Oct. 25, 2006

New Orleans – In some ways, the persistence, skill and determination required to lead the Gulf Coast's long recovery from the biggest natural disaster in U.S. history will be more challenging than managing the disaster itself, the mayors and editors of New Orleans and Biloxi said Wednesday.

"The type of leadership required in the first week, when the adrenaline is flowing, is different than the leadership required in week 54," Jim Amoss, editor of the New Orleans Times-Picayune, told hundreds of editors attending the Associated Press Managing Editors conference.

Stan Tiner, executive editor of The Sun Herald in Biloxi, Miss., agreed, saying that while many reporters and editors talked last year about the Hurricane Katrina story being the biggest of their lives, "the biggest challenge is now," as journalists weave together "a coherent story" about their communities' future that offers hope.

"This story's going to last a decade or two," Tiner said.

Mayor Ray Nagin predicted that it would be "at least five years" before his city was back to the New Orleans people remember, although an influx of Hispanic workers was helping rebuild the city's population faster than he had anticipated. The city's population is nearing 250,000, down from 462,000 before the storm and its floods, Nagin said.

Nagin said he had no model to follow, as no major city had suffered such destruction in modern times, but that he was working, day by day, to get "painfully slow" federal and state grant money to do the rebuilding work they're supposed to do. The biggest untold story of Katrina is how little of the "enormous federal money" being spent on cleanup and recovery has reached the neighborhoods that need it, he said.

Biloxi Mayor A.J. Holloway said he did have a recovery model to follow because he lived through the devastation of Hurricane Camille in 1969. "Camille was no lady, but Katrina's a bitch," Holloway said, drawing a blast of laughter from the crowd.

Holloway expects the casino industry to lead the Mississippi Gulf Coast economic recovery, saying he expected 18 to 20 casinos to be operating in the Biloxi area in 10 years, compared to seven today.

The editors and mayors gave riveting details about what it was like in the days following the storm, when dazed citizens turned for guidance to anyone who they perceived represented a trusted institution – newspaper reporters and editors, as well as political leaders.

People were wandering around with "the stare," Tiner said, "as in the aftermath of a nuclear attack."

Holloway said that as soon as the floodwaters receded enough for him to get around town, he and the Biloxi police chief made the rounds, and citizens kept wandering up to them, saying, "Mayor, I lost my house, what am I going to do?" He said he didn't know what to say, except to encourage them to keep their faith.

Amoss said that one of the myths that arose from national media coverage of the Katrina tragedy was that New Orleans is hopelessly "fractured and Balkanized" by race and class differences. While it has the same problems as any other big, diverse city, Amoss said, wherever citizens gather to discuss rebuilding their neighborhoods there is a "palpable unity" between rich and poor, black and white.

Another myth is that New Orleans and the Gulf Coast region mishandled the evacuation before the storm, according to the editors and mayors. Nagin had ordered the first-ever mandatory evacuation before Katrina, Amoss said, and the vast majority of people who stayed behind chose to stay. "In America, you can't force people to leave their homes," he said.

Tiner agreed, saying his own family changed its evacuation plans at the last minute and decided to stay when he decided he had to stay. "The freedom we enjoy in America applies to disasters as well," he said.

Panel moderator Ken Paulson, USA Today Editor, reminded people that disaster preparedness planning remains relatively knew. When growing up, Paulson said, his school prepared students for nuclear war with drills in which they ducked under their desks. When young people react with amazement to that story, he said, "I tell them that in the '50s we had very sturdy desks."