Will New Orleans ever be rebuilt? Leaders debate federal funding isuses while historical precedent is reviewed BY LIBBY C O P E L A N D A N D NEELY TUCKER The Washington Post American cities have been assailed by fire andfloodand earthquake and hurricanes, seen thousands dead and hundreds of thousands more turned into evacuees. But so far, no natural disaster has snapped a major city's spine, no matter how impractical its location or difficult its demographics. The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 was, like the catastrophe of New Orleans, the worst and most expensive natural disaster in the nation's history when it happened. On April 18 of that year, a major quake and subsequent fires killed more than 3,000 people, leveled almost the entire city, and left more than half the population of 400,000 homeless. Thousands of victims took boats across the bay to a little town called Oakland. They never left, and Oakland became a big city. Others headed south, helping a town called Los Angeles boom. And many moved right back, using new technology to build stronger buildings. Buttressed by the westward push of millions of Americans, today it is one of the nation's most beautiful, expensive and desirable places to live. "You're going to see a huge reconstruction effort" in New Orleans, says Philip L. Fradkin, author of "The Great Earthquake and Firestorms of 1906: How San Francisco Nearly Destroyed Itself." But after it is rebuilt, the Crescent City may be as vulnerable as before, Fradkin argues. He says San Francisco, with its highrises built on land reclaimed from the bay, is more in danger for the Study of the American South at the University of than ever. North Carolina. "But families Last week, with violence have been rooted there for and explosions and swampy generations, with their food water covering New Orleans, and music, their celebrations there was much despair that of Mardi Gras, which are all the freewheeling Big Easy, completely unique. It's part the sex and sin and jazz capiof the American psyche. It's tal, may never really return. impossible to imagine America Dennis Hastert, speaker of the without New Orleans." U.S. House of Representatives, suggested that a city below sea If past is prologue, then level, wedged between a huge Ferris is right, and America lake and one of the world's will keep its sensual port on mightiest rivers, should not get the Gulf of Mexico, a city federal funds to rebuild. whose trademark cocktail will continue to be the hurricane. "It doesn't make sense Natural disaster may lead to to me," Hastert, an Illinois population shifts, restructurRepublican, told the Daily ing of politics and income, and Herald of Arlington Heights, further stratifications of race 111. and class, but big cities have But U.S. history, and the always endured. nation's That's not cultural to say things mytholwill automatiogy, is of rebuilding) doesn't cally bounce a people back in the same who stand make any sense to way. Consider their ine...." Hurricane Andrew. ground \ One of and take Dennis Hastert only three docutheir r of the House mented Category chances— 5 monsters to hit even amid the United States, it wiped devastation. San Francisco out much of South Florida rebuilt. So did Chicago, which on Aug. 24, 1992. Ten years suffered a catastrophic fire in later, researchers from the 1871. So did Galveston, Texas, International Hurricane after a 1900 hurricane killed Research Center at Florida more than 6,000. The city International University found built a massive seawall and that many middle-class white raised the entire elevation of residents in Miami-Dade the sandbar on which it sits— County had taken their insurthough the storm knocked it ance settlements and rebuilt out of the race with Houston to become the dominant Texas their lives. By contrast, an impoverished, predominantly city on the Gulf. black area called Florida City "Some beautiful homes in never really recovered. New Orleans will never be rebuilt, some entire neighbor"The poor get poorer after hoods will just never be the disasters," says Nicole Dash, same," says William Ferris, a sociologist affiliated with co-editor of the Encyclopedia the research center. "They of Southern Culture and hisdon't have the political power, tory professor at the Center they don't have the economic "It (federafipuSiey Utah universities seek to cut rising fuel costs board in every grade."" ' ~ ""~ District facilities can't keep up with the growing demand. One new elementary school, Little Valley on St. George's east side, is under construction, but wasn't open in time for the school year. The situation has forced students and teachers of two school communities to share another school building on a split schedule. Rising property values in the area mean the district will get millions of new tax dollars with which to build more schools in the future. This year alone the district expects to see $4.6 million more in new revenue — a 12.5 increase — and raise the district budget to a little more than $41 million, Rose said. "In the next two years, the district will see several new schools being added; as many as five," district superintendent Max Rose said in his annual report to the community. "The commitment of the district is to not get caught in the trap of being too slow to respond." But while the high costs of housing in the area is good for the district's bottom line, it also makes it tough to hire teachers who can afford to live here, Rose said. The average cost of a 2,400-square foot single family home in the area is nearly $260,000. "We've actually had teachers accept positions and then call back in a few days and tell us they can't afford to live here," said Bills. "The cost of housing has gone up so much it's really starting to become problematic for us." District officials have begun talking with local city leaders, economic development groups and building contractors to look for solutions, Bills said. SALT LAKE CITY (AP)— With gasoline prices inching toward $3 per gallon, Utah's largest public universities are looking for ways to cut fuel expenditures and reduce the use of faculty and staff vehicles. University of Utah officials estimate they'll spend about $600,000 on gas for 466 vehicles. In the last fiscal year budget the school spent $438,0000 on fuel Utah State University spent $415,000 on gas. Tips for reducing idling time and air conditioning use — which increase the amount of fuel burned — have been circulating across campus, said Orfeo Kostrencich, the school's administrative manager of plant operations. And school officials are giving thought to