What I did today

So, now that I actuallt have work to do, I should write about it.

Most mornings, I start by reading the paper. This morning I found out that the FBI is investigating the spending of Federal Money in the County. No surprise there. We will see what happens.

I then had a few errands, like I promised to get some information for a county employee, so I tracked it down and called her.

Then, at 10 am, we had a meeting with the Citizens Recovery Committee, to try to repair our relationship. The CRC had spent the previous meeting extracting a few pounds of flesh from the new team lead, and had gotten out a lot of their anger. They were ready to get to business. We discussed the time frame and work plan for the next three weeks (when we get sent home).

Then I met with the county community development and planning department. There are a couple of projects that are connected to them. For instance, there is an idea to create a Builders Row, where home builders can build model homes and everyone can shop and compare. Also, there is a plan to have a one stop shopping information center for people that want to buy new houses or refurbish their homes. The idea would be to have all the necessary government officials, non profits, banks, etc, all in the same place. Both of these projects are important to get the parish back on its feet and both could get outside funding.

So I met with them. The associate director was really excited about the projects, but the director decided they were too busy to help. They suggested I talk to the tourism department. Evidently, the planning department does nothing that could be confused with consumer service and they pass off those things to other departments.

I explained that I was not going to put much effort in to the projects if they were not going to be ready to work on them after I left. There are too many things for me to work on to put a lot of energy into a project that lacks a local champion. We will see how it goes.

Next, I met with a council member that is hosting a neighborhood meeting, and tried to help him prepare. When DPZ (Duany) was here, he suggested that the parish host a bunch of neighborhood meetings so neighbors could decide if they wanted to rebuild, rebuild on a smaller foot print, or move to a new area of the parish. The council members are on their own to host the meetings. They receive no staff support. They will all do different things at their meetings and all get different information and results. It will be ugly. Planners should be involved.

Then, the new and old team members met to get the new members up to speed on the changes that have happened to the project (the source of the citizens uprising).

Finally, at the end of the day, I met with the architects that are coming up with a competing plan to DPZ’s vision about what should happen in the parish (what areas should be redeveloped and what should turn into greenspace). It is a little weird because DPZ’s plans were made in isolation of this other architect’s firm. In any case, we had a good discussion session about their plans.

So that was the day. Again, it is great working for a boss that is not a micromanager!

Looking up

Things are going pretty well here in Jefferson Davis County.

The boss that was supposed to head the team, the one that pissed off the CRC, was placed in charge of a different project, and a new person was put in charge of the team.

It is such an improvement from the old micromanaging boss. There are a couple of key differences.

Now, we are no longer forbidden from talking with the county government and other key stakeholders. The old boss was so afraid of politics that he would not let us interact with government officials. We also could not talk to members of the Foundation, the largest land owner in the county.

Let me explain why this is so important. The entire housing stock of the county was trashed and much of it will not be rebuilt. In fact, much of it is below sea level, so it does not make sense to build it back. The only way to get people back in the county in a logical way is to build a new neighborhood in some of the Foundation’s land. They own thousands of vacant acres so there is plenty of space for a new neighborhood. We even wrote up a bunch of recovery projects that assumed the Foundation would sell land, but we never talked to them. We don’t even now if they are willing to sell.

So now, we are able to talk to them and everyone else we want!

Also, when people bring up ideas in staff meetings, they are not rejected automatically.

Finally, the new boss can think strategically. The old boss just missed the big picture so often, went off on tangents, missed opportunities, etc.

In any case, hopefully things will continue this well.

First day on the job

Well, today was the first day with the new boss and it seems promising. He is not a micromanager and I hope there is potential to do some good in the next four weeks. Also, the team is planner heavy, which is what we need, rather than so many engineers and agency (HUD, SBA, USDA) people.

We have a pretty big challenge, the county government and the Citizens Recovery Commmittee hate us, or at least no longer trust us.

The funny part is no one seems to know what we are supposed to do in the next four weeks. The new team lead, John, said, "You asked what we are doing and that's a good question. The answer is, well, um, I'm not sure the answer. They only made me team lead yesterday afternoon."

There are ten of us now, 7 people from other counties, 3 who worked in Jeff Davis county before. I have a list of things that I think are important including:
1) setting up a street where home builders can build sample properties
2) implementing the DPZ plan
3) getting the Foundation, the largest property owner in the state, to agree to sell or lease their land for new housing
4) making our plans accessable to the public
5) helping with neighborhood meetings about where to rebuild and where not to rebuild

Back to work

I have been home in the Midwest for the weekend and displaced before that, so I have been a little slow in writing.

