Docs 4 U

Conveniently, the City Attorney Office published all of Mayor Nagin's Gustav and Ike related executive orders.

Unfortunately, the link to the order suspending the advisory committee charged with making recommendations as to which applicants would receive municipal economic development dollars remains broken.

But have no fear, I requested a copy of the order and have uploaded it using google docs.

Enjoy! (this one's a pdf so it's trapped for now)

Here's the fun part:

THEREFORE, I, C. RAY NAGIN, BY THE AUTHORITY VESTED IN ME as Mayor of
the City of New Orleans by the Constitution and laws of the State of Louisiana and the Home
Rule Charter and laws of the City of New Orleans HEREBY ORDER AS FOLLOWS:

Section 1: The Office of Recovery & Development Administration ("ORDA") shall
immediately provide to the Mayor, for his review, all of the 2007 applications for
Economic Development Funding, and following such review, the Mayor shall
submit a recommendation to the City Council for its adoption, amendment or
rejection.

Section 2: Sections 70-407 through 70-408(c) and Section 70-408(d) in part, of the Code of
Ordinances of the City of New Orleans shall be hereby suspended for the duration
of the present emergency declaration originally ordered by me on August 29,
2008.

Specifically, the following portion of Section 70-408(d) shall be
temporarily suspended for the duration of this emergency declaration:
"Upon receipt of the advisory committee's proposed recommendations, the mayor
may modify, change, or amend the recommendations in whole or in part."

More Docs 4 U:

I have also published the application (this one's available for everyone) used for the controversial 2007 round of economic development funding.

Baffling

If you haven't read this article by the Times-Picayune's David Hammer, you should.

There might not be a better illustrator of the disconnect evident within the Nagin administration, between the Nagin administration and City Council, and between Ray Nagin and everyone else.

The introductory sentence pretty much says it all:

The New Orleans City Council is expected to decide this week whether to hand out $5 million in grants to 20 local businesses and nonprofits, even though members of the council and Mayor Ray Nagin's administration acknowledge that the proper review process hasn't been followed.

Wow. What the hell is going on here?

Briefly, Nagin and Blakely hired Greg Rigamer's firm, GCR to evaluate the different projects vying for municipal economic development dollars. The grant awards were supposed to have been distributed nearly a year ago but the Mayor couldn't get an advisory council to rubber stamp some of his pet projects so he let the money just sit there while our city begs for economic investment. That's nearly criminal by itself.

But then, he used the stress of Hurricane Gustav to issue an unchecked executive order that simply bypassed the advisory committee. (Ray Nagin must be reading Shock Doctrine only somehow he's interpreting it to be a textbook for how to subvert democracy and abuse power without getting in any trouble.)

So now he just gets to submit his grant proposals to City Council and explain how important it is for the money to finally be spent and how they shouldn't question his motivations or anything.

Beyond that, Council required the Mayor to submit a full cost-benefit analysis of each project to City Council before any votes but Mayor Nagin has refused to do so.

David Hammer tells us why this requirement was enshrined in the law:

The council voted last year to require those analyses in hopes of avoiding situations such as a $350,000 grant in 2006 to a Lafayette nonprofit to promote manufacturing a portable toilet seat invented by a New Orleans woman.

Councilman Arnie Fielkow said Saturday that the council has never found out what that grant produced.

Arnie Fielkow has foolishly decided to allow the proposals to come to a vote in his committee tomorrow anyway. Show some teeth, Arnie! Demand to see the analysis before any vote.

This whole thing is obviously dirty, just look at all this:

Rigamer recommended giving no money to nine of the 20 applicants Nagin is backing. Rigamer said the applicants either didn't provide sufficient information or had other means of getting the financing. But in each case, Blakely went the other way, and Nagin backed his aide rather than the consultant.

For example, Rigamer recommended against a grant for infrastructure assistance connected with the proposed Veterans Affairs hospital, saying it wouldn't create enough permanent jobs to justify the $4 million request. But Blakely recommended a $2.7 million grant, and the mayor approved it.

In one case, Nagin went against both Rigamer and Blakely. Rigamer suggested $50,000 for a World Trade Center initiative for bringing more international business investment to New Orleans. Blakely recommended even more: $100,000. Nagin, who has made several overseas trips in hopes of expanding the city's global business connections, rejected the application outright.

Fielkow said he was baffled by that.

