New Orleans hires firm to oversee recovery projects

Seeking to quickly move hundreds of stymied rebuilding projects toward reality, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin announced Thursday that the city has hired an engineering management firm to oversee the repair of public assets and keep residents updated on the work.

MWH, formerly known as Montgomery Watson Harza, will earn an estimated $6 million to coordinate the work of architects, engineers and building contractors hired by the city to fix flood-damaged police and fire stations, streets, recreation centers, court buildings, museums, libraries and parks.

The company's efforts will bolster the work of overwhelmed City Hall employees who before Katrina handled just a handful of capital projects every year. Since the storm, a reduced staff in city government and other agencies has struggled with a mountain of paperwork, including public bid documents and requests for FEMA reimbursements, trying to get hundreds of projects started at once.

"We know that this amount of work is unprecedented, and that's why we're bringing some outside help in," Nagin said during a City Hall briefing.

Online updates

Of particular interest to residents, MWH plans to create a mechanism to provide steady updates on progress in each project. The result may resemble an Internet-based map that the company designed for Kansas City, Mo., said Bob Uhler, the company's chief executive officer.

That map, which Uhler projected for reporters on a large screen, allows residents to click on icons posted at all project sites and view details such as the lead contractor, ground-breaking date, target completion date and the phone number of the city official responsible for the project. The Web address for the map is www.kcmo.org/cimo.nsf/web/public

In New Orleans, such a service could be online by February, city Recovery Director Ed Blakely said.

As with most of the cost of repairs to flood-damaged assets, Nagin said he expects the cost of the MWH deal to be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

FEMA spokesman Ronnie Simpson said Thursday that while federal officials have not reviewed the MWH agreement, the agency generally reimburses the cost of such management contracts as long as the vendor oversees only projects that qualify for FEMA payments. FEMA generally is barred by federal law from paying for repairs that can't be shown to relate directly to storm damage.

City officials long have cited the lack of sufficient administrative support for recovery projects to explain slow progress in infrastructure repairs. For months, they have talked about hiring a private project manager to handle the mammoth task.

Money has arrived

But Nagin said officials said they could not award a management contract until they were confident they had money in hand to launch a significant number of public projects. That moment came late last year, the mayor said, when the Louisiana Recovery Authority allocated $294 million for infrastructure projects in New Orleans.

The Nagin administration also has other pools of cash at its disposal: a $300 million revolving loan fund approved by the Legislature, $117 million in infrastructure money released earlier by the LRA, $75 million from the sale of city bonds and $54 million in Federal Highway Administration dollars for improvements to major streets.

"You can't do a recovery without money, and the money has just become available," Nagin said. "The check is no longer in the mail. It's available to us, and we're starting to really rock and roll."

MWH will begin by coordinating some 150 projects for which city employees already have completed FEMA request forms known as "project worksheets." Nagin said the worksheets, which detail the level of damage and scope of rebuilding, carry a combined value of about $650 million. He added that another $250 million worth of repair requests is in the works.

While city officials will continue to set spending priorities, with criminal justice facilities and fire stations topping the list, Blakely said he expects MWH to step in make sure the myriad concurrent projects run smoothly.

For instance, he said, project managers will coordinate the purchase of materials needed for several unrelated projects so the city can buy in bulk to save money; City Hall will maintain control of the public bidding process. MWH also will coordinate projects geographically to reduce disruption to neighborhoods, he said.

In keeping with the strategy of the newly reorganized Office of Recovery and Development Administration, Blakely said he expects MWH to deliver visible results that will give fresh confidence to property owners leery of investing insurance settlements and Road Home grant awards in neighborhoods that are still languishing.

MWH employees also will work closely with city workers, sharing their expertise in the use of computer technology designed to manage major capital efforts, Blakely said.

MWH will earn as much as 8 percent of the cost of each project that it oversees, with simple projects that require minimal oversight, such as a roof replacement, worth a smaller percentage than a major construction project, Blakely said.

Working in 35 countries

As the company begins work, Uhler said he plans to transfer employees from across the country -- and from other parts of the world -- to help with the New Orleans effort. The initial staff likely will include some 30 employees, including 15 to 20 people already based in MWH's New Orleans' Poydras Street office.

Based in Broomfield, Colo., MWH employs more than 7,000 workers at 165 offices in 35 countries, according to a fact sheet provided by the company. The company opened its New Orleans office in 1979.

Nagin said that in deciding whether to seek proposals for a project management firm, he sought advice from several local business leaders, including developer Pres Kabacoff, Superdome manager Doug Thornton and Jay Lapeyre, chairman of the New Orleans Business Council. All three attended Thursday's news conference.

