Day 661: Thursday Grab Bag

grab bag n. A container filled with articles, such as party gifts, to be drawn unseen.

Was I supposed to write about Rome, Florence and Venice before my immediate impressions wane? Let me mention these important New Orleans news items first and then pen things less dire.

* My thoughts are with friends, Mominem, Dambala, Lisa and Mr. Clio, who struggle to move on with their lives 661 days into The Big New Orleans Cock Up, and very much with P, who lost his sister to a completely unforeseeable act of brutality. Send happy and healing wishes their way, please.

* Ellenese Brooks-Simms ensures herself a spot in the special rung of hell reserved for those that steal from children. This former Orleans Parish School Board president and self-proclaimed patron of the children admitted to accepting $140,000 in bribes from Mose Jefferson, “in connection with the I CAN Learn [computer-based algebra tutorial] system, which she collected between 2001 and 2004.” A part of me can excuse the wanton corruption if our kids had benefitted from it, but the means created no good end. As this T-P article from May 2005 (pre-Katrina) suggests, “NOPS lifted most of their results slightly more than the state average. However, Orleans remains one of the six parishes having the highest percentages of students with scores of ‘unsatisfactory’ in English and mathematics.” And there you have the unpardonable sin. Still, yes, Dambala, I am happy for this turn of events. It’s time for close citizen monitoring of the school board, after its current membership of cretins are given the boot and the creation of a (somewhat) clean slate. See Adrastos, American Zombie, Jeffrey and Oyster for more.

* The US Army Corps of Engineers’ Risk and Reliability Report is out, with interactive flood maps, i.e. static maps and downloadable Google Earth overlays. As Mr. Clio observes, “when I click on the map for my sector of the city, our sector is called “CB, French Quarter, Garden District, Broadmoor, Fairgrounds/Mid-city.” Where is Uptown? Why are the unflooded CBD, FQ and Garden District lumped with Broadmoor and Mid-City? Clio continues, “I have no confidence in the Texans and Iowans and Alaskans who are supposed to keep [USACE] accountable and to fire incompetent people there.” Here’s the NYT’s graphical interpretation of the report. Edit: In the 0.2% (1 in 500 year flooding) case, why is the sliver flooded (presumably with standing water) if this area is above sea level?

* Fix The Pumps’ “Bombshell” peeks past the watered-down mea culpas of the ACE in their recent internal investigation, to find gems like this:

MWI and the Corps were so aware of the problem that they implemented it on the six extra pumps at 17th Street, but never bothered to retrofit the other 34, leaving them in the same danger of failure that they’ve been in since they left the factory … according to the report (dated May 11, 2007), this flooded suction inlet work has yet to happen.

Related Article – BBC: New Orleans ‘Still A Flood Risk’

* On a lighter note, I’m nowhere near the desire to reproduce, but will certainly place my imaginary child in the snazzy Star Wars AT-AT Imperial Walker Baby Stroller. Cue the Imperial March (Darth Vader’s theme).