Councilman Fielkow: If you're so baffled by all this, cancel the Tuesday vote. This was all brought on by an inappropriate power grab during a state of emergency. The Mayor is not following the law. He is not following the findings of his consultants. He refused to allow the consultants to follow through with the grant applicants when critical financing information was missing.

If you want to vote on anything, it should be for an immediate investigation into why the Mayor is pushing certain projects, why he gummed up the advisory committee process for almost a year, and why he has refused Council the legal right to see a full cost-benefit analysis. This begs for an abuse of power investigation, not an up-or-down vote on a bunch of the Mayor's pet projects.

--

This needs to be further researched. Who appointed the advisory committee that was supposed to review the projects?

Tragedy Strikes Twice

Gustav and Ike.

Accountability...

is not just having the incompetent head of the Dept. of Social Services resign for her failures during the recent hurricane evacuations. It is also providing restitution to those that were forced to use their meager wages to pay for food that was supposed to have been provided by the DSS. I heard on the radio that there was a small protest today over the poor conditions at the state's shelter sites. One woman explained that she had had to use her rent money to buy food at a state shelter because DSS had failed to provide special needs meals to those with diabetes. Then she started bawling as she tried to explain that she'd just been evicted as a result. What a disgrace.

Looting Out of Control

Oh my god! What about my stuff?!?

Every press conference with the Mayor and his Police Chief begins with an update on the number of looting arrests. There have been just a handful. It hasn't really been an issue.

But the looting update still leads the press conference and then leads the article, like this one from yesterday.

It's a dishonest picture of the situation here. The top story in New Orleans right now is the chaotic food stamp distribution process and the economic impact of the evacuation on the poor.

The Mayor and the Chief get to pat themselves on the back about tens of looters arrested for petty crime when they need to be challenged for their responsibility to the thousands needing the basics - food. The media should challenge Nagin's knowledge of the evacuation economy given his recent delusion regarding the high salaries of short-order cooks.

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I should point out that the article which I sort-of criticize does do a great job challenging Nagin's almost comical assertion about what Gustav tells us about our levees.

This one is a C. Ray classic, only much more destructive to our recovery than usual:

"Gustav proved . . . that our community and the levee-protection system probably can handle a Category 3 storm, " though he acknowledged that it had weakened to a Category 2 before making landfall.

The reporters, Gordon Russell and Andrew Vanacore smartly go to Rising Tide key note speaker John Barry for a response:

"I don't think the mayor's comment is helpful, " said John Barry, author of "Rising Tide" and a member of the levee board that oversees the city's storm protection. "I wish he were right. He is, unfortunately, simply mistaken. We were lucky. The storm missed us. But it is good to know that in the areas where the storm did exert pressure, everything held up well."

Let's Stop Talking About Palin

I've been mulling over lots of different thoughts since John McCain's announced his VP choice.

I thought at the time that it reflected a desperate lack of judgment on the part of Senator McCain and exposed some real control issues within his campaign. How, I asked myself, could they not even vet her? Why would they undercut the 'experience' theme they've been building for months? How could McCain choose someone he'd only spoken to once or twice?

And then when the details began to emerge, from her daughter's pregnancy to the state trooper firing scandal to the bridge to nowhere lies, I thought to myself that McCain's gambit had totally backfired. Here he's elevated this total political novice without fully vetting and it's backfiring right in his face.

And maybe it did sort of happen like that. McCain's advisers and GOP stakeholders knew he needed to shore up the evangelical base not just if he was going to have a chance at bridging the so-called 'enthusiasm gap' but also because there would be no grassroots basis for 2010 or 2012 if McCain had had his way and picked Joe Lieberman. They convinced John McCain to go with Palin, assuring him that the positive aspects of a ratings draw for the ticket would far outweigh whatever gaffes she may commit or bad positions she'd previously taken.

Democrats and especially a lot of online progressive news sites walked into the unintentional trap. Immediately there were many questions about Sarah Palin's ultraconservative ideology, her poor performance as Mayor of Wasilla, and the trooper scandal. There were even more questions about what the selection said about McCain's judgment, whether or not he himself had a basic familiarity with Governor Palin, whether or not he'd known about the family preganancy. I'm not sure that I 100% buy the argument that the 'unintentional trap' was the typical GOP wagon-circling and push back against the elite media though certainly this was the party response. I don't think that the left is entirely caught off guard by that tactic anymore, as it had certainly been employed at various junctures by the McCain camp already.