Let me start by explaining the changes that are happening. For the past four months, there have been Long Term Community Recovery teams in dozen plus Mississippi counties ( I worked for the one in Jeff Davis County). Most of those teams finished their work March 21st and disbanded. The plans they wrote were posted on a website and the people were sent home. Two counties, Biloxi County and Jefferson Davis County, were not so lucky.

In these two counties, the plans had major problems. What is happening is that most of the team members from the trouble counties were sent home and new members were brought in from more successful counties. For instance, in Jefferson Davis County, 17 staff members were sent home, three were kept. I am one of those three.

Another change is happening, but I have to back up to explain this one. FEMA was created by the Stafford Act and all our work is governed by that law. The mission of FEMA is to help communities recover from disasters. In a disaster of normal proportions, FEMA’s main role is to write checks. FEMA pays for 90 percent of the cost of rebuilding public infrastructure, like schools, roads and libraries (called public assistance). FEMA also provides support to individuals (e.g. rental assistance) as they try to move back home (called individual assistance). FEMA is not about improving communities (with a few exceptions), just putting them back how they were.

The question arises, what do you do when writing a check is not enough? Simply rebuilding all the damaged schools and libraries in Biloxi won’t put the community back together. To name a few things, the city is broke, residents are scattered around the country, businesses are closed and city employees are not coming home.

In this case, a special branch of FEMA, Long Term Community Recovery (aka Emergency Support Function 14) comes into existence. The goal of LTCR is to provide planning to help communities make better decisions and better use of the money. We help communities identify projects that will let them recover from the disaster (and go beyond the scope of just rebuilding what was already there). But, many Bush appointees do not believe in this mission.

They believe FEMA’s role should be the traditional individual and public assistance. Part of the reason we have struggled is because the FEMA bosses do not support LTCR. One indication of this is that we have had 6 bosses of LTCR is 5 months.

So, what is happening now in Mississippi is that LTCR is being shut down. The implementation phase is being handed off to the Mississippi National Guard (which will be a disaster, but that is another essay). The two counties that have not finished their plans are being transferred to a different division of FEMA, essentially the logistics division. So when I return, rather than working for Long Term Community Recovery, I will work for the logistics division (called Planning in FEMAspeak).

It is not clear how or if this will affect the work we do. I suspect it will not change too much, considering we are only here for another four weeks.

New website

They moved the website with all the plans to
http://www.louisianaspeaks-parishplans.org/

To the dumpster

Evidently, the site manager started throwing out all the government records that people left behind due to their hasty firing. Mind you some of these are original documents that need to be kept, he just wanted to clean up. Mark, our national guardsman who is taking over, saved some stuff. Unfortunatly, some of the records from planning day were lost.

Money Woes

Money Woes

Things look bleak in the county. The state is not letting up their scrutiny about the finances and will not release any money soon. Trash is piling up in huge mountains. There are 2500 volunteers here this week alone, removing moldy sofas, busting up drywall ceilings and removing insulation. All of it ends up on the side of the street. The debris removal contractors are owed $75 million and have walked off the job. The state is not going to release more until accounting irregularities are straightened up.

There are little things that need to be straightened out. For instance, the county bought a bunch of trailers for council members and other essential personnel to live in. They never bothered recording who lived in the trailers, so when they submitted the bill the state asked for more information.

Other stuff is more serious. There is a lot of talk about corruption. Everyone I talk to thinks that there are big problems with the contracts.

The state auditors are moving in. They are taking over an office trailer and setting up camp.

Meanwhile, the county is going to float a bond for $50 million in emergency money. I am not sure who would lend money to the county right now, but who am I to doubt the market.

Pulses

Cities don’t die, they wither. The metaphor should not be a tree where the whole thrives together; rather a forest where some parts prosper and others do not. Detroit, Buffalo, Camden, they are have not died, but they have suffered.

People ask me how Biloxi is doing and the answer is, what part do you care about? There are parts, the French Quarter with its raucous tourist scene, the Garden District with its upper class trappings, that are still strong.

Other areas of the city are not so lucky. The areas that flooded badly are reeling. Mile after empty mile, with debris but few humans. I worry about these areas, with their history and architecture and families and parades and food and music. It is these pulses that are not strong. It is hard enough for me, an outsider, to see the city suffer so, for people whose families have lived here for generations, it is heartbreaking.

