Katrina victims demand 'right to return'

Reuters ^ | 12/10/5

[Crackingham]

With jazz music, prayer and offerings to the gods, hundreds of Hurricane Katrina survivors on Saturday demanded the government move faster to rebuild the city and provide evacuees with more disaster assistance. Shouting "We're Back," protesters said they feared the city's poor would be shut out of reconstruction after being dispersed far across the United States since the storm. City officials estimate more than 300,000 New Orleans residents have yet to return since Katrina flooded the city, reducing entire neighborhoods to a rubble-strewn wasteland.

In one of the largest rallies in New Orleans since the hurricane, survivors marched to City Hall from Congo Square, a centuries-old meeting place where African slaves once gathered to trade, play music and dance. African drummers and a brass band dubbed the "Soul Rebels" set the carnival-like tone, while a tribal priest made an offering of rum and watermelon.

"I lived in my house for 45 years -- my mother died and left it to me," said Gloria Brown, 70, an evacuee living in San Francisco. "I swam seven blocks in filthy water with my dog Queenie to survive. I want to come back but I can't pay for it."

The federal government is providing varying amounts of assistance to evacuees to cover temporary housing and living expenses. But some evacuees said they have not yet received any money.

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has held meetings with evacuees living in places like Alabama or Mississippi to gather their ideas about how to rebuild the city. City and state officials have yet to determine how to rebuild a faulty levee system that created the flooding, a key decision for insurers and lenders financing the reconstruction. Some hurricane evacuees said there should be less talk and more action.

"Right now they're treating us like refugees," said Mervin Lucas. "They're worried about health in Afghanistan, the cold in Pakistan. They're giving folks in Iraq better things than they're giving us."

Rally organizers accused the city of discriminating against black residents by moving slowly on rebuilding, particularly in low-income areas that were hardest hit, after failing to rescue them quickly in the days following the storm.

"It's no secret the rich white folks uptown don't want us back," said Malcolm Suber, a protest leader with the grass-roots People's Hurricane Relief Fund. "This government left us to starve and to die."

[WatchOutForSnakes]

"I'm disgusted with the whole lot of NO residents."

The whole lot? Wow, that's quite a statement there Freebird. You know when you make such broad statements it really takes away from any argument you want to make. It's your perogative to not send any money to help but I bet if you tried really, really hard you just might be able to find one, heck maybe even TWO residents in New Orleans who are trying to do the right thing, work hard, get back on their feet and start their lives again. And if there is just ONE person in New Orleans doing that then you shouldn't be disgusted with the "whole lot", right?

[WasDougsLamb]

"It's no secret the rich white folks uptown don't want us back," said Malcolm Suber, a protest leader with the grass-roots People's Hurricane Relief Fund. "This government left us to starve and to die."


----Amazing how if we say one thing we are being racist and they are allowed to spout racial comments every friggin time they open their mouths. Funny part of it is, their comments are all a bunch of BS not even worth listening to. GET JOBS.

[daybreakcoming]

I have long felt that the government (city, state and fed) have determined that NO will be built for corporate interests and not for the residents.

Hi conservbabe - I take it you do not believe that businesses must return first followed by the people?

Your posts tell me that you do not "get" New Orleans other than the headlines you read. Just as in Irag, the progress being made in New Orleans is not being heralded by the media. You are being used if you believe everything these self appointed Cynthia McKinneys are espousing, courtesy of the msm.

[UCANSEE2]

Seems to me they could have diverted their energy from having a parade into giving a hand in digging their own houses out of the muck.

Seems that those who suffered as much or more in the rest of that state, as well as two other neighboring states have little time left to protest, as they are too busy digging.

[onyx]

You are making far too much sense!

[sweetliberty]

"...demanded the government move faster to rebuild the city and provide evacuees with more disaster assistance."

And just what are they doing to rebuild their own lives?

[sweetliberty]

"The federal government is providing varying amounts of assistance to evacuees to cover temporary housing and living expenses. But some evacuees said they have not yet received any money."

It sounds like some of them never left the plantation. They're still waiting for massa to provide for them. It's just that massa is federalized now rather than privatized.

[SouthernFreebird]

Oh bite me. I'm sick of the whole lot in NO. I don't give a rip if even half are trying. So what R you gonna do about that. Broad brush my butt...all I've seen come out of NO since Katrina is bitching and whinning and racists statements from blacks about whites as they have their hands out demanding even more money.

Queers dancing in the streets celebrating their nasty sexual habits while the bodies of their fellow citizens were still floating by.

LE taking vacations before the streets were even dry. Others too busy looting to keep any law. Criminals set free while the helpless old people were left to die.

And there is so much more that makes my skin crawl about that place and the people that inhabit it, I don't even want to put an effort into finding that one person you think exists in NO.

[ItsForTheChildren]

I've been looking for a Texan to ask this question: how is it going down there with the evacuees?

I live in the North Texas (Dallas) area and while I understand the are some evacuees living in these parts I have personally noticed no difference. My daughter knows of two kids from NO in her middle school and they seem to have adjusted well. I do recall hearing of an assault, I believe it was, in Ft. Worth committed by a Katrina evacuee. Other than that all seems to be quiet in this neck of the woods. I know initially most were placed in the San Antonio area but I believe a fair number of them have been dispersed throughout our state and other states in this region.