Rather, the 'unintetional trap' that Democrats stepped into was Palin's personality.

The GOP push back against the 'liberal media' was in full swing in the days before Palin's acceptance speech but it did not necessarily yield any kind of response from the public. I anecdotally remember seeing many numbers indicating fairly disparate national favorability numbers for Palin, shockingly low considering that VP picks are supposed to poll positively right after their selection. As I recall, roughly 38% of respondents indicated that Palin had made them more likely to vote for McCain and pretty much the same number indicated that Palin made them less likely to vote for McCain.

Once Palin flashed that smile on stage in St. Paul and told her story, her place on the ticket was solidified beyond a doubt. The two most often quoted lines from that speech illustrate what her selection was really all about. Can you remember anything she said she'd do politically? No. You remember the line about hockey moms and lipstick, you remember the brilliantly delivered cutesy line about putting the state jet on EBay, you remember all the small town America nonsense. The whole speech was about imagery, identity, personality, and relate-ability.

Then, when it was kicked back to the Left's pool of tv pundit talent or to the progressive blogosphere, the pointed questions kept being asked - and it looked like this 'everywoman' was being bullied around on her first day at school - never mind that she's been lying about her record.

And since the convention wrapped, criticism of Palin continues dominate the headlines, even on progressive blogs. I know she's being isolated from the press and being briefed over and over again because she has little command of the issues Americans face in this election. I know she's lying about the bridge to nowhere.

But who cares?

Is it really more important to highlight Palin's lies than it is to contrast McCain's blank speech to Obama's extremely detailed agenda? Shouldn't we be highlighting the ridiculousness of McCain's calls for change?

Palin brings ratings. And she brings them to a Republican ticket that was really struggling to generate any kind of interest or excitement.

This Dick Polman piece, which is excellent, examines this theme by critiquing the poor political sense of those clamoring for the use of Hillary Clinton as a foil to Palin:

The Clintons may be exasperating figures to roughly half the Democratic electorate, but they do know a few things about politics and how to play the game. The McCain people have made a politically smart move by picking Palin - her lack of preparedness is another matter entirely - because they have created buzz for the Republican ticket, allowing the GOP to focus on personality and thus distract voters from the Republican policy record of the past eight years. If Hillary was to take on Palin directly, in a battle for the sisterhood, she would be fighting dumb, on the new Republican turf - personality versus personality - while failing to focus voters on the Republican policy record of the past eight years.

And consider this: If Hillary went mano a mano with Palin, how long would it take for this kind of imagery - courtesy of James Bond cinema - to be the talk of the nation?

Wolfson, wise to the imperatives of popular culture, and the allure of so-called "cat fights," put it this way: "For whatever reasons, editors and news executives are convinced that two women fighting sells magazines and attracts eyeballs. You can imagine the thinking. If Angelina Jolie vs Jennifer Aniston, and Britney Spears vs Christina Aguilera sell copies, what could be better than Hillary Clinton vs Sarak Palin...(That) might drive ratings and sell magazines, but it wouldn't be good for the Democratic party or the cause of women's rights."

You see, the McCain camp became wise to the fact that Americans are really bored by John McCain. They realized that McCain's understated public persona, awkward mannerisms, inability to fluidly read a teleprompter, and increasingly common 'senior moments' really exacerbated the age issue and turned off voters on the right and in the middle. The McCain camp is happy to have Palin bump McCain's TV time. Her appearance alone makes her inherently better able to connect with average Americans than John McCain. Notice that Palin and McCain continue to stump in tandem. It may be, as many on the Left snicker, because Palin needs more prepping before she's allowed to do her own photo ops recite her own talking points. However, it is much more probable that the McCain campaign strategists are purposefully working to obscure Americans' views of the ticket by putting Palin out front. It ensures that media coverage of any McCain campaign speech is as much coverage of Palin's barbs as it is anything the actual nominee says. It ensures that Biden and Obama will continue to be pressed to respond to this Palin quote or that Palin quote. It ensures that the progressive blogosphere continues to rip apart all of her misstatements and distortions.

She sells ad shares, she drives web traffic. Palin is getting pretty good mileage out of the same one-liners written for her convention speech whereas Barack Obama's extremely detailed, persuasive, and historic argument for progressive change has generally failed to generate residual coverage.

It's what the McCain camp is banking on.

I actually think the Obama campaign has really played this pretty good. Neither Biden nor Obama have really mentioned Palin by name and continue to hammer away at McCain's proposals that expand upon the Bush administration's disastrous policies.

