The New Orleans question

Steve Chapman listens to the politicians bloviate and asks the hard questions:

New Orleans, like Valmeyer, had long been a natural disaster waiting to happen. Most of the city lies below sea level, surrounded by water on three sides, and it's sinking. On top of that, it's steadily grown more exposed to hurricanes, thanks to the loss of coastal wetlands that once served as a buffer. It's a bathtub waiting to be filled.

As one scientist said after Katrina, "A city should never have been built there in the first place." Now that we have a chance to correct the mistake, why repeat it?

Theoretically, it's possible to keep New Orleans dry. All you have to do is surround it with levees designed to withstand a Category 5 hurricane. That's what Hillary Clinton urges.

[. . .]

The cost of the levee system envisioned by Sen. Clinton is tabbed at $40 billion. Restoring other infrastructure would increase the cost. The question is whether that's the best use of our resources. For $40 billion, you could give more than $61,000 to every Louisianan displaced by Katrina — nearly a quarter of a million dollars for a family of four.

I have to say that this makes more sense than trying to use the Dutch model and hold back the seas: but I don't live there . . . it's easy for me to take an Olympian viewpoint. I've visited New Orleans, and I was horrified by the damage and loss after the hurricane hit, but I don't have the same stake in the question as those who live there, and those who'll actually foot the bill for reconstruction or relocation

Update: Daniel Rothschild talks about the myths of Katrina:

Myth Number One: The main impediment to rebuilding the Gulf Coast is a lack of federal money.

Talk with people on the Gulf Coast area and you'll soon learn the primary problem they face is not a lack of funding, but the mass confusion created by federal, state, and local governments about the rules of the game when it comes to rebuilding. Confusing and contradictory regulations, showboating by politicians, and stunningly complex bureaucracy have only exacerbated the problems of people who've already been through hell and have kept people from making the decisions they need to make to get on with their lives. This creates what economist Emily Chamlee-Wright calls "signal noise" — the persistent uncertainty created by uncoordinated government at every step of the recovery process.

All levels of government deserve blame for this. On the federal level, Congress and the US Army Corps of Engineers have failed to articulate a clear, credible plan for what types of flood protections will be built and when they'll be completed. And of course, based on the Corps' recent track record, no one could fault Gulf Coast residents for questioning whether those protections will perform as advertised once (and if) they are completed.