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Archive for February, 2009

Feb 28

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A Train to Bourbon Street?!?!?!

Admittedly, my title is piggybacking off of Jeffery’s post, “PBJ’s Train from Harrah’s to Tigerland.“

Perfect.

Earlier this month, I posted about the need to connect New Orleans to Baton Rouge via commuter rail and questioned the inertia behind the proposal, which, during the aftermath of Katrina, we were told would take a matter of months to complete, not a matter of years.

Well, thanks in large part to the wretched stimulus bill that our Governor derided on national television on Tuesday, Louisiana could finally be getting this important connection.

Today’s Times-Pic:

Louisiana’s transportation department plans to request federal dollars for a New Orleans to Baton Rouge passenger rail service…

YES! It’s about time!

…from the same pot of railroad money in the president’s economic stimulus package that Gov. Bobby Jindal criticized as unnecessary pork on national television Tuesday night.

Oh. Well, that’s unfortunate.

A aide in Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office said the state also has passenger rail connections from New Orleans to Houston and Meridian, Miss., on the drawing boards, but the Baton Rouge line is the most realistic at this time.

The federal stimulus bill does not specifically mention a rail line connecting Las Vegas to Anaheim, Calif., because any potential recipient of the money must file a grant proposal. However, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, was instrumental in boosting the amount of money for the rail projects in the stimulus bill. He has said he intends to tap that money for a rail line from Las Vegas to Anaheim, where Disneyland is located.

Asked for comment Friday about the Jindal stance on the federal rail money, the governor’s Chief of Staff Timmy Teepell said he does not think the Las Vegas to Anaheim line is a good use of taxpayer money. He did not address the Louisiana proposal.

Teepell should know a thing or two about transportation projects.

He calls himself a “Road Scholar,” after all. (He didn’t graduate from college; instead, he learned everything he knows while hitchhiking across the nation, which, as everyone knows, is the ideal resume for a Governor’s Chief of Staff).

Either way, instead of admitting that the New Orleans to Baton Rouge line is a worthy and needed project, Teepell could only rehash the straw man argument of a meg-lev train from Vegas to Disneyland.

Good luck with the grant application, guys.

There’s nothing quite like inventing a line of attack against a worthy endeavor and then, days later, announcing that you want money for your own train too.

I am sure the good people of Louisiana will understand when we lose out on grant monies for infrastructure projects because our 37-year-old Governor is running for President (after only a year on the job).

Feb 27

Disney Dissonance

Jindal on last Sunday’s Meet the Press:

GOV. JINDAL:  Other spending started out, like the, the magnetic-lev train subsidy started out smaller and ended up larger than what both chambers passed in conference, $8 billion.  You know, now they’re talking about spending billions of that to build a train from Disneyland to Las Vegas.  There was so much wasteful spending here.

Jindal’s Republican response:

…their legislation is larded with wasteful spending. It includes $300 million to buy new cars for the government, $8 billion for high-speed rail projects, such as a “magnetic levitation” line from Las Vegas to Disneyland , and $140 million for something called “volcano monitoring.”

The next day:

After giving one of the biggest speeches in his time as a politician, Gov. Bobby Jindal is heading to Disney World.


Feb 27

Photographic Evidence

No matter how confused Jindal’s staff members are by the meaning of words, they can rest assured that Michael at 2Millionth Weblog has the photographic evidence to back up Jindal’s claims:

See? Teepell’s right! Jindal Press Secretary Melissa Sellers and those pesky liberal bloggers are full of it.

Quoting TPM (bold mine):

Team Jindal probably would have been wise to leave things there.

Instead, they went back to Smith, now telling him, in Smith’s words, that Jindal “didn’t imply” on Tuesday that the story “took place during the heat of a fight to release rescue boats.” (Take 30 seconds to read Jindal’s actual words, and you’ll see that’s flatly untrue — but no matter.) Rather, Jindal spokeswoman Melissa Sellers told Smith, “It was days later .. Sheriff Lee was on the phone and the governor came down to visit him. It wasn’t that they were standing right down there with the boats.”

Smith added:

“She said she thought Lee, who died in 2007, ‘was doing an interview’ about the incident with the boats when the governor described him yelling into the phone.”In other words, Jindal only heard from Lee later that this had happened. He didn’t actually see it happening and played no role in it himself. We posted a few hours ago, noting that Jindal’s office had admitted the story was false.

But then things got weirder: Jindal’s people went back for yet more.

Smith soon posted an update explaining that he had misunderstood Sellers earlier. According to Teepell, Smith now wrote, rescue efforts were in fact still underway when Jindal met with Lee. And Jindal overheard Lee yelling on the phone to justify a decision he had previously made, not giving an interview about the episode, as Sellers’ earlier version had had it.

In fact, that whole thing about Jindal overhearing Lee giving an interview? It’s now gone from Smith’s post (though, thanks to the dangers of syndication, it remains here) as if Jindal’s office never said it.

There’s more. Amazingly, Sellers then argued to Smith that there is no difference between Jindal’s original story as told Tuesday night, and the one her office finally settled on this afternoon. And even more amazingly, Smith added another update in which he transcribed that argument without comment, as if it were reasonable.

