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Bush to announce new help for hurricane region
As U.S. President George W. Bush prepared to unveil plans on Thursday to revive areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, the mayor of New Orleans said his own initiative could return 180,000 people to the city within two weeks, the Associated Press reported. Bush, his approval ratings at a low amid criticism of the government's response to the August 29 storm, was to address the nation from New Orleans at 9:02 p.m. EDT (0102 GMT on Friday) following stops in Mississippi, which also suffered widespread damage. The speech "will be an opportunity for the president to update the American people about the latest developments of our recovery and talk about the way forward as we begin rebuilding," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said. He added that Bush, who has visited the U.S. Gulf Coast area three times since the storm, will unveil some "new initiatives" but did not elaborate. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, whose city of 450,000 was all but turned into a ghost town after levee breaks flooded most of it, said he would introduce measures of his own on Thursday. "I'm going to announce a phased repopulation plan that is going to deal with some of the areas that were least hit by the hurricane and had less water, and then within the next week or two we should have about 180,000 people back in the city of New Orleans," Nagin told CNN. Earlier Nagin singled out the historic French Quarter, which is above sea level and did not suffer flood damage, as well as the central business district and two other neighborhoods as likely candidates for early resettlement. Parts of New Orleans are still under water. In poor neighborhoods, lightly built structures in a region that rarely sees freezing weather were lifted off their foundations by the water and collapsed. Many appeared beyond repair. DEAD STILL BEING FOUND Nor was the task of recovering all of the dead in New Orleans complete, though the count is far lower than some earlier projections. The death toll stood at 711 with 474 in Louisiana, 218 in Mississippi and another 19 deaths in Florida, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee. But recovery was spreading across the region. Officials in Jefferson Parish, which curls around New Orleans from the west to the south, said two more towns, Kenner and Harahan, would open to residents on Thursday. Officials in hard-hit St. Bernard Parish east of the city said business owners there could return on Thursday to check on their properties. In Mississippi officials said they were receiving far more donations of used clothing from around the country than they will ever be able to use. The more than 1,000 people still housed in shelters near Gulfport have a greater need for items such as canned food, personal hygiene items, detergent, bleach and cleaning supplies, they said. Residents returning to some Louisiana towns on Wednesday for the first time since the storm struck were either devastated or relieved. In Lafitte, a quiet fishing town where a summer seafood festival is the highlight of the social year, some homes were untouched and others piles of rubble. "It was real hit-and-miss," said Lester Cipriano, whose home suffered minor damage. A shattered mobile home nearby had lost its roof, with torn insulation covering the floor. New Orleans was still technically under a mandatory evacuation order, but some residents were sneaking back to reclaim houses that escaped heavy damage. In the Garden District near downtown, where many gracious homes were spared, some people had returned. "It's better here than in a hotel," said David, who did not give his last name. He got past a security checkpoint through his girlfriend, who has a medical ID, and they moved back into their wood-frame house, relying on bottled water and flashlights. NURSING HOME TRAGEDY In Washington Sen. Charles Grassley (news, bio, voting record), an Iowa Republican, asked the U.S. Justice Department and the federal Department of Health and Human Services to launch investigations into the deaths of 34 patients who apparently drowned when floodwaters engulfed a nursing home for the elderly near New Orleans. He said there were reports that 28 other patients may have died before they could be rescued from two nursing homes inside New Orleans. Louisiana officials have filed criminal charges against the owners of St. Rita's home in St. Bernard Parish, charging that 34 elderly and disabled patients were allowed to drown. A lawyer a representing the couple who own the facility said they had behaved responsibly. Traces of the tragedy inside that home were still visible. Beds were overturned and wheelchairs were stacked up near windows, perhaps indicating desperate attempts to escape by those who died. Water marks indicated the rooms were flooded to within 1 foot (.34 meter) of the ceiling. The names of patients were still on the doors, pictures of them on walls and stuffed animals and other belongings mired in mud on the floor. Louisiana Attorney General Charles Foti said the owners had turned down an offer from local officials to take the patients out by bus and did not bother to call in an ambulance service with which they had a contract. Their lawyer said some of the patients were far too frail to have been moved and would have died had that been attempted. The storm will likely be the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history, with damage estimates ranging from $100 billion to $200 billion.
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