Unfortunately, however, the progressive netroots is being called to action to clamor on and on about the media's refusal to report accurately on Palin. That's a mistake, it's not something worth leveraging progressive muscle for.

Call out her lies, highlight her distortions, and continue to uncover her insufficient qualifications but stop making her the focal point of the response to the McCain campaign. She should be treated as though she is completely irrelevant because she's essentially being put forth to distract Americans from the actual proposals of the GOP platform and of the McCain campaign.

It's also extremely frustrating as a resident of New Orleans. So much energy went into going after Sarah Palin, who is still essentially a NOBODY, that few bothered to question the 'gee Louisiana really dodged a bullet with Gustav' narrative that allowed the GOP to go back to partying in Minnesota while a huge swath of America barely hangs on.

Eight Weeks Left

Oh thank god this election is almost over. It is time for the nation and the media to move on toward more substantive issues -
Let's kick it to the election center for speculation on who's hot and who's not for the 2012 nominations...

It's been an extremely frustrating two weeks here in New Orleans and all along the Gulf Coast.

I'd like to apologize on my neighbors' behalf for distracting everyone from important matters like the difference between an artificially contrived demographic classification and a pitbull.

All of this is a non-story.


The ratings came in and it's bad news for Louisiana. Our show performed poorly during sweeps.

By the way, I made it home

I-10 from the Fla. panhandle was a breeze.

My apartment is in great shape - the block never lost power during Gustav, but did take a blackout for 20 minutes yesterday evening.

The neighborhood smells a little bit like dead crustaceans though.

Who Changed Nagin's Mind?

Let us be clear:

Mayor Nagin did not change his mind with regard to the blockade of Orleans Parish yesterday morning.

Mayor Nagin was forced to cave to the demands of Orleans Parish residents.

It may seem like Mayor Nagin simply did the logical thing by reversing course on his reentry policy, but to characterize the decision as one that he made falsely portrays what occurred.

I don't begrudge the media for prioritizing the immediate release of information vis-a-vis reentry, but when you aggregate the censoring of Garland Robinette and the James O'Byrne column with the misleading oversimplification of Nagin's reversal, it becomes extremely problematic.

My hope is that over the next several days, the media will fully examine and prominently publish the timeline of Nagin's reversal decision - including the rift with City Council, the instances of censorship, and the massive movement of Orleans Parish residents to disobey the Mayor's stay-away order.


UPDATE: It is inaccurate to say that Mr. Robinette was pulled or censored. It may have been the end of his shift or he may have voluntarily taken himself off the air as a result of his anger. I prematurely published this rumor based off an email that indicated he may have been censored. I can now say that this was not the case.

This does not detract from the troubling censorship of the O'Byrne column or the points made above.

UPDATE II: Here is a link from reader Carmen. The T-P's Dave Walker recaps the blow up between Robinette and Riley.

The Third Estate

My wallet won't open for another night at a motel and my soul won't allow another night in the Florida Panhandle - nice beach day notwithstanding.

I understand that reentry tomorrow morning is limited to Tier Two employees:

The city likely will open Wednesday morning to Tier 2 workers, including employees of building supply companies, medical supply companies and financial institutions, Quiett said. Tier 3 personnel, including gas station operators, grocers and other retailers could get in by Wednesday afternoon, she said.

Quiett stressed that residents not carrying placards issued by the city to companies and organizations that requested priority reentry will not be allowed beyond checkpoints being manned at all roads into the city by Louisiana National Guard soldiers and state troopers.

The administration's plan is dividing the municipal government as it appears Jindal has uninvolved himself with the reentry portion of the proceedings. Councilman Fielkow and Councilwoman Head have gone public with a statement to the media indicating their opposition:

At a minimum, Orleans should have followed all the other parishes and allowed re-entry as of 6 am Wednesday.

While conditions in New Orleans are not good, electricity is not widely available, and health services are seriously depleted, Cms Head and Fielkow believe that people who need to return, particularly small business owners, should be allowed to make decisions for themselves.

It is likely that many many New Orleanians will disobey Mayor Nagin's stay-away order. A lot of this has to do with the fact that Mayor Nagin has no credibiliy with an overwhelming majority of New Orleans residents. Another factor is some folks' perception that the threat of Gustav was intentionally exaggerated to score political points for 'competency.'