Then the capper: With Jindal’s office now satisfied with the third iteration of its story — a version that clearly acknowledged that the first version, told Tuesday night to millions, was false — Teepell went back to Smith with the following comment:

“This is liberal blogger B.S. The story is clear.”

Feb 26

Louisiana Panned, Seared

H/t to Bayou St. John at Moldy City for this post and for linking to this video:

Governor Jindal had a tough act to follow on Tuesday night, and unfortunately for him and for the State of Louisiana, his response has been nearly universally slammed.

I know what has been said. Oyster and Ryan have both been cataloging the criticisms.

But I think a good friend of mine, Andy, in Houston may have said it best :

I’d like to thank your State for giving the rest of us the pleasure of watching your Governor’s career die on live television. It was truly a joy. I like the part where he says sneeringly that the government’s paying for “something called ‘volcano monitoring.’ Like, why would anyone feel the need to predict a natural disaster? Especially in the same speech as all of that misguided Katrina stuff. The whole thing was just staggeringly ill-conceived. I think to everyone else on the planet the lesson of Katrina was that we do need a functional government. It’s hard to pull yourself out of drowning by your bootstraps.

I would think that people would be pretty offended by this guy threatening the State’s bottom line to advance his own Presidential fantasy.

Ouch. I’m not quite as ready to sound the death knell, but certainly, the speech did deflate Jindal’s “Presidential fantasy,” which, hopefully, means he’ll be spending more time actually being Governor of Louisiana and less time posturing, politicking, and campaigning all over the nation, only a year after being elected Governor for the first time.

Yes, I thought the speech was horrible. I thought he sounded less like a strong leader and more like a kindergarten teacher reading to his class.

But either way, the real unfortunate collateral damage this speech inflicted wasn’t on Jindal’s Presidential fantasy; it was on the State of Louisiana.

He made us all look ungrateful.

While he droned on about government waste and Katrina as an example of incompetence, the rest of the waking world was thinking, “Wait, isn’t this guy from Louisiana? What about all the federal aid they received?”

Chris Matthews wasn’t the only person in America wondering this; he just happened to be on live television at the time.

It puts the rest of us in Louisiana in a defensive position.

It severely undercuts the truth: That the failure of the levees in New Orleans was created and caused by engineers and bureaucrats in the federal government and that, for decades, Louisiana has not received her fair share of oil and gas royalties (a point Jindal actually made, rather forcefully, during his interview on Meet the Press).

What we need now is someone, other than our Governor like, say, President Obama, to counter this criticism. Louisiana is not “a rich State,” as Mr. Jindal likes to believe when he’s on the trail; it’s a poor State, the SECOND poorest State in the nation. Rich, technically I suppose, in natural resources, but what good is that when we receive the short end of the deal on oil and gas royalties?

Jindal’s colleague, Governor Sarah Palin, on the other hand, presides over a State that actually PAYS people to live there from the beaucoups of money they receive in royalties.

We all need to work hard to stop this ridiculous meme that Louisianans are ungrateful. We’re not ungrateful. We simply seek equity on these critical issues.

Oh, and ironically, guess who is “indignant” about Jindal’s snipe at volcano monitoring?

Alaskans! Quoting The Boston Herald:

“Volcano monitoring is a matter of life and death in Alaska,” Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, said in an open letter to Jindal.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, quickly agreed, noting in a press statement how “absolutely appropriate” it is to spend money on volcano monitoring.

…

The USGS also staffs volcano observatories in Hawaii and the Pacific Northwest, but most of the nation’s active volcanoes – and most of the yearly eruptions – occur in Alaska, said Eichelberger, who once worked at the Alaska Volcano Observatory while a professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

“It was a strange thing for (Jindal) to pick up on,” he said. “This is really very important work. We can see these eruptions coming, so it saves lives to be able to warn people.”

Feb 23

2 Comments

Jindal on MTP

On Sunday, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal appeared on Meet the Press, and today, he will deliver the Republican response to President Obama’s speech to a Joint Session of Congress.

Just in case you missed it, you can watch Jindal’s interview by clicking here.

Oyster’s already provided his analysis, and as always, I agree (almost) completely.

Chris Matthews believes that Jindal is “clearly running for President.”

Jindal did a fine job defending federal spending for Louisiana’s levees and coastal wetlands. He was articulate and to-the-point about the federal responsibilities and Louisiana’s short end of the deal on oil and gas royalties. Governor Jindal:

Let’s be clear.  Everybody knows the federal levees that were designed and built by the Corps didn’t do what they were supposed to do in 2005.  We absolutely have worked with Representative Clyburn and other members of the Congress in both this administration and previous administration to–and as governor of Louisiana, I will continue to work to make sure that the federal government repairs and builds the levees the way they should have been built in the first place, repairs our coast to prevent against future storms and also, by the way, helps to repair some of the damage that was caused by the breaking of those federal levees.  That’s important for Louisiana, it’s important for our country.

Our, our state, by the way, 9 to $10 billion comes off of our coast in terms of federal oil and gas royalties.  If that was federal lands within our state, we’d get 50 percent.  We get virtually none of that.  You look at 30 percent of the nation’s oil and gas in some form comes off of our coast.  It’s important for the country that America rebuilds those levees, that America helps those communities get back on their feet.