In all, 18 firms submitted proposals for the professional services contract, which under state procurement laws does not have to be awarded to the lowest bidder. Officials on Thursday did not name any of the other companies that sought the job.

MWH is no stranger to city government. The company won emergency contracts after Katrina to provide debris pickup and storm drain cleaning for city departments. It also assessed New Orleans' sewer and water systems for the Sewerage & Water Board.

Nagin said that as the pace of construction revs up under MWH management, the city may face a new kind of hurdle: finding enough local contractors to handle the work.

"The national economy has seen a downturn," he said. "Hopefully we can attract some contractors to come to this market."

Plaza empty, but troubles are not over for homeless

Chris Turnbow wears a gray Civil War-style beard and arms tattooed with the Grim Reaper and skeletons. Tall and gangly, he stands out in any crowd.

Still, Shamus Rohn, a caseworker for homeless-service consortium UNITY of Greater New Orleans, has lost Turnbow, 52, for as long as two months. For nearly a year, Rohn could eventually find Turnbow in the same spot: a piece of cardboard across the street from City Hall.

In late December, Duncan Plaza was emptied so that the state of Louisiana could prepare to demolish two buildings bordering the park. Now, the mayor's office at City Hall no longer overlooks the tents and trash of a homeless colony.

In some ways, the crisis has ended. But work has just begun for 44 caseworkers trying to house about 250 former plaza denizens, many of them with severe health problems and mental illnesses.

As of Monday, the caseworkers had found apartments for 47 people. The other 200 or so remain in low-rent hotel rooms while caseworkers scramble to find housing in a market where, they say, affordable one-bedrooms and efficiencies remain scarce.

But on Friday, UNITY faces a steep hurdle. The financing for hotel rooms will run out. In November, the city allotted $264,000 for that purpose but hasn't decided whether to add anything to that, said mayor's office spokesman James Ross.

Unless additional money materializes, UNITY plans to borrow money to pay those bills, Kegel said. Keeping 150 people in hotel rooms for a week runs about $60,000, she said, but it's worth the investment.

"We're not going to put vulnerable people back on the street," she said.

UNITY's hotel-financing crisis put homelessness at the top of today's City Council agenda. Council President Arnie Fielkow has requested testimony about Duncan Plaza and the city's increased homeless population from UNITY officials, homeless-service providers, the New Orleans Police Department's Homelessness Assistance Collaborative and the state Department of Social Services.

Typically, homeless clients need at least four weeks in hotels before they're moved to apartments. During that time, UNITY caseworkers try to connect them with social services, employers, landlords and apartments near jobs, usually downtown.

Researchers studying poverty agree that most people who become homeless regain self-sufficiency fairly quickly, often within a month's time, with little or no help. Within Orleans and Jefferson parishes alone, UNITY estimates that, at any given time, 12,000 people are homeless, but it's a constantly revolving group. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which finances homeless services, estimates that 10 percent of those people are likely to be chronic, long-term homeless people suffering from physical illnesses or problems with alcohol, drugs and mental health.

For the chronically homeless, caseworkers celebrate any sign of progress. Caseworker Renida Johnson rejoiced at one client who began talking, taking baths, combing her hair and laughing.

Others may simply require job-search assistance and temporary help with rent. UNITY caseworker Laniker Hunter walked into an employment agency earlier this week and asked for seven jobs, which she received.

"All seven of my guys are working," she said.  Mental health a battle

The hole in Chris Turnbow's gut trumps even the mental illness he has wrestled with for years. A construction worker who grew up on a farm in Arkansas and moved to New Orleans in 2002, Turnbow had lived at Duncan Plaza with a colostomy bag since October, when doctors removed part of his diseased intestine.

Despite daily doses of Seroquil, a common antipsychotic, and Paxil, an antidepressant, Turnbow suffers from bad nerves. One morning, as Rohn prepared to move him into an apartment, Turnbow emerged from his hotel room sleep-deprived.

"How will I feed myself?" he had worried all night.

Later that day, Turnbow wandered away.

The next week, he apologized for his disappearance. He had called home to let his children know that he was getting an apartment, he said.

"And I found out that my grandchild, who's 7, got hit by a car," he said. "I guess I've always been a loner and so I just went away -- just rambling."
As he continued, some details didn't quite match. Before long, it became clear that his story about the call and the grandchild may have reflected a desire to connect with his family. But not a bit of it was true.