Beyond that, of course, is the insult of a tiered reentry plan that allows stewards of financial institutions in ahead of everyone else and punishes citizens paying for hotels, gas, food, etc. by banning their return. All other neighboring Parishes will have allowed popular reentry by tomorrow morning and it's not as if New Orleanians don't notice that.

Right now, the Entergy is claiming that the electrical grid is not secure for some reason so those planning to return should pack essentials like food and batteries. Gas stations are few and far between so stay filled up as you approach the city limits.

Entergy is the big story here, it seems as though they're calling all the shots, floating the possibility that electricity may not be online again for weeks.

Evacuation with no reentry plan is like going to war with no exit strategy.

Jeffrey is pretty fired up too, and points us to this fantastic column by James O'Byrne that pretty much sums it all up.

UPDATE:

The O'Byrne column has been censored. I imagine the city pressured the T-P to do so. That's a pretty dangerous precedent. I'd like to know more about that.

Return

I had been planning on disobeying the stay-away orders and attempting to return today. That they are setting up roadblocks and that it is very pretty in the panhandle today is enough to keep me out for another 24 hours but that's it.

Tomorrow, when business partners return, is when I will return, road blocks or no.

We are tier one.

Where We Stand

It is ALL about the Industrial Canal. There is "tidal sloshing" that is sending waves of water over the walls of the canal, particularly on the West side of the canal into the Upper Ninth Ward and now also into the Lower Ninth Ward.

There are some loose vessels in the Industrial Canal, which will most certainly be the subject of a criminal investigation. One barge is hitting against the canal wall. Divers have been deployed to assess the situation.

I've been watching the WWL live feed, checking out NOLA.com, and this aggregate of live local coverage.

We probably have around six more hours before the threat against the Industrial Canal levee subsides.

Weird Juxtaposition

Anderson Cooper and another reporter in the French Quarter were just talking about how New Orleans maybe had avoided the worst of this storm and that while there was damage, it just hasn't been so bad. Cooper then asks the HQ in Atlanta when it will be safe to go check out Houma and other areas that may have sustained worse damage.

Meanwhile, on the Industrial Canal, CNN is reporting that the area of the Industrial Canal that is over-topping was a new section reinforced after Katrina.

Also, the Times Picayune is reporting that there is concern over loose barges now in the Industrial Canal:

Coast Guard officials have been dispatched to the Industrial Canal to check on reports that a pair of barges are drifting loose in the channel, a top official for Gov. Bobby Jindal who is embedded at City Hall said at 9 a.m.

"We're asking the Coast Guard to go out to the Industrial Canal and verify that they're loose or not, and if they are, secure them," said Paul Rainwater, Jindal's recovery chief.

--

Willard-Lewis, who represents the area, said she was told yesterday that the Industrial Canal had been cleared. She was upset by the mention that barges could be loose in the canal.

"The Coast Guard told me all barges had been removed. It was very disturbing to me," she said. During Hurricane Katrina, a barge drifted through a toppled Industrial Canal levee and landed on top of a school bus in a scene that became an infamous image of the 2005 storm.

That's no good.

Also reports of a fire at Broad and Esplanade.

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Here is video from WWL at the Claiborne Bridge on the Industrial Canal.

"Significant problems here."

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Nagin calls into WWL and confirms that there are some barges or ships loose in the Industrial Canal, one banging up against a levee wall. He is saying that they're "monitoring it."

Apparently the Coast Guard is evaluating whether or not they can send in divers to secure this barge in particular.

Motel Blogging

Anderson Cooper is near the courthouse in the FQ and is asking the CNN Center in Atlanta whether or not it is going to get any stronger because what he's experienced thus far ain't shit.

He's standing there all puffed up right in the middle of the street, not shielding his face from the wind like the dweeb reporting from Grand Isle.

At one point he said that people were out and walking around in the French Quarter, in between storm bands, making sure to note a pair of "drunk twenty year olds."

Also:

Army Corps of Engineers chiefs say they anticipate no storm surge flooding due to Hurricane Gustav, which is turning out to be far less than what was previously forcast by the National Weather Service.

But they do anticipate localized flooding due to heavy rainfall. That water will have to be handled by local drainage and pumping systems in each parish, they say.

"The dewatering of the internal city due to rainfall will be up to these non-federal pumping stations,'' said Brigadier Gen. Robert Van Antwerp, the corps' chief of engineers.

But now there's WWL video of water reaching the top of the Industrial Canal.