Everything in the city is exhausting. The roads are clogged because half the stop lights are out. There is trash everywhere. Even grocery shopping, with lines stretching down the aisles, is exhausting.

Local politicians are too scared to make any decisive announcements. The mayor has rejected every proposal that has been circulated about how the city should rebuild. Nothing is going to happen before the elections in May. Compounding the problem, FEMA has not provided maps that show how high residents will need to elevate their homes in order to participate in the flood insurance program. Congress and the Army Corps have not made clear statements about the rebuilding of the levees. Bush (until very recently) has refused to release supplemental money for residents to rebuild.

Cities have a million pulses all bound together. In Biloxi, some of them will survive. Perhaps with a different disaster or a different response, everything would be fine given time. But this has been the largest disaster in the United States in the modern era and the response, local, state and federal, has been pitiful. No city, no matter how strong it was, could come out whole. Biloxi has a fearcely loyal population, which will help it, but it has strikes against it as well, namely a history of weak governance and long sputtering economy. At 6 months, I would say things are not looking well, in another three, or another 12, I don't know.

Boss Hogg is not alone

It is fair to signal out Boss Hogg when there is so much blame to go around. Good old councilman Sheanen is an 82 year old libertarian who was the County president before Boss Hogg. He also was a state senator and now is a county councilmember.

Well, Mr. Sheanen does not believe in government spending money. When he was a state senator, he never brought home any projects. As county president he fired all seven grant writers. The grant writers paid their own salaries as part of their grants, but Mr. Sheanen was principled, he did not want to waste the government’s money, even if the County benefited. Getting grants was taking money and that was supporting taxes that were too high. So now, the county has no grant writers. Mr. Sheanen has even objected to the federal government paying the cost of ambulances in the county, why not let the people pay for the rides themselves (mind you that there are currently 6000 people in the county so there is no way to have ambulance service unless you subsidize it). Mr. Sheanen also did away with the planning department when he was president, a mistake that is costing the County dearly now.

Boss Hogg

It is time to write about Boss Hogg.

Boss Hogg is the head of the Jefferson Davis County. His real name is Henry “Junior” Hernandez. He very well could have been the real life model for Boss Hogg, of Dukes of Hazard fame, but he is fatter, uglier and meaner. He is as Coon Ass as it gets.

Boss Hogg uses a silver cane for walking or whapping. You see, sometimes in meetings Boss Hogg does not like what someone is saying. His response is to take his silver cane and whap it on the table over and over until he has the floor again. That is not the only thing that he likes to do with his cane.

A top guy from the Mississippi Recovery Authority was in the county and introduced himself. Boss Hogg took his cane and ran it all the way up the guys leg to his crotch and said, “Boy, if you want to work in this county you better grow a big pair of these.” Incidentally, that is not the only inappropriate bodily groping that Boss Hogg likes to do.

He is fond of grabbing the rear of men and women. Often, he will plan it ahead of time and say, “I am going goose that bitch.” Ever egalitarian, Boss Hogg is equally inappropriate with both dignitaries and nobodies.

The Governor was giving a speech and Boss Hogg was on the stage. In the middle of the speech, he blew on the back of her neck. When she turned around to see what the hell was going on, Boss Hogg said, “You’re looking mighty fine Kathy, Coach (her husband) must be treating you pretty well.”

Boss Hogg is not just sexist, he is racist too. In response to the Latino workers in town doing rehab, he said, “We don’t serve oyster tacos.” I am not sure if anyone has pointed out to him that his last name is Hernandez.

Oh, Mississippi, it does not get any better than this.

Spies

So,
I am not sure how many of you remember awhile ago I wrote about a colleague that got in trouble for circulating an email about a protest in favor of Category Five levees.

Well, it appears that the government has a cyber snoop program that reads all our emails and those with certain words get forwarded to the FEMA police. The FEMA police then contact the person’s supervisor and the person gets in trouble or gets fired. Evidently, words "Bush" and "protest" together get flagged and the censors intervene. Meanwhile, words like, Abortionists are murderers and welfare rewards the lazy, are perfectly fine free speech.

I say this because the person that got in trouble only forwarded emails to a few friends. None of her friends were offended so it does not make sense that they would lodge a complaint. Furthermore, the person that intervened was based in xxx city. We are all in Biloxi and there would be no reason for us to file a complaint in xxx city, even if we were so inclined.

