewhere, what do you think should be the appropriate response? What do you think the response will be?