New Orleans Public Schools just admitted they put their employees ahead of NO citizens

email response from Alvarez and Marsal | Sept 08, 2005 | Taxrelief

[Huber]

bttt!

Have the media begun to pick up on this yet?

[angkor]

Just for the record, A&M had terminated all the part-time drivers in their big July layoff.

[angkor]

It's starting to sound ominously like the State/Local government drew up plans for such disaster

They never resolved the issue of using school buses in hurricane evacs, despite at least a year of discussion with the City.

There are multiple FR threads documenting this.

[WHBates]

"If they (City of NO) let anyone other than certified school bus drivers operate those vehicles, they could have(and would have)been sued. Thank shyster lawyers and bureaucrats for that conditioned response. IMO, people should have helped themselves by organizing and driving the busses.

I understand your point but just think of the number of lawsuits that they are going to have for not following their own plan.

[Clay Moore]

"That's why Hastert wants a joint Senate/House investigation, because nobody else is going to get to the truth about why so many people suffered and/or died."

I wish I could believe that was going to happen. Every house/senate trial I have ever seen was just a big show of bloviating and pontificating. Nothing was done in the end.

This one will be no different.

[angkor]

These folks were idiots. Let the drivers bring their families.

The City had offered the School Board to allow drivers to bring their families, as well as supplying police protection on each bus.

That's expressly and unambiguously discussed in the June 9 School Board meeting minutes, which are posted elsewhere here on FR.

[pollyannaish]

Maybe this is a stupid question, but couldn't they have evacuated just the same by taking the buses with people in them? The two do not seem mutually exclusive.

[AlexW]

"Bump for MSM attention "

Fat chance....The MSM has only one objective...BASH BUSH.
They are just one step short of accusing him of creating Katrina.

[freeperfromnj]

A 19 YO brother of one student drove us to town in the school bus, dropped us off, then went to the local junior college for his classes.

Speaking of college students, why is it that all of the universities were able to successfully evacuate 100,000+ students and the city of N.O couldn't even get the elderly out of nursing homes?

[angkor]

Maybe these people have their own houses and vehicles and families to worry about without having to bailout Nagin and the rest of the city over its non-plan.

True enough, they may have.

But the City had previously offered to let the drivers bring their families along on the buses, as well as police protection for each bus.

The School Board (e.g., Phyllis Landrieu) continued to stonewall as is clearly proven in the June 9 School Board meeting minutes.

I have no sympathy for Nagin - he's been grossly incompetent as a Mayor - but the School Board also was continuously negligent on the topic of school bus use in the City evac plan.

As of June 9 2005, there were no provisions in either the City or the School Board's hurricane prep planning to use school buses for evac, however there were extensive ongoing negotiations to do just that as indicated in the minutes.

And it was the School Board that was stonewalling, not the City. Not Nagin.

Let's put the responsbility where it belongs.

[angkor]

Why didn't the employees evacuate WITH their buses, and WITH a full load of citizens on board?

Because they had no official authority to do so, due wholly and completely to the negligence and dithering of the Orleans Parish School Board.

Nagin also had no authority to use the buses except under declaration of emergency, a problem the City had been trying to resolve in its negotiations with the (stonewalling) School Board.

[angkor]

As it was the end of the month, rather than the beginning, there was no money for gas to escape.

They didn't want to use School Board gas for a City evacuation anyway, as is indicated in the June 9 2005 School Board meeting minutes.

[Prince Charles]

[Polyxene]

"hese folks were idiots. Let the drivers bring their families."

Exactly what I was thinking! Get your stuff, your family, get on the bus and GET OUT!!!!! SHEESH!!!
(If I read much more of this idiocy, my head really is going to explode!)

[zeaal]

Local and state officials were required to file an emergency plan so that could get access to Federal $$$$s. But, it is apparent now that the only reason a plan was drawn up was to get the money and not to actually be used to safe lives and evacuate a city. GREED.

[Frank_Discussion]

They may not have resolved it, but they did put it in the published plan they were to follow.

[Congressman Billybob]

Your last paragraph is wrong. Once Mayor Nagin issued his evacuation order for New Orleans on Saturday morning, the existing evacuation plan kicked in. That's been cited dozens of times for a week now on FR. Suffice to say, paragraph 5. on page 13 requires the Mayor to use "public buses" including both municipal and school buses to evacuate those who "do not have, or cannot afford, private transportation."

The Orleans Parish School Board certainly could have shown some brains and some initiative and ordered its buses to be used. But the responsibility under Louisiana law and New Orleans ordinances, belonged to Nagin as of Saturday morning.

He did not have to "negotiate" with the School Board, as you suggest. He had, and should have used, the power to order those buses to roll. Immediately. And as of Saturday morning there was enough time, barely, to get every man, woman and child out of New Orleans before Katrina hit the following morning.

Congressman Billybob

Latest column: "Mayor Nagin: 10,000 Counts of Manslaughter"

[TaxRelief]

We do not know if those keys were available.

[HelenP]

Except that parts of it are a lie. The kid isn't 18, he's 20 and a car thief. He's also told multiple stories on how he got the bus, including that a police officer handed him the keys.
But I guess he could step in front of the camera and say "Yeah, I stole the bus. I knew how to do it because auto theft is my career. i've had a lot of pratice hot-wiring vehicles."
http://www.wdsu.com/news/4869342/detail.html

[the Deejay]

Personally, I never really cared
how he got the bus.

And he didn't just take himself
and his buds out.

Only thing that mattered is he
got a bus load of people the
hell outta that putrid city.

That young man showed more
backbone and courage than
the gov & mayor put together.

As far as his age, 18 or 20,
is hair splitting.

NO could have used 200 + kids that think like him. A lot more people would have gotten out a lot sooner.