I am tempted to pretend there is a protest and send a pretend invitation to a friend to see if it gets snagged. Then send a second one replacing the words, "Bush" with "Senator Landrieu"

Of course, it would probably get me fired even though it was a pretend protest.

The Plan!!!

You can see the first version of the Long Term Recovery Plan at
http://www.louisianaspeaks-parishplans.org/

Non-Biloxi News

In case things seemed bleak here:
The Mongolian Cow Sour Yogurt Supergirl contest, a Chinese version of the show American Idol and the most popular show in China, is threatened by Chinese censors who are concerned that female contestants wear baggy jeans, thrust their arms in the air in excitement, and occasionally cry on stage. The national order is further threatened because some girls reportedly dress and act like boys.

Seventy percent of Republicans believe there will be a civil war in Iraq. In case Iraqis are worried, they can now buy terrorism insurance that guarantees their family a payment equivalent to $3500 if they should happen to be axed by insurgents.

So unpopular is Vice President Dick Cheney that Thomas Kean, the Republican candidate for Governor, had to avoid his own fundraiser until Mr. Cheney left.

In India, 10 million more female fetuses have been aborted than males.

A man is facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity in the newly freed and democratic Afghanistan.

And, in a bit of good news, in select arena’s around the country, you can now order and pay for beers and wieners over your cell phone without leaving your seat.

Wrapping up

I went into the office late today, dressed in a t-shirt and sneakers. All the normal office rules have broken down. Our team, the Jeff Davis County staffers that is, is being disbanded and new staff from across the state are coming to redo our work. Most of the old staff has left and the new people don’t arrive for a week.

It was king of depressing. It was me and three other people, milling about, trying to get our things in order. Everyone else has already left. Today was supposed to be everyone’s last day, but to save a little money they were called on Thursday or Friday and told to go home that day. It made for weird goodbyes written on sticky notes or dry erase boards. It also made for an eerily empty office, like a southern textile mill where they just turn off the power one day, the clocks still on the wall reading 5:01, or whatever time the end of business was. Desks full of papers, the refrigerator full of food.

So I went and packed up my stuff and said good bye to the few people left. The theory is that Mark, our national guard liaison, will take over. Mark, a physical therapist by profession, has no idea what he is supposed to do. The Mississippi Recovery Authority gave him a half day workshop on grantwriting and told him he should work on implementation. He spent a chunk of the day trying to find donated office space, because he will be kicked out of our office/trailer. He did not even know where to get a copy of our plans that he is supposed to be implementing. Of course, all our plans will change when the new staff arrives.

I moved all my office stuff to the new building in Biloxi. In theory, the new staff, my self included, are going to be improving our plans and project proposals (or writing new ones), this time based out of the Biloxi office. I have to say I brought with me a heavy sense of foreboding. The new team lead is a Northerner, blunt and direct. He led the “strike team” that came down and made us rewrite all our plans without talking with the citizens group. Consequently, the citizens group and the county officials hate him already.

I am doubting my decision to remain another four weeks. I timed my shenanigan tolerance to be exhausted at the same time I was supposed to be sent home (tomorrow). Now that I am staying another four weeks, I don’t know how I will deal if the inefficiency and stupidity continues.

Co-dependency

The top bossman asked me to stay on another four weeks (mind you, I was supposed to "demobe" (demobilize) on Monday and they only got around to asking me to stay today (Satuday.) They are sending the vast majority of everyone home and keeping a few of the strongest people to fix up some of the trouble spots (namely my county and the neighboring big city, which I call Biloxi).

It is a nice recognition that they wanted me to stay. I decided to accept, but I had mixed feelings.

Working here is a little like being married to an alcoholic. The marriage isn't working, but you see the potential for good. You remember how optomistic you were when you said yes initially. But, life is not living up to that potential.

You decide to leave. You tried, you gave it your best and it didn't work.

But the alcoholic begs you to give it one more chance. Your head says no, alcoholics don't change so quickly, not without going to AA, and this alcoholic says she will go cold turkey. But your heart says, think of all the good you could do if it is true.

The best hope is that my boss won't be team lead any more. Perhaps then...

DISCLAIMER

Look, I think most people know this, but I am not in Jefferson Davis County, Mississippi. Jeff Davis County barely felt the hurricanes.

If you want to know where I am you should ask me in a private email. FEMA fires people for lesser offenses than writing blogs. It has to remain anonymous.

Any time I post an article I just do find/replace so it looks like it is about Jefferson Davis County.

Sorry if that was not clear.

