Katrina Revisited Part IV

Today is the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Over 1800 people perished, 270,000 homes were damaged or destroyed and $55 million in damage was done by one massive storm. How many lives were devastated by loss is almost incalculable. Americans were mesmerized and outraged by the images they saw on their televisions. Reminders that not all Americans live like those on their sitcoms, reminders that it's still been ten years since the working poor have had a pay increase. Shocked that there was no plan to evacuate everyone and that the poor were simply left to die Americans reacted and so began the slide that has President Bush in mid-30's approval ratings. It woke people to the absolute incompetence of this Administration.

People stayed behind for three main reasons: they didn't have transportation, they couldn't afford to leave, or they wouldn't leave their cherished pets behind. The exercise done in July 2004 called Hurricane PAM revealed the problem of evacuating 100,000 poor and "low mobility" residents. To alleviate some of this FEMA promised to supply 500 charter buses to evacuate as much of these people as possible.

When Katrina came the buses didn't.

Emergency shelters not allowing people to bring their pets has resulted in a lot of unnecessary heartache and death and not just with Katrina. To many people their cats, dogs, parrots and ferrets are members of their families. They'd no sooner leave them behind than their children. Many of those who stayed behind to care for their pets perished. Pets fending for themselves wandered the streets of New Orleans until animal rescue groups got them.

Another lesson of Katrina has been dealing with homeowners insurance and hurricane damage. Much of the damage has gone uncovered by the insurance industry. Claiming water damage isn't covered tens of thousands of homeowners are having to sue to collect damages. In a storm of this magnitude with a surge of water accompanied by 75 mph wonds it's all bu timpossible to delineate what damage was caused by what. It's time for reform so policies in the future cover all hurricane related damages in these zones.