Late last month, Turnbow's mother and son drove to New Orleans from Arkansas after hearing him talk with a National Public Radio reporter about Duncan Plaza. During a tearful reunion, they told Rohn that they thought he'd probably died during Hurricane Katrina.

Homeless Pride moves on


Jesse Arbuthnot, 45, was the first of what he calls "the Homeless Pride Originals" to move into the Prieur Street apartment complex. Several others followed him. All get rental assistance from UNITY.

In July, this group of men and women started calling themselves Homeless Pride. As the tent city grew around them, they took a certain satisfaction in living in plain view of the mayor.

A native of the Irish Channel, Arbuthnot does odd-job carpentry and works sporadically for a nearby temp agency that cleans the New Orleans Arena and the Superdome. He is an affable man, a natural diplomat, who became Duncan Plaza's self-appointed law-enforcement officer. At night, Arbuthnot walked around, ironing out tensions. When problems arose, people came to him for help.

But, in the end, he was relieved to leave his post.

The day after his move, Arbuthnot returned to Duncan Plaza, visibly changed by one night's sleep in his own apartment. He was showered, happy and well-rested.

"Looks like 50 pounds of pressure was just lifted off me," he said, smiling. "I'm away from the chaos."

That is not unusual, said Angela Patterson, UNITY's head of outreach.

"The people we're meeting in the hotels today are not the same people we brought from Duncan Plaza," she said.

In mid-December, Arbuthnot ran into one of the other Originals, Tyrone Collins, 38. Before the hurricane, he lived in his family's Lower 9th Ward house, which floated away, Collins said. He hasn't been able to rebuild.

He could, however, get help from UNITY. He had been placed in an apartment about a week earlier.

Arbuthnot walked up to him with a grimace. "Why are you still here?" he asked.

Collins pointed to a key hooked on a belt loop of his pants. It was for his new place on Philip Street, he said, but he hadn't even tried the key yet.

"I'm not going to sleep there until I get a refrigerator and some furniture," he said.

'This is over with'

Many UNITY clients end up in apartments with little or no furniture, since the agency has no budget for that. But it's also not unusual for homeless people to feel uncomfortable alone in a quiet apartment, after months spent in loud, makeshift homeless communities, caseworkers said.

Arbuthnot wasn't in the mood for excuses. He put one hand on Collins' shoulder and made a sweeping gesture with the other hand at the rows of tents surrounding them.

"This is over with," he said sternly. "And all of us are happy it's over with."

Later that afternoon, Collins did go to Philip Street. The key worked, he said. But he spent the night, once again, in his tent across from City Hall. He didn't begin sleeping in his apartment until a few weeks after UNITY placed him there.

Collins himself doesn't know why he felt this way.

"A lot of people are cracking up out here," he said, as he sat in a lawn chair overlooking Duncan Plaza. "Homelessness does mess with your mind."

Harry Shearer: Three Little Words: We Moved On - Politics on The Huffington Post

Harry Shearer: Three Little Words: We Moved On - Politics on The Huffington Post

Barack Obama delivered a rousing didn't-I-almost-win speech Tuesday night in New Hampshire, and John McCain delivered a stirring I'm-the-comeback-don't-call-me-kid address on the occasion of his victory. What they, and all the other candidates in the first primary in the nation, had in common was one thing: they were totally, utterly, stunningly (to this observer) dedicated to ignoring the greatest disaster to befall an American city in modern times. What is there for a presidential candidate to say two and a half years after the levees breached and flooded New Orleans? Well, judging by this piece in the New Orleans alternative weekly Gambit, the US Army Corps of Engineers, which built the defective structures and is responsible for planning the improved ones, is still letting the community down--in this case, missing a deadline for submission to Congress of its report on a system to afford protection against Cat 5 storms. A theoretical candidate could offer to repair the city's breached faith in its nation, to re-think the way great public works in this country are designed and built, to commit to a program of infrastructure repairs before more levees beach and more bridges collapse.

I was in New Orleans the first week of this year, and, as the city shook off its sudden attack of Arctic air and welcomed the second consecutive Big Game crowd in a week, as the French Quarter filled with so many visitors in purple (for LSU) and red (for Ohio State) that Regina, my friend who co-owns a restaurant, said "It looks like New Orleans again", it was possible to do the post-K squint and believe that everything was okay. That squint, which entails just looking at the grass-roots recovery and ignoring the affordable housing crisis just blocks away, is pretty convincing when the temperature is in the 70s, and Carnival season starts up just as the city gets a $200 million jolt from big events that, if you believe the Presidential Debate Commission, New Orleans isn't yet prepared to host.

