That title is the flat out truth. What is good for Ray Nagin is just as good for Bobby Jindal. But you know what? Governor Bobby does not think so. Much has been made about e-mails and transparency in Louisiana government. The Governor has continued to tout his “ethic’s reform” as the gold standard. Too bad everything in that “gold standard” is basically un-enforcable. Nice to have the laws on the books, not so nice that they are basically worthless laws. So the corruption continues.

New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin received a ton of heat for his administration’s failure to produce public records request pertaining to his own e-mail and his daily schedule. My personal opinion is that he destroyed the majority of the information requested so something smelly would not come out. But I have no proof so it is what it is. The mayor, I am sure, has learned to not e-mail information that he does not want public and that is his right. I have no problem with that decision. But I do have a problem when the Governor of the great state of Louisiana directs his staff to oppose legislative bills designed to open up the governor’s office to more public access.

I think most level-headed, non corrupt folks/citizen’s understand that not everything in a e-mail should be shown in a public record request. Most people understand that private business information and the like are not necessary for all to read. But by not only limiting the publics’ access to the correspondence of the governors office and attempting to restrict even the limited access now available, Governor Jindal is basically saying that the rules are different for him and his office.

Well you know what Governor Jindal, you are no more important than any other public servant. By you and your office attempting to control what the public knows, it comes across as either you have something to hide or you were a total liar when you ran for this position and asked the people of Louisiana to join you in a crusade to change the way Louisiana does business. Neither stance is a real positive for Bobby Jindal. So why is he choosing to control public access to his office?

Oh, green goddess in a bottle. Have you seen the trailer for Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans? Go ahead, I’ll wait.

…

Among the many objections I have to the entire harmonicaporn genre, please tell me: WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO JENNIFER COOLIDGE? AND WHY?

[via TheAwl]

I was in San Antonio last week helping a old friend from the past find his new home. He is being transferred by his company due to some downsizing and such. We basically did nothing but look at new houses, eat and sleep. I was able to see some of the city. While San Antonio is not really my kind of town, I do have to admit to some serious jealousy. Things in San Antonio work. Like traffic lights. And there seems to be a lack of murders in a city twice as big as New Orleans. I am happy for him but I am very jealous that he will be moving to a new city with a new home with all of the “quality of life” things, such as a abundance of grocery stores and such to choose from. While San Antonio seems to have a Applebee’s on every corner, I think after all this time I’d take the occasional Applebee’s for a little more stability around here.

I am a observer. I generally sit, listen, watch, wait and soak in everything around me. I found it very interesting that the flight(s) into Texas were very very packed. I also was a little discouraged that the flight coming back to NOLA was half empty. This after the airline had cancelled two other flights into NOLA that were scheduled for later. These were really business flights so what most of us already knew is true, there are no business peeps coming here.

I was at a local restaurant that I have some business dealings with for lunch. About 1:45 a young lady walked in to the establishment to apply for a job. Obviously lots of this going on around the country, nothing realy different except this being New Orleans, the young lady of course did things a little different. Like I said earlier, I observe. I saw her come in, ask the hostess for a application and she made her way to the bar area to fill out her application. This is a high end steak house deep in the heart of the French Quarter. She rolled in with flip flops, capri pants (I had to as a female friend lol) and a wife beater t-shirt. Doubtful she would have gotten a job anyway dressed like that, but the topper was what she brought with her. A big ole bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos and a Mountain Dew. She proceeded to snack on the Doritos, taking big guplps of the Dew along the way. When the manager came out to look over her application and to actually interview her, she continued to munch away on the Doritos and swig that Mountain Dew like someone was gonna take it away from her. I wanted to walk over and help myself to a chip, but watching her tear through that bag, I was afraid I would come away with nothing left after the wrist. She didn’t get the job.