My company is an IT service provider and I know both Katrina and Rita put a strain on local as well as national IT disaster recovery facilities for awhile but that was to be expected and seemed to have pretty much abated by early to mid November.

So all in all, not too bad. I just hope that if they choose to stay in Texas it doesn't shift the political demographic back to the left. Those were not good days.

Those evacuees with the entitlement mentality are welcome take it right back to Louisiana. I'll even chip in on the bus ride.

[Conservababe]

You say so much about yourself in your post. You do not like what was the city of NO. How do you feel about Vegas, I am wondering. LOL

[noblejones]

>>
Obviously you've been waiting to use it, since what I said on this thread is not as bad as the other posts on this thread.
<<

I think some folks from DU have figured out a way to hijack dormant FReeper accounts. That's about the fifth one I've seen just today.

[noblejones]

>>
Yes, I do realize that it takes time to recover from a once in a lifetime disaster. That is why it makes me fume to hear other posters on FR calling them lazy welfare bums just wanting to live on government handouts.
<<

Try reading the article.

[packrat35]

I want to come back but I can't pay for it.

Well I want a new house myself. But I don't expect someone else to pay for it.

[packrat35]

He came to Memphis to speak also.

[WatchOutForSnakes]

I love getting posts like this one. It's just one more unreasonable person exposed. Now most reasonable people know to just ignore your posts and thoughts because they are so irrational. It's like taking candy from a baby.

[SouthernFreebird]

Not unreasonable.

Disgusted and pissed. But if it makes you feel better to deny what we've all seen and read of the NO crowd then knock yourself out dude.

[Libloather]

Demonstrators march down Canal Street during a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 2005. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

Mary Ihsaan holds a sign in front of New Orleans City Hall, Saturday, Dec. 10, 2005, during a hurricane survivors march. Katrina survivors from New Orleans and the Gulf South and their supporters from around the U.S. assembled at the birthplace of Jazz, Congo Square and marched to the city hall to present a 'Declaration of the People' . (AP Photo/Chitose Suzuki)

Royce Osbourne (L), in a skeleton mask, takes part in an African ritual during a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 2005. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

Royce Osbourne, in a skeleton mask, marches in a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 200. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

Evonne Tisdale (L) of Philadelphia chants a slogan during a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 200. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

Viole Washington of New Orleans, face to camera, receives a hug from a supporter Njere Alghanee from Atlanta, Ga., in front of New Orleans City Hall, during a hurricane survivors march, Saturday Dec. 10, 2005 in New Orleans. Katrina survivors from New Orleans and the Gulf South and their supporters from around the U.S. assembled at the birthplace of Jazz, Congo Square and marched to the city hall to present a Declaration of the People . (AP Photo/Chitose Suzuki)

Demonstrators pass by a pile of debris during a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 200. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

Members of the Soul Rebels brass band performs during a protest for hurricane victims' rights in New Orleans December 10, 200. Protesters feared they would receive federal funds to rebuild their homes. REUTERS/Lee Celano

[Libloather]

From NOLA.com -

'Justice After Katrina' was sponsored by a host of activist groups banded together as the People's Hurricane Relief Fund & Oversight Coalition, all protesting the mass displacement of residents and the failure of local levee.

From the People's Hurricane Relief Fund & Oversight Coalition website -

OBJECTIVES

The Objectives of the December 8-10, 2005 Assembly/Conference and the Demonstration are as follows:

1. To build a Hurricane Katrina Survivors General Assembly which will speak for the Gulf Coast Survivors and which will demand and exercise the peoples right to self determination in New Orleans and other effected gulf coast areas in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

2. To demand the people’s right to return to New Orleans and to the Mississippi and Alabama Gulf Coast with dignity and without poverty.

3. To demand reparations for the governments’ criminal indifference, negligence, and malicious actions towards the Victims and Survivors, before, during and after Katrina.

4. To demand, launch and/or continue investigations, law suits and prosecutions of governments, agencies and persons responsible for the human rights violations and crimes against humanity committed before, during and after Katrina.

5. To build a national united front in support and solidarity with the self determination and reparation demands of Katrina Survivors, and through this front to design and initiate a plan of action and institutions which will allow black people to fortify themselves and serve their own needs in the face of future disasters which are either natural or by human hands.

6. To link today’s demands for reparations and self determination to the historical and future struggle of black people and other oppressed populations for self determination and reparations.

[pageonetoo]

Racist statement anyone?

Of course not. The speaker was black...

[pageonetoo]

And the black residents of NO probably do have a complaint. I have long felt that the government (city, state and fed) have determined that NO will be built for corporate interests and not for the residents.

Who in the hell do you think pays for things? Do you think it's the Gum't that pays for rebuilding? Is it proper for these (for the most part) leaches, that are demanding their projects be rebuilt, so they can come back to sit idle?

If business isn't reconstructed, there are no jobs. If no jobs, then who pays for the welfare state? If no profit-led business taxes are paid, then the burden of paying their bills, falls on others. Maybe they need more casinos.

They are not owed a damn thing. Charity is a freely offered thing, not something extorted... and yes, it is mostly poor black people that are affected. Maybe it isn't "somebody else's fault"!