The Times-Picayune reports on the chefs who moved away and couldn't stay away, and musician friends of mine are returning home, and Brad Pitt's Make It Right Foundation has apparently doubled its matching fund goals for building new green homes in the Lower Ninth Ward. So there are stories of hope and progress as well as of delay and betrayal in New Orleans. None of them worthy of a mention as candidates left and right outlined their visions for the future.

Obama's speech ended with a ringing evocation of three words he claimed were emblematic in the life of the nation: "Yes, We Can"; and the crowd joined in chanting those words in response. But, in their turning away from a "man-made engineering disaster" (in the words of UC Berkeley's Dr. Bob Bea), in their turning away from a city that was betrayed by its country twice--in the faulty construction of a "protective system" and in the refusal to follow the letter of the nation's own National Response Plan when that system failed, the candidates, Obama included, are paying silent tribute to the three words that more accurately describe America's contemporary approach to problems: We Moved On.

Katrina claims add up to quadrillions

The most expensive Katrina claims filed so far against the Army Corps of Engineers -- those specifying damages of at least $1 billion each -- total $3 quadrillion, according to a thumbnail set of figures released Monday by the agency.

That's $3,013,283,057,589,910, to be exact. And no cents.

One claim alone accounts for all but $13.3 trillion of the total, and that one came from Baker -- 93 miles northwest of New Orleans and far outside the Katrina flood zone. Federal privacy laws prohibit the corps and plaintiffs' attorneys from identifying claimants by name, so the basis for the Baker claim was not immediately clear.

The corps released a list of 247 claims of $1 billion or more in response to requests from news organizations. Most claims were filed by individuals. Fourteen of them included compensation requests for "wrongful deaths."


The list includes a $77 billion claim filed by the city of New Orleans, which is a matter of public record, as well as three claims by unnamed insurance companies, according to the Bruno & Bruno law firm, which represents thousands of hurricane victims.

Anyone seeking to collect damages from the federal government must first submit a Form 95, which preserves the right to sue. Almost a half-million such forms have been filed with the corps since levees and floodwalls failed during Katrina, triggering catastrophic flooding that killed more than 1,500 people in Louisiana and ruined homes and businesses. Though the accounting is far from finished, it is generally considered the costliest disaster in U.S. history.

The corps reports receiving 489,000 claims as of Monday. But corps spokeswoman Amanda Jones said that a number of those are duplicates.

At the same time, some claims are still being filed, and the corps is adding them to the agency database, Jones said. The filing deadline was Aug. 29, and a lawyer involved in some of the cases said a federal judge will ultimately decide whether to accept claims filed after date.

Lawyer Joe Bruno, who said he represents about 70,000 Katrina victims, is concerned that the dollar value of claims listed on the Form 95s will be used to vilify Katrina victims.

"It will be obscene if anyone uses these to paint our people as being a bunch of money-grubbers," he said. "The forms are a joke, but the government requires them.

None of the claims have been investigated by the corps or presented in court. And until they are verified, Bruno said, it's impossible to know what the real numbers are.

"Government also requires that you put down a figure .¤.¤. although only a judge can determine value." he said. "But here's the deal: Whatever number you put down, you can never get one dollar more than that amount. To be safe and fair, we told folks they'd better put a larger number."

For that reason, Bruno said, the numbers on the claim forms have little to do with what he ultimately expects claimants to recover.

"My best estimate as to the worth of this case .¤.¤. the amount of uncompensated damages .¤.¤. is about $50 billion," he said.

The biggest claim of the 247 is for damages of $3 quadrillion, and it's a personal claim that doesn't include a wrongful death. According to information released by the corps, the claimant listed a ZIP code for Baker, which wasn't directly affected by the levee breaks and subsequent flooding.

Robert Warren II, another lawyer with the Bruno firm, said he doesn't think his firm represents the Baker claimant and that there might be some sort of "issue" with its size.

"It's just speculation on my part without seeing the form," he said. "It could be a data entry error or just emotion. This person could be a relative of someone who was injured or died in the storm."

Or, Warren said, the filer might have mistakenly put a mailing address, perhaps a temporary address used after Katrina, instead of the ZIP code where damages are alleged to have occurred.

In some cases, Bruno said, people put "outrageous" amounts down "because they're outraged.

"Try sitting on your roof for days until you're rescued by a helicopter," he said, "and you'll be outraged, too."