Sounds great, but let’s face it: His recent posturing on the national stage is not really about promoting the interests of the people of Louisiana; it’s about promoting the Republican Party, and to many, our Governor, the wunderkind, represents a significant opportunity to re-brand the Republican identity. Indeed, the bulk of the interview on Meet the Press was about Governor Jindal’s “philosophical” disagreements with the stimulus bill. Quoting the Governor:

I think the best thing they could’ve done, for example, was to cut taxes on things like capital gains, the lower tax brackets, to get the private sector spending again.

I wish someone- anyone- could explain how cutting or eliminating capital gains taxes would actually stimulate the economy during this recession. President Obama is intent on cutting taxes for the “lower tax brackets,” so, on this issue, he and Jindal agree. But the lower tax brackets don’t pay capital gains.

Jindal also repeated an obvious lie about the stimulus funding a high-speed train between Disneyland and Las Vegas.

You know, now they’re talking about spending billions of that to build a train from Disneyland to Las Vegas.  There was so much wasteful spending here.

John Boehner crafted this line of attack, which is simply a back-handed way of demeaning the merits of a commuter rail network, something, strangely, that so-called “pro-business” Republicans oppose. Quoting Matt Yglesias:

In a last-minute change, the total quantity of funds available was increased. But there’s no special plan for Las Vegas. The money will be spread all across the country. As it happens, I think an LA-Vegas HSR line is a perfectly reasonable project. But in practice the areas that will get a leg up should be the Federal Railroad Administration’s officially designated high-speed rail corridors. As it happens, LA-Vegas doesn’t make the cut. But guess who does have such a corridor? Ohio!

Ohio, of course, is the home state of none other than John Boehner.

Indeed, the existing plan is a bit freakishly Ohio-centric, offering both a Cleveland-Toledo-Chicago line and a Cleveland-Columbus-Cincinnati-Indianapolis corridor while leaving things like Houston-Dallas and Orlando-Jacksonville (and, indeed, LA-Vegas) off the list. Long story short, John Boehner doesn’t know what he’s talking about and his position on this issue would imperil both short term jobs for Ohioans and an opportunity to substantially improve Ohio’s long-run capacity for economic growth.

I’ve argued in favor of a Dallas-New Orleans corridor. This would augment the multi-modality of numerous towns and cities across the Great State of Louisiana. It would shrink our State; it would offer an alternative route for the thousands of people who make the daily commute between Baton Rouge and New Orleans; it could be utilized during mass evacuations; and it would increase tourism, particularly in Central and Northern Louisiana.

Jindal’s statement about a mythical Disneyland/Vegas train line was actually about a publicly-funded, national commuter rail network. Funny enough, our Governor, thankfully, has no problem taking stimulus money for roads and transportation improvements. A publicly-funded national Interstate highway system is perfectly fine, but a high-speed commuter rail network is somehow a joke.

And so is unemployment insurance. And quoting Jindal again:

How does $300 million for federal cars, $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts, how is spending like that going to help our economy?  How’s that stimulus?

A $300 million work order for new hybrid cars from American manufacturers won’t just save American jobs; it will also save taxpayers millions of dollars in fuel costs. And though I don’t know the specifics of re-funding the depleted National Endowment for the Arts, I do know that $50 million, while a gigantic figure, represents less than seven tenths of 1% of the stimulus bill.

Philosophical disagreements are different than practical disagreements. Jindal doesn’t disagree with the practicality of the stimulus, but he claims to have fundamental philosophical differences with it– which is a perfectly understandable position to have, if you’re a media pundit or a paid political operative. But if you’re the Governor of the second poorest State in the Union, practicality should always trump your own personal economic philosophy, particularly during a prolonged recession. As Governor Granholm noted today, the stimulus isn’t “his (Jindal’s) money. It’s the people’s money.”

The people of Louisiana are footing the bill for the $100 million in unemployment insurance allocated for Louisiana.

Whether or not Jindal accepts the money, we’re still paying for it.

Feb 20

15 Comments

Sharon Tohline: I am Ziggy Stardust

Sharon Tohline, one of Alexandria’s newest residents, pens an open letter to the disc jockeys of Central Louisiana.

By the way, I’d be remiss not to mention that Sharon’s previous post was the 1,000th post on CenLamar, which means this is the 1,001st post.

An open letter to Central Louisiana Radio Stations:

Dear Disc Jockeys,

I want to preface the words I am about to utter by informing you that I’m not a music snob.  I spent four years in California, central headquarters of music snobbery.  I have seen two grown men come to blows over the relative worth of “noise music” versus “ambient music.”  I don’t need obscure music to make me happy.  I do like to have a reliable radio station to tune into, though.  I am a dedicated but open-minded music lover who considers radio a vital format even in the era of iPods and Sirius.  Radio has the power to take the pop cultural pulse of its audience, to form an image of the moods and attitudes of an entire population.

