[Mb-civic] Visions of the New New Orleans - E. J. Dionne - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Visions of the New New Orleans

By E. J. Dionne Jr.
Tuesday, September 20, 2005; Page A23

PORTLAND, Ore. -- If the rebuilding of New Orleans is to be something 
other than a new government disaster, a coalition of the skeptical and 
the visionary will have to stand together and confront the lobbyists and 
the corporate welfare artists.

Fiscal conservatives in Congress are right to worry about the potential 
for -- yes -- waste, fraud and abuse if the federal government throws 
off tens of billions of dollars into a haphazard and ill-planned 
spending fest. If the goal is to spend as much money as quickly as 
possible, the benefits will flow primarily to the well-connected, and 
the result will be a new mess built on the old.

But because the rest of us are morally obligated to those whose lives 
have been damaged by natural calamity and government failure, it's a 
fact that the federal government will be spending a lot of money. That's 
why the fiscal conservatives need the visionaries. The visionaries are 
insisting that we put in the time to make New Orleans a model for a 
better kind of city and the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast a model for a 
better approach to governing. The people of the region, not the 
lobbyists, need to lead in creating an environmentally sustainable, 
socially just and economically viable region.

These thoughts are inspired by one of Congress's rare visionaries. Rep. 
Earl Blumenauer not only represents his beloved city of Portland but is 
also evangelical in spreading Portland's gospel of "livability." That 
odd but increasingly popular word embodies the idea that if governments 
plan right (and in cooperation with local citizens), they can safeguard 
the environment, create more agreeable lives for families and 
individuals and let loose sustainable private-sector growth.

Blumenauer, a Democrat always seeking to put together left-right 
coalitions on behalf of his eclectic mix of ideas, is both worried and 
excited by the prospect of rebuilding the Gulf. Speaking for the 
fiscally conservative, he describes himself as "a little scared by how 
fast they're doing all this stuff because I don't think there's anybody 
in charge."

But his excitement burns through during a discussion at a restaurant in 
Portland's Pearl neighborhood, an old warehouse district near an 
abandoned rail yard that is now thriving. "I've been in Congress for 
nearly 10 years and I've never been so optimistic that we have a chance 
not just to engage in the gargantuan task of helping people in the Gulf, 
but also of healing the body politic." There is an opportunity, he says, 
for government to ask the basic questions: "How do you build a 
community? How do you get people involved? You've got to build a citizen 
infrastructure along with all the roads and bridges."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/19/AR2005091901296.html?nav=hcmodule
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.islandlists.com/pipermail/mb-civic/attachments/20050920/cbf1beb3/attachment-0001.htm