Slow Rebuilding in New Orleans

Today NPR covered recovery in New Orleans with this story about the long, slow recovery a year after Katrina nearly destroyed the city and the Gulf Coast. I was just talking to Julie Belcher of Yee Haw Industries last night. Her partner Kevin went to Jazz Fest in April to sell their posters and found stores just outside the Midtown festival site still boarded up. In June Chloe and I rode the streetcar to the end of the line on Canal and found the same thing. The displaced population and government neglect has made recovery in NOLA very slow.

As usual, NPR does a great job of covering this story in depth, bringing out the character of a city that will not die. The Rebirth Brass Band is shown at the Maple Leaf Bar in an audio slide show, and Lower Ninth Ward resident Ronald Lewis is rebuilding in the Lower Ninth. Out in St. Bernard Parish Donald and Colleen Bordelon are rebuilding room-by-room. Everywhere, the emotional burden of living and working in neighborhoods that still look like disaster areas is overwhelming. Many are beginning to show the strain. Read the whole feature story here.