D.J.’s of Cenla, I do not think you are living up to the mission of radio.  Your choices confound me.  I had always understood radio stations to be something organized by theme.  I grant that these themes are generally vague.  “Classic rock” stations can get away with playing 70′s cock rock right alongside 80′s hard rock.  But they still behave in a fairly predictable manner.  They will never throw Madonna into the mix, or anything featuring Sid Vicious.  R&B stations do not suddenly break out a Johnny Cash record or something by the Rolling Stones.

Arguments can be made in favor of genre-bending D.J.’s.  Someone who normally plays contemporary hip-hop might feature a track by Beck, or maybe something by the Beatles. If they did, this would be an unspeakably cool move.  It would seem self-aware and interesting.  It might even spark some discussion about the relationship of those artists to a rainbow of genres.

Frankly, Cenla D.J.’s,  I don’t think you’re participating in either of these schools of thought.  I think, in fact, that most of you are tossing CD’s at random into a disc-changer and hitting ”play.”  Yesterday on 93.1, a station that seems to play almost exclusively Top 40 hip-hop and rap, I heard a contemporary country song.  Last weekend I swear  I heard Phil Collins fade in directly after a Guns N Roses tune.  Have you no ability to discern your own audience?  I cannot think of any single person who listens to both Flo Rida and Trace Adkins.  And I cannot even begin to imagine a heavy metal fan’s commentary on “Sussudio.”

As far as I can tell, the radio stations that come through my stereo are divided into three categories: Old Music, New Music, and Religious.  Is this the problem?  Is it that you’re having trouble competing with the preachers?  There are certainly a lot of them, I’ll grant you.  Baton Rouge has these stations.  Ditto New Orleans.  But as far as I know, there are only a couple, and they are most prominent on Sundays.  Here you can listen to preaching pretty much any day of the year, from a variety of voices.  At some point I’d like to undertake a closer study to discover which denomination dominates the airwaves.  (Does congregation B’nai Israel get a station?  Or is that too much to ask?)

Sometimes I enjoy the grab bag quality of my radio.  Driving home from Wal-Mart one day, worried about my high grocery bill and my relatively low income, I happened upon “Red, Red Wine” by way of UB-40, the UK band who, according to VH1′s Pop-Up Video, are named after the federal form Brits had to fill out to go on unemployment.  This seemed like great stage timing.  I sang along cheesily as they promised that red, red wine would keep me rocking all of the time, despite my financial woes.

But I’m not always so amused.  If random playlists could encourage listeners to broaden their horizons and appreciate new types of music, I would be all in favor of your methods.  But I’m just not sure that’s ever going to happen.  Music is generally something people are passionate about.  When I hear the high-octave piano tinkling in the background of an Arcade Fire song, I want to grab the collar of the nearest person and force them to listen, to feel the energy I feel when I hear “Neighborhood #1″.  We deserve the right to love our favorite styles and to pan the ones that just don’t suit us.  But when a station isn’t excited or considerate about its own playlists, how can it expect its listeners to grant it any dedication?

The CD player in my car is broken, and the device I purchased to play my iPod through my radio can’t find a clear station to broadcast on.  I listen to a lot of radio in my car, and there’s one thing I’ve learned:  if a song comes on that doesn’t suit me, I’m likely to just change the station.  I don’t need obscure music all the time.  I don’t have to have a college radio D.J. droning along in an un-inflected manner.  But I do need to know which stations are my enemies and which are my friends.  You’re about to drive me to the preachers, Cenla.  At least they get excited about their content.

Feb 17

6 Comments

Sharon Tohline: Southern Hair

Sharon Tohline, CenLamar’s newest contributor, moved to Alexandria (for the first time) only two months ago.

I was going to talk about something serious in this post.  I promise I was.  I’ve had a lot of interesting conversations with people lately about what it means to be new in a small city, and about what outsider status means in general.  And I wanted to respond to all of that.  But I can’t right now because I’m distracted by how much I hate my haircut.

When I called one of my Baton Rouge friends last Thursday night and mentioned I was on my way to a salon, she said “Are you sure?  Why don’t you just drive home one weekend and have it done?”

This comment reveals much of the skepticism I heard from friends when I told them I was moving to Cenla.  I’m sure you’re all more aware of this than I am, but the people of South Louisiana – particularly those in Baton Rouge and New Orleans – are not picking up and transplanting themselves to Alexandria and Pineville anytime soon.  A close friend of mine, who made countless visits here to visit her grandparents during her childhood, still hasn’t stopped sending me Facebook messages mocking my relocation plans.  When I try to invite people to make the 2-hour drive to visit, they generally say, “Why not come down here?  We could go out!”  Meaning, I suppose, that there are no “out” options here that don’t involve enormous bikers or toothless men who invoke images of dueling banjoes.

In general, I am trying to combat this skepticism.  I’m enjoying my new home.  I enjoy newness in general, and so far Alexandria and its environs haven’t lost their shine.  But now I recognize that I should have listened when even my mother said “If you’re going to get your hair cut up there, be sure you have some recommendations first.  Recommendations from people who are like you.”  She was infuriatingly right, and I am cursing my unquestioning loyalty to my new home.  Because now, after not listening to friends and family, I have Southern Hair.

