Just when you think the price for Katrina can’t get any higher, another wave crests onto the Gulf Coast:

Gulf Coast cities hit hard by Hurricane Katrina four years ago stand to lose future federal funding, and possibly some political representation, as mostly lower-income residents stay away from the area, analysts say….

This has a huge impact on the area, including how Housing and Urban Development funds are distributed.

In the Gulf Coast region, where low-income housing has already been wiped out in favor of luxury condo development and higher-income rental fix-ups, this is yet another sign to folks who can least afford another blow that their kind may not be welcomed home.

Except it also may cost representation in the House for several Gulf Coast states and a huge chunk of federal funding lost:

Roughly 311,800 people now live in New Orleans, down from the 484,674 who lived there before the storms. City officials are so concerned about a potential undercount that starting next week a staffer will be devoted full time to local census issues, according to a city spokesman.

Wade Henderson, president and chief executive of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, which is leading the Gulf Coast coalition, said hurricane-affected communities there could lose up to $20,000 per person in federal funding.

As we look ahead, there is a lot yet to be done. And issues yet to be resolved. But lives go forward regardless, don’t they?

I want to pause and thank Scout for her work on these issues the last few years. Kudos for a job well done.

I’ve been meaning to get pictures of our trip to New Orleans up for ages, and just haven’t found the right moment to write about them.  Until now.

Seems a fitting tribute to the resilience and strength of the human spirit that we saw from so many in NOLA to post some pictures of how beautiful areas are, and how far things have come for so many who have been working to rebuild in the aftermath of Katrina.

But don’t let these pictures fool you, there is still a lot of work to be done.

As you’ll see in the video, there is a desperate need for health care and mental health services still in New Orleans. 

I was fortunate to meet Dr. Janet Johnson, who helped found Project Rising Sun, at reader Lindy’s house while we were there.  It’s an amazing community effort to help folks rebuild their inner lives while working to rebuild their own communities as well. One of their efforts has been to work on community garden projects along with the drumming circles featured in the CNN report above, and many, many other efforts as well.

This is just the sort of stepping up within our own communities that makes such a huge difference, one person at a time. New Orleans is fortunate to have them.

We didn’t get out to the Lower 9th Ward or any of the parishes that are still so devastated from the storm while we were there.  It was a desperately needed vacation and we could only do so much in a single trip. 

But, as you’ll see, New Orleans certainly has the power to pull us back for another trip.  We loved it, and I hope you enjoy this stroll in pictures through some beautiful spots all over town.  And, if you are considering a trip at some point, New Orleans is a great place to spend some vacation moolah — I’m just sayin’… (more…)

Can’t just wash it away…

Hurricane Katrina marked a real low point in human compassion and decency in this country on so many levels.

But it also brought out some of the best in so many people from all over the country — and the world.

Neighbors helping each other cope with their horrible losses.  Rescue workers sweeping in from all over to pull folks off their rooftops and back to safer ground. Donations pouring in of clothes and food so quickly that aide organizations could not sort and ship it fast enough.

We saw that same common purpose of spirit and hope after the attacks on 9/11, when we lifted each other up during such a time of tragedy and loss.

But each time?  Whatever feeling of community and connection we briefly held began to ebb as we all went back to our own daily grinds and personal frets.

We lose sight of the "we" and grab hold of the "me" far too quickly these days, in my opinion, and it is to our detriment that we do so.

For it is our connections — the things that bond us to one another — that make us far more strong than we could ever be standing alone.

Digby’s faith in individual humanity got renewed recently by a simple act of decency.

Wouldn’t it be something if we could all find a way to renew each other? What if we could reach past all the trumped up divisions that line the pockets of those who trump them up, but really do nothing for the rest of us, and find some common ground?

I don’t know what the answer is to all of our problems, but I do know this: they won’t be resolved by hate.

And the folks all along the Gulf Coast who lost so much in Katrina’s disastrous wake? Imagine what we could have accomplished if the whole of the nation had come together to help out our fellow citizens in an act of true compassion and decency? We can never know what could have been, but we can certainly do better in all of the disasters to come.

We have a responsibility to each other — e pluribus unum…out of many one. Imagine what we could do if we all started living that slogan instead of just carrying it around on the money in our pockets.

On this anniversary of Katrina, let’s talk about our connections. And reach out to folks we know who need a hand, forge those connections anew. Just as we should have done from the moment the waters and wind began to lap at our nation’s shores.

We have an obligation to lift each other up when one of us stumbles, and we can’t just wash it away. Pull up a chair…