Jazzfest 2009

Can I just say? Most hilarious JazzFest photo I’ve seen so far. In fact, it’s hilarious with or without jazz. [via my friend Jeremy]

C’mon down to the Quarter this weekend for the Louisiana Roadfood Festival. Saturday and Sunday from 11am to 7pm on Royal Street, tons will be going on including the World’s Longest Oyster Po’Boy. Music of course will be on hand both days, up and down Royal Street, including Loose Marbles, Lee Floyd Trio and the Doreen Letchens Jazz Band.No charge for the event, but bring some cash cause you will want to taste some of these offerings:

Meat Pies, Crawfish Pies, Fried Catfish, White Beans, Creole Hot Sausage Po’Boys, Jambalaya, Shrimp Remolaude Po’Boys, Gumbo, Smoked Turkey Legs, Cochon de Lait Po’Boy, Red Beans, Alligator Ettoufee, plus tons of sweets, think pralines, snowballs etc…

Proceeds from the food go to the participating restaurants, including Cafe Reconcile

BHOPAL IN THE MAKING:
Port of New Orleans sets itself (and New Orleans) up for disaster

It’s Monday morning, and the sun is shining, and the temperature is just right, and Spring is definitely in the air, so I hate to be that guy, but I really have to point out that New Orleans is about to get screwed. Again.

The backstory:

• The Port of New Orleans is one of the largest ports in the country, and New Orleans Cold Storage (NOCS) is one of its biggest clients.

• NOCS processes poultry for shipping. Recently deceased chickens are trucked to NOCS, where they’re frozen solid, loaded onto ships, and sent around the world.

• NOCS used to have a facility on the Mississippi River, but that plant was destroyed during Hurricane Katrina. For the past three and a half years, the company has been operating from temporary digs on the Industrial Canal.

• NOCS needs a new home on the Mississippi River so that big ships can have easier, faster access to the plant than they currently do. The company’s former location is unusable, so the Port wants to custom-build a new facility for NOCS on a wharf adjacent to the French Quarter in downtown New Orleans.

PETA may take issue with the whole livestock thing, but for me and for most of my neighbors, that’s not the real concern. We understand the need for commerce and industry, so chicken processing is fine by us. Our problem is with the facility’s location. Here’s why:

• NOCS uses large volumes of anhydrous ammonia to do its work–a dangerous, highly flammable chemical compound.

• Housing such a dangerous, highly flammable chemical just steps from the historic French Quarter and Faubourg Marigny neighborhoods is reckless and shortsighted and shows complete disregard for the residents and businesses of the area–not to mention the millions of tourists who visit each year.

• At the very least, the planned NOCS facility will generate loads of traffic (approximately 100 big-rigs per day) and interrupt important city- and state-sponsored urban renewal plans that focus on the riverfront.

• At the very worst, the facility could present a massive safety hazard, complete with explosions, evacuations of homes and businesses within a three-mile radius, and untold damage to one of Louisiana’s most historically (and fiscally) significant sites.

Let me reiterate: it’s not the project that most of us find offensive, it’s the location. Is it in anyone’s best interests to put such a high-risk facility next to the state’s most notable tourist attraction? Right next to two of the most densely populated neighborhoods in the state? Jindal and others–particularly legislators and lobbyists from north Louisiana–keep pushing for the project, apparently having forgotten what happens when the goose that lays the golden egg (for Louisiana’s budget, anyway) gets dealt a nasty blow.

You wanna see something funny? Check the video that accompanies this story, wherein the Port’s CEO, Gary Lagrange, calls complaints like mine “hogwash”. Which makes me wonder, (a) don’t you have to be wearing a Colonel Sanders bowtie to use that kind of language, and (b) who’s put the gun in Gary’s back and said, “Get this done, or you’re toast!”?

You wanna see something not so funny? Check the following video about a similar processing plant in Arkansas that experienced an explosion and ammonia leak exactly one year ago today. Not only were the government and the factory owner, Cargill, forced to evacuate local residents, but the company chose not to rebuild and forfeited its multi-million dollar investment. (There are follow-up stories here and here; free registration required.) Or you could read all about a similar accident that hospitalized a dozen people just last week in Connecticut.

THE MOST IMPORTANT PART: This is not a done deal. The Port still needs massive allocations from the state if it’s to proceed with construction. However, it’s making headway, and chances are good that Lagrange & Co. will find the requisite cash unless pressure from the general public forces the state to reconsider.