I’ve seen Southern Hair in Baton Rouge, but not in nearly the concentration that it exists here.  It’s difficult to describe exactly what I mean by “Southern Hair,” because the precise style changes from year to year.  But those of you who have seen it and been subjected to it on your own heads know what I’m describing.  The majority of women in Louisiana are willing to spend countless dollars and hours on their hair.  I am not.  Unlike many girls I knew, I grew up with a mother who wore no makeup, never thought about her weight, and is perfectly willing to leave her salt-and-pepper locks untouched.  While I’m more appearance-conscious than my upbringing might suggest, I’ve just never been able to pull off true Southern Hair – a style with enormous volume requiring two bottles of hairspray and at least 5 implements to maintain.  In California I discovered that there is a whole subculture of people with un-styled hair, and my lack of conviction suddenly became socially acceptable.

Now I’m back in Dixie again, but this time even further inside the big-hair belt than I was in Baton Rouge.  Here, there seems to be no middle ground between heavily styled hair and Pentecostalism.  Or if there is, my stylist was having none of it.  When I showed her a picture of what I wanted, she said, “Oh, that’s too short.”  Then, rather than giving me the modified version of the cut I requested, she gave me her own hairstyle.  Exactly her hairstyle.  We could have been twins, except for the fact that the style suits her, while it makes me look like I’m wearing a tri-corner hat.

Granted, all of this might seem a bit obsessive.  But it occurred to me today that my experience searching for a hairstylist is representative of the overall experience of being new anywhere, no matter the culture.  When we are safely entrenched in our homes, we also tend to be safely entrenched in our subculture – our neighborhoods, our school, our primary friends.  We grow up learning the lesson of the social ladder, learning how to seek and maintain friendships with those who share our basic values and beliefs. (If you disagree, just ask someone from Baton Rouge what the difference is between a kid from Baton Rouge High and a kid from Catholic.  I’m sure your city has the same types of divisions.)  And we build most of the remainder of our experience from the perspective of our subcultural division.  Things like finding hairdressers or local bars or restaurants become easier once we know people who share our viewpoint.  But when you’re new to a place, all of that changes.  Your perspective is unconstrained, at least temporarily, as you reach for the most immediate available experience.

So I may have unflattering hair, but at least I can take comfort in knowing that my style is a reflection of my willingness to reach beyond my comfort zone.  Rather than driving down to Baton Rouge, I took a chance on a recommendation from a girl who is nothing like me, and ended up with a haircut that makes me look nothing like me.  Or maybe not.  Maybe I’m just a different version of myself, one who’s a little more open to new experiences.

Feb 15

1 Comment

Richard Florida’s Shaping of America Map

picture-4Richard Florida created this map, tracking changes in patents, population, and income on a city-by-city level in order to make predictions on how and where America will grow in the future.

Florida, the author of The Rise of the Creative Class, is one of America’s most prominent urban theorists.

By the way, you may need to download a plug-in in order to view the map.

For example:

picture-1As you can see, Alexandria’s not exactly a patent capital, even compared to a place like Lafayette, Louisiana:

picture-2And here’s how our income tracks:

picture-3Quoting from Florida’s How the Crash Will Reshape America (bold mine):

But that was then; the economy is different now. It no longer revolves around simply making and moving things. Instead, it depends on generating and transporting ideas. The places that thrive today are those with the highest velocity of ideas, the highest density of talented and creative people, the highest rate of metabolism. Velocity and density are not words that many people use when describing the suburbs. The economy is driven by key urban areas; a different geography is required.

Feb 13

9 Comments

Saving Charity

H/t to to Oyster for pointing me in the direction of this insightful post from E at We Could Be Famous.

Preservationists will love this case.

The world’s seventh largest architectural firm versus the State of Louisiana, both arguing over the future of a 1939 art deco building and the fate of an entire neighborhood.

If you haven’t already heard, the State and the Feds are apparently thinking about entering into this great deal in which they raze an entire neighborhood in New Orleans (one of only a handful of neighborhoods in the State listed on the National Register of Historic Places) in order to build a massive new medical campus for LSU and the VA.

Awesome, right?

The only problem is that, currently, in the middle of town, nestled in between the Tulane School of Medicine, the existing VA, and the existing LSU Medical School, there sits the now-vacant Charity Hospital. It’s a behemoth of an art deco building. Its bones are solid, and it’s ripe for renovation.

Quoting from Eli (bold mine):

LSU has argued that their teaching hospital needs to be connected to the VA. Why? Why do the hospitals need to be connected? Are they sharing facilities?

Not really. In fact, there is no compelling reason why these hospitals need to be directly adjacent instead of two blocks away.

What is it about the Charity building that makes it incongruous with a modern facility?

Nothing. In fact, the RMJM Hillier plan does not plan to preserve Charity’s interior or anything about the outdated ward layout. They propose preserving the solid limestone exterior while building an entirely brand-new facility inside.

LSU has never taken the time to properly evaluate the structure of Charity. One of their major claims by LSU is that Charity is unsound structurally because of rusted connectors in the limestone shell of the building.

In fact, RMJM Hillier took a thermal image of the building and found that the building wasn’t even constructed with connectors.