'Pink house' project ends on high note

On Sunday, in front of a backdrop of flamingo-colored houses, hundreds of people celebrated Brad Pitt's Make It Right foundation and caught a rare appearance by the Lower 9th Ward's homegrown superstars: the Lastie family, whose musicians have blown horns and beat drums for this city's finest bands for nearly a century.

"The Lasties are one of the greatest unbroken line of drummers," said writer Jason Berry, who decades ago, made a documentary about two great New Orleans music families: the Nevilles and the Lasties.

The Lastie Family Gospel Choir's afternoon concert marked the end of the art installation of 150 pink fabric homes that appeared in early December as an attention-getter for actor Brad Pitt's nonprofit Make It Right project, which aims to build environmentally friendly, affordable housing for Katrina victims.

To kick off the fundraising, both Pitt and philanthropist Steve Bing, a real-estate developer and film producer, pledged to match up to $5 million in contributions.

The nonprofit is still collecting dollars, but at this point it has raised $10 million matchable dollars from more than 17,000 donors in more than 80 countries.

The donor list is studded with luminaries: Angela Bassett, Bill Cosby, Tom Cruise, Carrie Fisher, Morgan Freeman, Laurence Fishburne, Will Ferrell, Goldie Hawn, Salma Hayek, Ethan Hawke, Angelica Huston, Samuel L. Jackson, Quincy Jones, Lenny Kravitz, Jack Nicholson, Keanu Reeves, Ving Rhames, Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon, Meg Ryan, Kevin Spacey, David Spade, Oprah Winfrey, Forest Whitaker, Denzel Washington, Barbra Streisand, Russell Simmons, brothers Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez, and brothers Branford and Wynton Marsalis.

Tom Darden, the project's executive director, said the exhibit would have had a longer run except for its rented scaffolding, which was needed elsewhere for Carnival.

Once the 40,000 square yards of pink awning material is removed from that scaffolding today and tomorrow, it will be recycled into collectible handbags that will be sold on the Web site for Make It Right, www.makeitrightnola.org.

So far, 70 families have applied for financing from the project, which hopes to break ground in March for the initial 20 of more than 150 houses. The first homes should be finished by the end of summer, Darden said.

By that time, the Lastie family -- independent of Pitt's organization -- also hopes to have a toehold back at the other end of the Lower 9th Ward. Specifically, once Road Home financing materializes, the family wants a new roomy house, built on the corner lot where the big green two-story house once stood, behind centuries-old oak trees.

It's the place that the younger generation of Lastie-family singers ate their way through pounds of red beans and stuffed mirlitons. "We all ate Sunday dinner -- always -- at Teedy Betty's," niece Devora Hampton said, referring to her aunt, Lastie family matriarch Betty Ann Williams.

The older generation knows the demolished house on Delery Street as the rehearsal spot and hangout for musical legends such as Professor Longhair, Oliver "Who Shot the La La" Morgan, pianist Emile Vinette, and Jessie "Ooh Poo Pah Doo" Hill, Williams' uncle.

The family's legacy got its start in the 1930s, when Williams' father, Deacon Frank Lastie Sr., brought drums into Guiding Star Spiritual Church. He was thought to be the first musician in town to incorporate percussion into worship service.

Three of Deacon Lastie's sons also became notable musicians -- trumpeter Melvin Lastie, saxophonist David Lastie and drummer Walter "Popee" Lastie -- as did his two daughters, Williams and her sister Devora Hampton, who lead the choir at St. James Methodist Church, where Williams is organist. A fourth son, Joseph Lastie, raised a drummer son, Joseph "Fish" Lastie, Jr., who Sunday played the drum set behind the family choir, his bass and snare drums matching perfectly with the choir's rhythmic hand-clapping.

Williams' son, top-flight jazz drummer Herlin Riley, was absent Sunday: He was on the road, playing music. When Riley was only 3 months old, his uncle Melvin Lastie began playing his horn by Herlin's crib; when Herlin reached six months, he began trying to blow on a trumpet.

Williams' grandsons, too, pursued music, including the late Joseph Williams, a trombonist, and brother Arian Macklin, a tuba player who now leads the Kinfolk Brass Band. He and his brother both started out on percussion before turning to horn, Macklin said.

"This is a drumming family," he said as his toddler, Joseph Macklin, Deacon Lastie's great-great-grandchild, lay against his chest, tapping a small hand in perfect rhythm.

Williams looked past the stage at the streets she had walked as a young child, before the brick and wood houses had floated away, to be replaced temporarily by pink ones.

"By the hand of God, I know that the 9th Ward will come back," she said. "This is home for me. It's home for our family, for all of us."