New Dance: The New Orleans "slow down"

New Dance: The New Orleans "slow down"
By Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist
April 30, 2007 talkback

I'm sure you have heard of the famous "second-lining," that goes with the joyous, African-inspired dance that is so popular in New Orleans. Well there is a new dance that is not so popular, but very public and it goes on mostly behind the scenes.

When Civil Rights leaders complained earlier this year that not much had been done to open the flood gates of money to fuel the "Road Home" program, and Sens. Joe Lieberman, Barack Obama and others went down to New Orleans to hold hearings, George Bush said his administration had appropriated $5.3 billion dollars and had done their job. Then he sat down and watched the dance.

Problem is that the money is not moving very fast to those who need it, since over $100 million has been position for rebuilding homes in New Orleans and only $200,000 of that money has been distributed to homeowners. Something smells. Moreover, when I recently said on a radio show that the "slow down" dance amounted to a strategy to further confuse and frustrate those homeowners who would come back, some caller said that was "conspiratorial."

This "slow dance" is killing the disbursement of money not only for
New Orleans, but coastal rehabilitation as well. A Tulane law
professor, Mark Davis, ran the Coalition to Restore the Gulf of
Louisiana for years and believes that shoring up the damage to the
coast-thereby helping to prevent further erosion and damage from
storms-is being held back by a cumbersome approval process and
congressional bickering. A journalist from the Times-Picayune believes
that "Leadership from the White House could cut through the squabbling
in the Congress, but as of right now Senator Landrieu says that she
sees "no sign of presidential intervention."