And so on and so forth.

Before we spend 1.2 billion public dollars and destroy an entire neighborhood (a neighborhood, by the way, that includes many homes that have been recently renovated with taxpayer subsidization), perhaps we should seriously study alternatives.

Oyster found this instructive video from RMJM Hillier:

Here is the executive summary of RMJM Hillier’s report. Quoting (bold mine):

The RMJM-Hillier Design Team has looked at many critical factors in this feasibility study, and we have determined that all of them can be resolved in a positive way. Naturally, there is a significant cost to doing that, but we believe the cost of resolving any issue will be far less than the cost of a comparable new building.

Oh and by the way, by “far less than the cost of a comparable new building,” they mean $136,000,000 less.


Feb 11

5 Comments

Drew Ward: DTV Coupons – Out of Date? Out of Luck!

My mom asked me to look online and figure out the process for reordering the two coupons we had received earlier this summer. Like many people she had logged into dtv2009.gov and requested coupons for a digital converter box. I am sure you’ve seen the ads, heard the messages and even enjoyed the amazing amount of news space fill KALB has dedicated to it in recent months.

These coupons were ordered around March and arrived about 3 months later. The only problem was that by the time the coupons arrived, there were no converter boxes to be had! As neither of my parents are very electronic gadget oriented, I took it upon myself to go pick up their converters and hook everything up.

I spent far too much time this past summer going to Wal-Mart, the other Wal-Mart, having that Wal-Mart call the third Wal-Mart. Going to Radio Shack, having that Radio Shack call all the other Radio Shacks, etc. Basically nobody had any, and nobody could say when they would be getting any. No one was taking holds or calling when they got them in.

Long story short, finally now, stores seem to have them in stock. Granted, even the cheapest are more expensive than the $40 coupons, but still they have them. Only problem…the coupons are expired!

These coupons were only valid for 90 days from the date they were mailed. According to the DTV2009.gov site, it was expected to take 10 days for delivery, so under the best circumstances, that means consumers have 80 days to purchase their converters.

Now, is it just me or would a total lack of converters not seem like a good reason to change a little bit of computer software somewhere and leave these cards active? Last week there was some local coverage of the coupons and especially of the fact that the coupon program had run out of money. Well, I doubt they’ve really run out. Because, if most people couldn’t find a box to buy, then their coupons are also expired. Thus that money, although allocated has never been spent!

The purpose of this rant I suppose is to draw some attention to the fact that according to the DTV website, once coupons are expired, consumers are simply out of luck. You can’t reactivate them. You can’t replace them. And you can’t order any more because once you have your two, you’re done! This reminds me of the Army, where a paperwork error on their part was a problem for you to deal with on your part.

I’d love to know who else out there has had this same issue? Please comment if you have.

I would say we should write or call our Representatives or Senators, but in 15 years of being a registered voter, I have yet to once receive a response to an email or letter sent to any of their offices.

Feb 10

Alexandria’s 2008 Progress Report

Here.

Feb 10

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Sharon Tohline: Joblessness and Friendliness

I’m happy to announce a new contributor to CenLamar, Sharon Tohline.

Sharon and her husband moved to Alexandria only two months ago. She’s from Baton Rouge by way of Los Angeles and the Big D, and she’s currently discovering Alexandria for the very first time.

A few days ago, Sharon introduced herself to me in an e-mail and pitched an idea for a weekly column on experiencing Alexandria as a newbie. And after confirming that Sharon was, in fact, a real person with real credentials, I knew she could add a valuable perspective in the discourse of “life in Louisiana.”

That’s all the introduction Sharon needs. Throughout the next few months, as Sharon is introduced to Alexandria, I’m certain that she will also be introducing herself to us.

So, without further adieu, Sharon’s first post:

Joblessness and Friendliness

Joblessness has struck Alexandria.

This was my first realization upon relocation. Not the beauty of living around the corner from a national forest. Not the strangeness of having less than a 15-minute drive to everywhere. Not even the overwhelming friendliness of most of the people I met when my car broke down the first time I headed into town. Before I could appreciate any of these things, I was struck by the remnants of joblessness, all within the space of my own home and yard.

As my boyfriend and I pulled into the driveway of our new rental trailer, we were forced to edge around a broken Nissan in the front yard. When the landlady unlocked the front door to show us the interior, she had to sidestep an abandoned playpen and matching car-seat lying in the entry hall. “These will be gone by the time you move in,” she promised. “Belong to the other renters.” Because my landlady is a true Louisiana woman, the effort necessary to garner further information from her is not significant. She admits fairly quickly that the other tenants left quickly because of the expense of renting. At least one member of the couple had lost a job; possibly both had. The story was not clear. They were moving in with family.

One week later, as we walked our dogs around the property, we encountered a neighbor loading boxes into his truck. He stopped to chat and we learned that he too had lost his job as a supervisor at a local plant. He was hoping to find work again, and he had more than thirty years of experience. But plants and mills were more often laying off than hiring.

I understand joblessness. As a defector from the world of higher education and a person with an arts degree, I am used to the feeling of being turned down one hundred times before hearing even a “maybe.” But I am not used to this level of joblessness. I am not used to being around so many others who understand and identify with my predicament – people who are used to working, who have held productive jobs their entire lives and never suspected to have them snatched away.

