Bourbon Street Blues

A friendly place

Where has all the money gone?
            -sung to the tune of “Where Have All The Flowers Gone”
Where has all the money gone, long time passing…
where has all the money gone, in New Orleans…
where has all the money gone, to politicians pockets, each and every one.
when will we ever learn, when will they fix this town…

 

Here we are in the Big Easy, my second trip since Katrina and there is good and bad to report. On the surface, in the tourist areas of the French Quarter and the Warehouse District, things look good. Yes, there is a lot of repair and construction still going on and obvious spots where business have gone, never to return. One of my favorite furniture stores has gone out of business. And the Quarter is jumping, even at this traditionally slow time of year. But the areas hit the worst are still suffering.

Most tourists, business people and vacationers hang in their hotel and flood the Quarter at night but never see these other areas or get to meet the people who make this area so special. I decided to take a walk and poke my nose in some places I hadn’t seen before. I spent some time in a local Deli and met a woman I will refer to as Melanie, a native New Orleaner whose family has owned the business for over 30 years. Melanie had another business but the company was forced out of operation by City authorities, or so she claimed, so she came back to the family deli business. Though the store is back to normal, and doing its usual business, her home had only recently gotten back its electricity and renovations were way behind. This is just too hard to believe but it is a common story you hear.

Back in November, on my last trip to the Crescent City, my cab driver told me his neighborhood had not gotten the power back and I hear now that in some areas it is still a problem. They all blame local government, not the Federal government, for the slow progress and all the locals seem to feel that the millions poured into the area have been squandered by their own politicos. If this thinking is due to a history of corruption or to actual facts I couldn’t say, but it seems to be the unanimous consensus.

Is this where the money went?

How is this possible? When earthquakes destroyed the roads around LA and the Army Corps of Engineers declared it would take years to fix, government and the private sector made it happen in months. Why not New Orleans? Why does the most powerful nation on earth plow trillions into a war in a foreign land but ignore the very serious problems of one of its most culturally rich and diverse regions? Is it racism? Is it that the Christian right Administration doesn’t condone the hedonism that New Orleans represents to some?

I don’t know but I do know that it is to our nation’s shame that we have not made this area whole. I have to be honest and say that when I first saw the devastation of Katrina on TV, I was one of those who thought that it might be best to just plow the whole thing over and let it go. But when you are here in this wonderful town you realize quickly that we can never let her go. When you leave the Big Easy you take a little bit of her home with you.

Some of the photos you see here were shot on a walk through the Warehouse District on a rainy Thursday.

Wall Artalley way downtownstreet scene