If you live in New Orleans, please visit the Faubourg Marigny’s Stop Cold Storage website. The site’s still in development, but you can definitely sign a petition opposing the NOCS’s planned location. If you’re on Facebook, you can also join the “Stop Cold Storage Group“. And for free spirits who’d rather do things on their own, below you’ll find the email addys of city and state representatives; drop them a note and ask them to oppose funding for the project at the Governor Nicholls location–while there’s still time:

James Carter: jcarter@cityofno.com
Cynthia Hedge-Morrell: chmorrell@cityofno.com
Arnie Fielkow: afielkow@cityofno.com
Stacy Head: shead@cityofno.com
Jackie Clarkson: jbclarkson@cityofno.com
Mary Cunningham: mbcunningham@cityofno.com
Shelly Midura: smidura@@cityofno.com
Cynthia Willard-Lewis: cwlewis@cityofno.com
Rep. Juan Lafonta: larep096@legis.state.la.us
Rep. Charmaine Marchand: larep099@legis.state.la.us
Mike Moffitt, VCPORA: VCPORA@wildapricot.org
Meg Lousteau, VCPORA: meglousteau@gmail.com
Chris Bonura, Port of New Orleans: BONURA@portno.com
Chris Costello, FMIA: president@faubourgmarigny.org

Thanks for bearing with me. I haven’t had an Erin Brockovich/Karen Silkwood moment in a long time.

The comedy of errors, better known as City Hall here in New Orleans, is yes at it again.  If your a member of the media in this city and have a request for “public records”, you better be prepared to wait weeks or months to get your request filled. Even then, the information you get will be blacked out, deleted or only exsist in Ray Nagin’s rather large noggin. Media outlets in this city have been complaining and some have resorted to suing the city to get public records to become actually public.

That is why I am asking why we can’t get a laugh track to go along with the situation at City Hall. You know what a laugh track is right? It is a fake audio track of a bunch of people laughing at some inane sitcom that is not even close to being funny. How the powers that be are running this city right now, with every story that is coming out, makes me do nothing but laugh at this point. It doesn’t help to get angry or mad or frustrated because not enough people in New Orleans are paying attention to make a difference.

Most people know the name Veronica White. She is the city’s Sanitation Director. The lady who has overseen the quadrupling of cost of having someone pick up the trash from in front of your house. The lady who has not been able to give the City Council a list of homes that is being serviced by the city’s trash contract holder. The lady who gave us the wonderful trash cans that dot the French Quarter landscape. At least the homeless peeps have somewhere to crash on those cold nights.

Ms White, who is not a lawyer and who does not oversee anything other than trash in this city, has been “outed” for passing along hundreds, maybe thousands of e-mails that belonged to City Council members. It looks like “community activist” lawyer Tracy Washington requested copies of the emails for Arnie Fielkow, Stacey Head, Shelly Midura and Jackie Clarkson. Along with Jeff Thomas, who is Recovery Director Ed Blakely’s first assistant. All 5 of these folks are white. No request was made for emails from any black council member.

Obviously, I am not debating Tracy Washington’s right to get access to these e-mails. Nor do I care if she only wants the messages from white folks. That’s her decision and personally I think that shows exactly where she is coming from. Most people are grown enough to read between the lines. All of that is the besides the point. And here is the point.

Ms Veronica White contacted the Mayor’s Office of Technology and requested these e-mails. No one has announced who in the technology office actually went into the server and burned thousand upon thousands of e-mails onto 3 cd’s which Ms White then handed off to Tracy Washington. Ms. White’s job is to oversee the trash contracts. A job which she has totally screwed up to this point. Her job is not to contact the office of technology and skirt not only the law but city procedures.

It’s just too funny, I’m sorry. Loyal readers know my past frustrations with the way the recovery has gone to this point. I’ve promised myself to not rail on the lame, impotent leaders of city government. So I am not. At least I know who to contact next time we have a public records request. Just contact the garbage lady and I’ll have it within 10 minutes. Only if I request it for the folks who Ms White doesn’t like though.

August 21st, 2007. That is the oldest e-mail I have on my work computer server. That is over a year and a half ago.I did the research and bring it up because earlier this week citizens of New Orleans learned that the city government “leaders” had all of their emails and correspondence deleted from the year 2008. Specifically Mayor Ray Nagin. That is correct, every email that Mayor Nagin sent out or received in 2008 “magically disappeared” after Channel 4, WWL-TV filed a public records request. Not only every email from the year 2008, but the Mayor’s schedule also has been deleted.