adding hybrid cars to the fleet. Utah State, a land grant university with satellite locations around the state, already has a number of gas/electric hybrids in it's fleet of 650 vehicles. We certainly do try to get rid of the older vehicles," said Darrell Hart, USU assistant vice president for facilities. The school has also replaced older campus shuttles with buses that run on compressed natural gas. The switch was designed to improve air quality, but over time may also save on fuel costs, Hart says. Utah State officials aren't ready to pass the rising fuel costs on to students. Weber State University in Ogden has increased the price of an on-campus shuttle system along with rising gas prices. Students are also now being charged $20 per year to park at the formerly free Dee Events Center lot. University of Utah officials say rising costs may have a ripple effect though the schools selfSANDY, Utah (AP) — Authorities have sustaining commuter service department, which released the names of two men who were stabbed doesn't get state funds. in their home, one fatally, and the man being held for investigation of aggravated murder and attempted aggravated murder. Christopher L. Roe, 54, of Sandy was killed and his roommate, Rex Edwards, was wounded and was in serious condition at University ST. GEORGE, Utah (AP) -Rapid growth in Hospital. southern Utah's Washington County is strainInvestigators said the assailant went into ing the capabilities of the local school district in their home at the Hooser Mobile Home Park late more ways that one. Friday and stabbed the two men after an arguWashington County School District officials ment. expect to add 2,000 students to classrooms this Zachary Hain, 27, who lives in an adjoining fall, marking the second consecutive year of sigtrailer park, was arrested and was being held in nificant growth. The district already serves about the Salt Lake County Jai. 22,000 students. Alan Roe described his brother Christopher as "Last year we had a 6.3 percent increase in "essentially a harmless guy." the number of students over the previous year," Police said a trail of blood stretched from the said Brent Bills, district business administrator. scene of the stabbing down the street to other "This year we're expecting more than 2,000 new homes, where Edwards had to get help. students. That's a 9 percent increase across the Victims, suspect named in Sandy stabbing death Growth strains schools in Washington County iiniiiiiiiii than 200. It triggered massive changes in levee management, in ways the nation's largest river was managed, and helped propel Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, who oversaw the relief effort, into the White House. But even though the Great Migration was underway—the huge movement of blacks from the rural South to the urban North—a flood of such epic proportions, even in the most predominantly black region of the country, did not significantly alter the social structure of so much as Greenville, Miss., much less the Jim Crow South. "They didn't have white boats and black boats to pluck people out of trees and off rooftops," says Pete Daniel, a curator at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History and author of "Deep'n as It Come," a history of that flood. "Anybody with a boat picked up anybody they saw. That lasted until they got to iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiit iiiimiiiimiiiiiiiiiii MINI i iiiiiiiiiiiiiiitiiiimim high ground. After the flood, everybody pretty much went back to the same old ways. Blacks couldn't get out of refugee camps until the owner of the plantation where they worked came to get them." Today, three generations later, the Mississippi Delta has undergone tremendous social change—but it is still the most predominantly black rural area in the nation, and its people the poorest. In New Orleans, some storm evacuees will never return, and Shrevcport, La., likely will gain new residents, from all income levels, as will Baton Rouge. But New Orleans is one of the world's busiest seaports, and has been the gateway of the Mississippi River, the commercial artery of the American heartland, since the Louisiana Purchase. Though its short-term future is certainly bleak, there's doubt that it's going to turn into a ghost town. USU Bid Sale Public Invited Sept. 7,8,9 2005 Time: 9am- 6pm. Daily Location: 880 East 1250 North (North of Romney Stadium) Over 1000 Items including: 1935 Chev.Truck, pickups, minivans, full- size vans, spray trucks, working computers, monitors chairs, file cabinents, computers desks, canoes, cameras, golf cart, lockers, copiers, antique stoves, and much more. Many items marked as "Cash and Carry" with no bid required. 3TORY ARCHIVES AT W W W.UTAHSTATE3MAN.GOM Regional Briefs iiiiiiiiiimimmiimiiiiimmiiiniiiiiii power to compete for the same resources that others do." In New Orleans, nearly a third of its population of 485,000 lives below the poverty line. Beset by long-standing "white flight," the population shrank by more than 2 percent from 1990 to 2000. More than half the population are renters, rather than homeowners, a sign of tenuous ties to the area, ties that many may just abandon. If the Saints, the city's football team, leave town, as the owners have hinted, and the Superdome never returns to its grandeur as host of the Sugar Bowl and Super Bowl and NCAA championship basketball games, the city would lose a great deal of its national cachet. "This is a real moment in history when New Orleans will begin to change dramatically," says Craig Colten, who wrote "An Unnatural Metropolis: Wresting New Orleans From Nature," which came out earlier this year. "The overall commercial significance of the city is going to erode further. I think you'll see the income disparity accentuated." Or locked in place, as regional patterns may dictate, whether urban or rural. In the most comparable regional disaster, the rainswollen Mississippi River broke through the levee in Mound Landing, Miss., on April 21, 1927. Other breaks followed in Arkansas and Louisiana. Roaring waters turned regions of Mississippi and Arkansas into lakes and then poured through Louisiana in such waves that the levee was dynamited in spots to save New Orleans farther downriver. The flooding displaced more than 300,000 and killed more Check our web site at: www.usa.edu/surplus Wfan on Private & Shared Rooms \Call us... 752-2073, or Check out our web site. com Fashion 4 YOU (Clothing & Shoes) ALL SHOES ARE BUY ONE QET ONE FREE! WOMEN'S SILVER Y.M.I DICKEY'S PLASTIC MEN'S SOLO lc LUCKYS LOW RIDER BEN DAVIS c tfVM® i{M(&tfT. 848 N. MAIN • LOQAN • 787-8115