A Silver Lining? - New Orleans had a failing public school system. Its children deserve better.

OpinionJournal.com ^ | 5 Sept 2005 | Brendan Miniter

[JRios1968]

Brendan Miniter hits it right on the head with this article. Maybe now can the children of New Orleans get cauhgt up in achievement with the children of the rest of the Nation. This might just be a ray of light in the darkness surrounding the entire Katrina episode.

[SteveMcKing]

No they don't. They need to study.

Not absorb more money - study.

[TheOtherOne]

I'll bet that 1/2 of NO citizens never comes back. They will be better off after the event with their new situations. As with most any event, it will have both positive and negative effects. Hopefully, the poverty hole known as New Orleans will have been washed away by the storm, never to return.

[JRios1968]

We can only hope.

[JRios1968]

My personal hope is that, in a new location, the children of New Orleans can actually get something in the form of an actual education, that actually justifies the money our government is throwing down the money pit called the Dept of Education.

[Sunnyvale CA Eng.]

...Maybe now can the children of New Orleans get caught up in achievement with the children of the rest of the Nation...

Don't hold your breath.

Money is power and there will be dump trucks of cash flowing to the area from the government (employed Americans). Those in power in N.O. and other areas will do everything possible to control the flow and allocation of funds (and likely cut a little slice for themselves). I expect the people (and school age children) of N.O. will be right back where they were 2 weeks ago - when this is all over. I also expect that we will hear stories of record setting corruption/ kickbacks /skimming in the coming years even with the best possible oversight from Washington.

[JRios1968]

I hate to admit it, but you're more likely to be right than I am.

[SteveMcKing]

Why bother when all of your basic needs are provided by taxpayers, and your soul enjoyment in life is lounging around and maybe having babies that others will pay for.

[TheOtherOne]

Money is power and there will be dump trucks of cash flowing to the area from the government (employed Americans).

I heard on the news tha the money raised by Clinton and Bush I will be given to the affected Govenors to use as they wish. That seems like a poor idea. It almost makes the Red Cross look good.

[spinestein]

[I'll bet that 1/2 of NO citizens never comes back.]



I think there needs to be a line drawn in the sand from today forward in the U.S.A.: there must be no more people erecting NEW buildings BELOW the level of the local waterline, with the expectation that expensive, and ultimately failure prone, dikes and levies will keep you safe.

If people want to move back to New Orleans (or any other disastrously flooded area) and build again, they must be required to build on higher ground.



And I'm certain we'll have this same national discussion all over again when the New Madrid fault lets loose with an 8.6 in the next few decades or so, and the city of St. Louis is devastated.

[moog]

My personal hope is that, in a new location, the children of New Orleans can actually get something in the form of an actual education, that actually justifies the money our government is throwing down the money pit called the Dept of Education.

I'm hoping and praying I get one or more in my class. Some are being housed just down the road.

But all things aside, we should just focus on what happened for now. I'm getting tired of all the politicizing--especially from the New Orleans mayor.

[moog]

If people want to move back to New Orleans (or any other disastrously flooded area) and build again, they must be required to build on higher ground.

It could be rebuilt to be like Venice, Italy.

[msnimje]

But Jesse Jackson says we have to hurry up and send them back to the system that is failing to educated them.
Jesse Jackson is Black America's number one enemy.

[TheOtherOne]

And I'm certain we'll have this same national discussion all over again when the New Madrid

We will have this over and over again with new disasters. The Country was willing to pony up after 9-11 but we are not the United States of Insurance. People will have to deal with the loss and move on.

We will save them and support them, but not make them whole.

Luckily, unlike NY, NO and Louisiana do not have good representation. The Country should not cater to their every desire to rebuild, but set the terms and conditions, so they benefit the National Interest.

[Sunnyvale CA Eng.]

Wow, I had not heard that.

I guess we'll get to see how good it is to have friends in high places. It would be a good time to pretend to be a Democrat, head to N.O. and start a general contracting business. I wonder if I can get a SBA loan from the government to use for bribes to get big reconstruction projects?? Hmmmm?

[TheOtherOne]

Luckily, unlike NY, NO and Louisiana do not have good representation.

Rather than saying NY had good representation, I should have just said NO, and LA's sucked. NY was a different case, as it was an attack on our Country. Anyway...

[Paleo Conservative]

And the school system's finances were in such disarray the state nearly took control. Instead financial control was handed off to Alvarez & Marsal, a New York firm, which recently cleaned up St. Louis's school system by shuttering schools, laying off staff and otherwise cutting waste. In New Orleans the waste wouldn't be hard to find. One problem was retired and even deceased teachers still on the payroll.

I bet they were still on the voter rolls too.

[TheOtherOne]

"This fund will serve as an umbrella organization for the three special funds established by Governors of Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi and will focus on collecting donations to assist in the long-term recovery plan for the states affected by this terrible tragedy. "

http://www.bushclintonkatrinafund.org/

Looks to be the case.

[RayChuang88]

If people want to move back to New Orleans (or any other disastrously flooded area) and build again, they must be required to build on higher ground.

What they really need to do is bring in a lot of landfill and raise the level of the city 20-25 feet, plus build dikes and levees with the same stringent standards the Dutch applied when the dikes were built the 1960's and 1970's to prevent a repeat of the storms of 1953 that killed several thousand Dutch from storm surges through the Zuider Zee.

[TheOtherOne]

One problem was retired and even deceased teachers still on the payroll.

Every time I read that this happens, it kills me. I have run businesses, hired and fired personnel. I can't for the life of me understand how persons are paid after quiting or dying. It is the grossest of incompetence.