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In addition to the Superdome, Harrah's Casino opened in Gulfport Mississippi this summer. Yet, there aren't many homes being built in New Orleans. Some rebuilding of homes is being done in Mississippi by church groups from other states. (I know this to be factual because I have a law student from Illinois living in my home. He and his church group went to Mississippi this summer to help with rebuilding. Another group went to Louisiana. Interestingly, both groups reported back that there were NO locals helping with the rebuilding projects.)

Have the levies in New Orleans been fixed yet?

The church groups have been great! Without them I don't know where things would be. We actually housed a group on our compound at work for a few weeks. We held pot luck dinners and did whatever else we could do as individuals to make their stay more pleasant. But you know what we were doing when they were working - working. On nights and weekends we were working on our own houses or those of our families. Sometimes we try to get our kids out of this mess and take them to the park (now that some of them have reopened) or do something else normal.

A limited amount of rebuilding is going on everywhere. When the money allocated in DECEMBER finally starts reaching peoples hands things should pick up to some extent. What is unbelievable is the fact that the damage was so bad and so extensive that gutting is still the major project in New Orleans - for many rebuilding is still a distant dream. This is the case for the middle class as well.

To answer your question - NO. The 50 or so "breachs" have been repaired. Nothing has been done to anything that did not actually break so many locations in the weakened system are on the point of collapse without any undo stress. Some of the repairs have crumbled under rainfall so you can't have faith in them either. To get back to the level of protection we were told we had before Katrina will take at least until 2010 and knowing what I now know about the Army Corp. I don't have a lot of faith in that date either.