In the early morning of Aug. 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina pounded the coasts of Louisiana and Mississippi.
A wall of water surged around the city of New Orleans. Within a day nearly every one of the woefully insufficient levees
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What ensued was a completely avoidable criminal tragedy.
The poorer, predominantly African American areas of the city were hit hardest by the flooding. Neighborhoods like the Lower Ninth Ward were entirely underwater and almost completely destroyed.
New Orleans’ population was nearly 70 percent African American at the time of Hurricane Katrina.
In the days directly before the hurricane hit land, the federal government ordered an evacuation of the city. But no coordination or assistance was provided. Tens of thousands of people with no means to leave were trapped in the city for over a week, many in their flooded homes.
After the hurricane ravaged the Gulf Coast, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and other federal government agencies did little to rescue those stranded. Food, water, medical treatment and temporary shelter were sent to New Orleans several days later. By then, the absence of any government response to the emergency was exposed.
People searching for food to survive under these difficult conditions were maliciously branded “looters,” and shoot-to-kill orders were given to the racist local authorities.
People in dire need of rescue and aid were criminalized. The government mobilized the National Guard and mercenaries from private security firms like Blackwater to protect oil refineries, banks, casinos and supermarkets—the private property of the rich.
While people were trying to make it to safety and save their loved ones, family members and neighbors, the National Guard set up armed checkpoints and roadblocks to restrict movement. Around 20,000 people were left in the New Orleans Superdome, suffering unsanitary, inhuman conditions for days.
Over 1,800 people lost their lives. More than 1,500 people died in New Orleans alone. The vast majority of these deaths were directly attributable to the neglect and racism of the U.S. government.
In the weeks following the hurricane, the United States relocated hundreds of thousands of people, almost all working-class African Americans, to surrounding states and beyond.
Racist neglect continues
Two years after Hurricane Katrina, the capitalist government still has done almost nothing to rebuild the city for the workers who live there. Nor have they made it easy to come back.
New Orleans’ population is a fraction of what it was in 2005. In most cases, not even the most basic services have been restored.
The levees themselves, clearly unreliable prior to Katrina, are still insufficient. The risk of flooding remains unchanged. It is estimated that the levees will not be able to protect the city from a category five hurricane until at least 2011.
The death rate among people who lived in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina made landfall in August 2005 increased by 47 percent during the first six months of 2006 compared with the rate in the years before the hurricane.
Half of the city’s doctors—nearly 4,500 people—have been displaced, causing a huge deficiency in the healthcare system. Ten of the 23 healthcare facilities in New Orleans remain shuttered. Charity Hospital, the only critical-care hospital for the poor has been closed since the disaster.
Only 45 percent of the city’s schools are open, according to a report compiled by the Washington-based Brookings Institution and the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center. The school population of New Orleans is 40 percent lower than before the hurricane.
Government refuses to build homes, create jobs
The Road Home program is a federally funded initiative that gives money to Louisiana homeowners with damaged homes. As of Aug. 2, only 22 percent of the 180,000 applicants had received any money.
Federal tax breaks meant to help rebuild neighborhoods are being used to build million-dollar luxury condominiums instead.
Thousands of public housing units are still uninhabited. Two of New Orleans’ largest developments—St. Bernard and Lafitte—remain closed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Housing Authority of New Orleans. The developments received little damage in the storm, but remain empty.
Over 100,000 rental units were destroyed in low-income neighborhoods. Only a handful have been rebuilt. At the same time, average monthly rent has more than doubled in New Orleans.
Though the population has shrunk, the number of homeless has increased.
According to FEMA, 43,000 families are still displaced. The number is probably much higher. Waves of people have been cut off emergency assistance in the last two years.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that 400,000 jobs have been lost. Many of the unemployed began looking for work and homes in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Atlanta and other Southern cities.
Instead of building homes and providing jobs to all unemployed victims of government neglect, state and federal governments have subsidized the rebuilding of casinos. Almost every damaged casino has been rebuilt and expanded.
The last two years are an example of the complete inability of capitalism to provide for workers’ needs. Capitalism’s unending drive for profits, manifested in attacks on working-class people on the Gulf Coast, has been showcased for the world to see.
Fight for justice
Despite incredible hardship, the workers of New Orleans continue to fight for justice. A movement for public housing is
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Groups like the Common Ground Collective continue to provide badly needed services like medical and legal help for free. The collective is resisting evictions, rampant police brutality, and ongoing government inaction and repression.
After the flooding, the people themselves rescued their neighbors and provided assistance to the most vulnerable. Hundreds of stories emerged of people coming to each others’ aid in a time of need.
The victims of government abuse, racism and callousness in New Orleans and the surrounding areas should be paid reparations. Their homes should be rebuilt and the neighborhoods restored. Hospitals must be reopened immediately. Jobs should be provided. Rents should be lowered to pre-Katrina levels. It is the very least the Bush administration could do.
Adequate levees can be constructed. Lives can be saved in time of disaster through social planning and coordination, especially in the United States, the wealthiest country in the world.
For example, the money being funneled into the imperialist Iraq war should go to the reconstruction of New Orleans and the greater Gulf Coast.
But left to their own devices, the Bush administration and the succeeding administration, Democrat- or Republican-helmed, will not provide the relief that the region still needs. Why is this so—even when it seems as clear as day what needs to be done?
No U.S. president or Congress in this system will put people’s needs before profit. They are in charge of a criminal and racist capitalist state.
Even in a national emergency like Hurricane Katrina, the capitalists cynically protect oil refineries at the expense of human lives. Only an organized, militant people’s movement can win the aid the people of Louisiana and Mississippi deserve.
Efforts to rebuild the Gulf Coast region ultimately must be part of the overall struggle to get rid of the system that enabled the Katrina disaster.
Throwing out capitalism and reorganizing the vast resources of society to meet human needs is the only way to right existing wrongs and ensure that no more Katrinas plague working-class people.