On the one hand, Alexandria and its environs are rich with hospitals and medical plazas, sanctuaries during times of recession. But these outlets are available only to those who have appropriate training. We are just as deep in mills and plants, manufacturing businesses that are often the hardest hit and the first to eliminate jobs. At my own job (I too have taken work as a medical staffer), at least thirty percent of the employees have husbands who have lost their long-held positions. Others are waiting, hoping that the economy recovers before a second round of layoffs ensues.

During our recent presidential campaign, then-candidate Obama took extensive criticism for his comments on small town life. We all remember this. We all know the lines about desperate, forgotten people “clinging” to religion and weaponry. Of course people were offended. But there are times when I understand what he might have been suggesting. Alexandria will lose its jobs long before Baton Rouge or New Orleans. It will definitely lose them before the larger cities I’ve inhabited in other states. And if this downturn rights itself before sweeping waves of poverty infect the middle classes of those cities, the conditions in places like Alexandria and Pineville will likely be forgotten.

Still, I’ve seen evidence here that whatever the rest of the nation might hear or remember about this time, the people of this city will remember. And they will have risen to the occasion by taking care of one another.

As my neighbor was packing up his car, he said something that proves this to me. “I hate to leave. The owners are nice people.”

He’s correct. The owners are nice people. They let both him and the tenants before us stay as long as they could. There was never talk of eviction. This is something else that strikes me about my new home – something that I fear is cliché, but that I also can’t leave unsaid. My landlord in Los Angeles was cutthroat. She regularly threw belongings out onto the street if payments came late. We survived four days with a broken toilet (the only one in the house) by running around the corner to the Circle K. We lasted even longer without power when a fuse blew and the owners were unreachable overseas. My experiences in Baton Rouge and in Texas were less harsh, but still impersonal. Garnering an extension was unlikely, if not impossible.

There are nice people here. We live in a community small enough in size that that kindness is noticeable on a daily basis. And while the personalities of a town’s people are certainly not enough to stave off starvation alone, living in a place where people try to take care of one another will always be important.

It’s a small thing, but it gives me hope. And it makes me love my new home, even if I couldn’t find a job in my field.

Feb 9

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Charlie Buras: Governor Jindal is Flying on Gambling Lobbyist’s Dime

It appears as if the intersection between Louisiana governors and gambling lobbyists continues to be heavily-trafficked.

picture-22According to Charlie Buras of The Old River Road, Governor Jindal has utilized the support of Alton Ashy, a registered lobbyist for the gambling industry,  in order to travel out-of-state for fundraising events.

Mr. Ashy’s style is currently influenced by “magazines,” and he believes that “watches” are the most important element of fashion. He “splurges” on shoes and coats but “skimps” on jeans. And he can’t live without shaving butter.

Quoting from Buras:

Sources now confirm for us that right before leaving for North Carolina, Gov. Bobby Jindal’s plane became unavailable — forcing him to scramble for alternate transportation.  Shaw Group executive Jeff Jenkins stepped in and coordinated the Governor’s use of a private Cessna Citation from Louisiana Aircraft based out of Baton Rouge.

Interestingly, I emailed Mr. Jenkins this morning and asked him about what I had been hearing.  He forwarded my question to Shaw Director of Corporate Communications Gentry Brann who responded, “Shaw did not provide any transportation to Governor Jindal.”  I guess I should have asked if they helped arrange any transportation.

The private jet, which seats seven, has a cost of $2,500 per hour!  But not to worry — Jindal is not paying a dime.  Rather, Alton Ashy, a fellow passenger on this trip and Louisiana’s top gambling lobbyist, is footing the bill.

A free ride to pick up fundraising checks in a private jet funded by the state’s top gambling lobbyist — now that’s something even ol’ Edwin would be proud of.

All of that said, I personally have no evidence that the dapper Ashy is, in fact, the state’s “top” gambling lobbyist. After all, he can only afford a Cessna Citation.

Louisiana is obviously a State of Gulfstreams, right?

Feb 6

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Drew Ward: Unemployment: Let’s actually look at the numbers

Today the Department of Labor Statistics released the unemployment stats for January.  Their report is anything but optimistic.  The current unemployment rate for the nation as a whole is 7.6%, reported as the highest since 1982.

Something I heard on NPR’s All Things Considered this afternoon caught my ear though.  Several economists were discussing the fact that at some point during the last 10 years, the US government changed the way they report employment figures.  They estimated that the actual unemployment rate was actually 14.8% and rising!

Why?  Because the traditional way of reporting employment statistics was much more straightforward.  Current reporting methods do not differentiate between involuntary part-time status (those who are working part-time because they simply cannot find a full-time job, and whose part-time job does not pay the bills) and full-time status.  It also removes a huge chunk of people (this month 80 million) from the statistical data set for any number of reasons.  These aren’t true non-workers (those outside the workforce such as retirees, children, voluntarily non-working spouses, the infirmed, disabled, etc).  These are simply people the government has chosen not to count (for our benefit of course).