The City of New Orleans claims that the server did not have the capacity to “store” all of these emails and schedules and such. Therefore, they just deleted everything. This is just total fraud. The city states that there is no way to get all of the deleted information. Which of course is public record and you me or any Joe Blow is suppose to have the right to get access to these within three days of a written request.

I gotta tell you, something is really fishy here. I talked with my IT guy this morning, he says you can get a extra terabyte something for a hundred bucks that will store over 1 million emails. Plus he says the first thing to go when a server has issues are large files such as pictures, videos and audio.

What does Mayor Nagin have to hide? Why would all of HIS e-mails and HIS schedule disappear when he touts himself as “The Technology Mayor”. I thought we were moving into the 21st century with Ray Nagin at the helm.

What will come next in the Curious Case of Ray Nagin’s e-mails? It might not be worthy of a Oscar nomination but I’m sure the answers we get in the future will be comical.

.Today the little one and I walked down to to corner of Royal and Press streets where a ceremony was taking place to unveil the new historical marker to mark the spot where Homer Plessy boarded a train in 1892 and was subsequently arrested. This led to the court case of Plessy V Ferguson which in turn led to the formalizing of ’separate but equal’ which stood until Brown V The Board of Education in 1954. It also happened to be the 200th anniversary of Abe Lincoln’s birth and the 100th anniversary of the formation of the NAACP so it was actually a pretty big event. Obviously bigger than anyone organizing thought it would be anyway. It was great to be there when something like this was announced to the public. It is great to have an historical marker for all to see and to have the privilege to live just blocks away from the place where such an important piece of history occurred. Although the little guy had more fun running around in circles in the green space behind all the action I am still happy to have the opportunity to take him to things like this and one day I will tell him about it and I hope I have raised him to care that he was there today.

Today’s Times-Picayune posted an interesting update on the current gay adoption conflamma. It seems that back in the heady days of helmet-hating Mike Foster, something called the “Commission on Marriage and Family” was established–presumably to talk about, you know, marriage and families and stuff. It’s never been very active, but the folks at Forum for Equality are concerned that the adoption case will spur the commission–which is now appointed by the similarly helmet-hating Bobby Jindal–to push new legislation banning gay adoption. That wouldn’t be surprising, given the fact that (a) we’re in the bright red state of Louisiana, and (b) the committee’s membership includes folks like Puritan-at-Large Tony Perkins. However, other members of the commission seem somewhat more level-headed:

Jindal appointee Gene Mills, Louisiana Family Forum director, said he believes gay rights advocates are simply overreacting to the Arkansas vote and California voters’ rejection of same-sex marriages. Mills’ group bills itself as “your voice for traditional families.” He said the commission could yield ideas such as continuing to make it harder to divorce; devoting more resources to job training for single parents; and increasing state prisoners’ opportunities to interact with their children.

But Mills and [commission chair Senator Sharon Weston Broome, D-Baton Rouge] demurred on the question of gay adoption. Mills said, “That’s really up to the Legislature.” Broome did not offer her position.

Asked through his aides about the commission and specifically about his position on gay adoption, Jindal released a one-sentence statement: “I believe family is the cornerstone of our society and look forward to the commission’s work on how we can do more to support healthy families.”

At least one member of the clergy serving on the commission said he has no intention of parroting views of the traditional social conservatives….

The Rev. Chris Andrews of First United Methodist Church in Baton Rouge said he wants to discuss ways to help all families, regardless of composition. He said he will resist any attempts to reduce the likelihood that a child might be adopted.

“In general, I would view adoption issues through the lens of whether an individual or couple has the ability to love and care for a child, ” Andrews said. “I do not think that is something that is limited to a particular sexual orientation.”

–full article at NOLA.com

Am I being a total Pollyanna? Am I putting too much faith in the common sense of our elected and appointed officials? Or am I being lazy? Probably all of the above.

Note: none of this is to say that I want kids–I have four dogs, which must be the equivalent of at least one child–but as an adoptee myself, I understand the value of placing kids in good homes. I fail to understand how anyone can argue against that.