Finally, these numbers as I’m sure you’ve noticed, are always non-farm workers.  So what about the farm workers?  How do these numbers translate to a place like Louisiana where a lot of our jobs are on farms and in forests and on waterways (all grouped under ‘farm’)?

These numbers are taken from the same DLS report, but the full version.

The first shows the numbers as they’re generally publicized:  7.6% unemployed, 92.4% employed (happy times right?).

The second gives us the view mentioned above…14.8% unemployed, 80% employed, and another 5% or so either very underemployed or just giving up entirely. (hmm)

The third one is scary.  It gives you the raw data.  The 142 million employed workers, the 12 million unemployed workers, and the other 80 million workers the DLS has chosen not to discuss with us.  (oh yeah, them)

Finally, of that 142 million employed workers, 38 million of them are part-time, and of that 38, at least a quarter of them really don’t want to be.

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So the reality of these numbers may in fact be much different than they appear at first glance.  If anything they tell us that officially only 104 million of 154 million workers are fully employed (67.5%).  This doesn’t mean they have good jobs, jobs matching their skills or education, or even jobs with sufficient income to support them.  It just means they are employed full-time.  That leaves the total of unemployed and underemployed at 32.5% or roughly 1/3 of workers.

If you account for the 80 million workers that DLS has excluded from their calculations, these numbers become 44% fully employed.  16% underemployed, and 40% unemployed.

And all of this still doesn’t include ‘farm jobs’.

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I’m not trying to make a bad situation sound worse, but I am saying that we should keep in mind the underlying numbers and realize that perhaps for many people in our economy and our community, the situation is much worse than we may think.

Feb 6

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On My Wish List: Amtrak

I stumbled across this report on Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover’s $2.3 billion “wish list” for his City, which includes finishing Interstate 49, hiring more police officers, and a collection of various infrastructure projects.

As long as we’re wishing, why don’t we ask to fill the gaping hole in the Amtrak commuter rail network here in Louisiana?

Check it out:

picture-20

Currently, if you want to get from Little Rock to New Orleans or Baton Rouge on Amtrak, you’d have to travel hundreds of miles in the wrong direction, all the way to San Antonio, before finally making the turn. Same thing, obviously, for anyone from New Orleans or Baton Rouge wanting to visit Dallas.

And, not surprisingly, much of the rail infrastructure appears to be in place:

louisiana-railway-map

I understand there is already an effort underway to fund a connection between New Orleans and Baton Rouge (or at least there was). Three years ago, a couple of months after Katrina, the project was being pushed by the DOTD. Quoting (bold mine):

Discussions of light rail service have surfaced over the years but never received serious attention. The inevitable question: Would enough people ride it to justify the expense? It’s a whole new situation since Katrina, says DOTD’s Cleo Allen, arguing train service at this stage isn’t a luxury but a necessity.

“We’re talking about a service for displaced workers, people who need to come to town for office jobs, reconstruction, to work on their own houses,” she says. “This service would also really unite the region.”

Then there’s the issue of the sizeable “captive population” of people forced by Katrina from New Orleans to Baton Rouge who either never had transportation or lost it in the flooding. DOTD is anticipating the need to move 600 people per rush hour between the cities, with extra capacity being added if necessary.

The Memorial Stadium depot and the Union Pacific terminal in New Orleans would be linked with bus lines to their respective cities. If DOTD officials approve the proposal from Amtrak and Kansas City Southern and funding can be secured, Allen says, passenger service could begin in a month or two.

A month or two? Seriously? Well, then we should get right to work, right?

A year later, in September 2006, we learned from New Orleans City Business that we had, in the interim, spent $4 million to study environmental impacts and alternative solutions. (And that the project was still “light years” behind).

And guess what? Two years later, in August of 2008, City Business followed up (bold mine):

In terms of a light rail, Brooks said he is still interested in a connection from Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport to downtown, but it requires obtaining the rail line from Kansas City Southern and a 150-foot wide right of way along Airline Drive.

“We haven’t given up on that, although it’s expensive and not easy to accomplish,” Brooks said.

We have spent millions of taxpayer dollars studying a project that the DOTD had said would only take a month or two.

Does someone have the real story here?

Now we’re being told that we have to “obtain” the line and that the whole thing also hinges on a 150-foot right-of-way that, it would seem, could obviously and clearly be expropriated for a public purpose.

I understand the need to study environmental impacts, but three years ago, it looked like Amtrak and Kansas City Southern had reached an agreement.

What happened?

Who is holding this up, the State, KCS, or Amtrak?

Or is this simply the auto lobby?

Right after Katrina, officials immediately realized the necessity and urgency of augmenting commuter rail in and out of New Orleans and Baton Rouge. And three years later, a project estimated to take only two months is still at square one.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I think KCS also operates one of the lines that runs from Baton Rouge, through Alexandria, and into Shreveport (which could then link up with Amtrak lines into Dallas and Little Rock).

Amtrak lines won’t just aid with evacuations and disaster relief, and this isn’t really about tourism dollars. Amtrak transportation can also significantly improve our ability to function together as a State, immediately increasing both inner-state and interstate business communication and augmenting the entire State’s intermodality.

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