Sample project

As I mentioned, I am not particularly proud of our work product. Here is one project. The request for funding for this project is $200 million.

This project will not be posted because it needs major work. (By posted, I mean, instead of doing a print version of the recovery plan, we are doing a web version, so this project will not go on the web.)

DESCRIPTION:
The impact of Hurricane Katrina leaves this community 100% devastated. All 26,000 residences in St. Bernard Parish, were heavily damaged by Hurricane Karina. Prior to storm, St Bernards population was approximately 69,000 with an 85+% homeownership rate. Today there are approximately 6,000 people residing in the parish, mostly in FEMA supplied trailers. Housing Assistance Funding, provided by the State in the form of Disaster Relief Block Grant Funds, will be used to assist in repopulating at least 20% of the pre-Katrina population to the Paris, within two years. This would equate to approximately 13,500 people returning to the Parish or the creation and restoration of 5,000 usable housing units.

The Recovery Program being recommended has 2 components:
1. Low-interest Loan Program: The objective of this program is to encourage people to rebuild in St. Bernard and attract new home buyers to the parish. The St. Bernard Mortgage Authority will issue bonds of $150 million and will solicit an additional $200 million from disaster CDBG funds to implement the program. The St. Bernard Mortgage Authority will offer low interest rate loans (rates comparative to SBA) with a maximum cap at $150,000, at a 2.7% interest rate. The program proposal is to pay closing cost, three years of insurance cost, provide low interest loans, and assist families in a one to two match for purchasing furnishing. Also considering forgiveness of the $50,000 loan (cap) over a 10-year period. This plan will create 2,500 new homes or 250% of the new homes goal by 2009.

The Chairman of the Board is the Parish Sheriff, Jack Stephens. There is no staff, only Board members and himself,the Board’s attorney. They do not plan to hire any additional staff to operate the program. All loan processing will be done by local banks that will receive qualifying criteria from the St. Bernard Mortgage Authority.

There are two other projects that also address the goal of repopulating St. Bernard Parish. They are: Medical Village,which includes a Senior Citizens Community development and a Vacant or Damaged Property Acquisition project.

2. Lenders will offer FHA 203(k) and 203(k) Streamline loans for purchase and rehab of existing properties. Loans will be available through qualified lenders, which will offer FHA insured loans at market interest rates. These loans are expected to generate rehab of approximately 2500 existing housing units or 25% of the housing rehab goal, by 2009.

Standing O

Duanny got a standing ovation today.

He recommended a third of the county not be rebuilt and 1500 residents still gave him a standing ovation.

More tomorrow when I am less tired.

I worked 13 hours today and over 50 in four days.

I need some sleep.

Efficacy

Separately, both the boss and the deputy boss pulled me aside today to say they were sorrow they did not use me more. Having HQ send down their “strike team” to our county, and only our county, felt like a judge telling us, you messed up. Both bosses told me that they knew we could have avoided lots of the problems if they had listened to me or let me have more control over our end product. It was nice to hear, but it was also a little sad.

At this point, there is no way to fully salvage our end product. It is going to be a mediocre plan. The goals, the projects, the needs assessment, all of them are not well written and not well thought out. Equally bad, our relationship with the CRC is shot.

It's nice to get the recognition from my bosses. I have felt this entire time that my skills were poorly used, and it is nice to have my boss recognize me. But in that conversation we had we were also tacitly admitting that the plan is not great, is not something of which we will be particularly proud.

I know I made some difference. One area where I made a difference was helping Duanny's team do their work, and they did excellent work. They relied heavily on my back ground reports, connections and to a lesser degree, my advice. That felt like a contribution. Then again, they would have gotten by without me.

The other thing we did was peddle hope. We led the CRC down a path and showed them a light at the end of the tunnel. But, at the same time, we distracted them from important questions, like what parts of the county should rebuild.

I came down here four months ago to try to help. I worked in an institution that makes it very hard to do that. If my time would have been better spent unloading boxes at the hippy soup kitchen, I don’t know.

I came down to try to help. I tried to help. That is all.

Hitting Bottom

The morning started well enough. I continued working on the project write-ups. The main office gave us an extension. Our original deadline was yesterday, but they let us work on them today (for better or worse). I almost want them to cut us off and take it out of our hands. Enough is enough.

The day took a turn for the worse when we met with the Citizens Recovery Committee. The thing I was most afraid of happened, they freaked out because we changed the projects without talking to them.

I wrote about this a few days ago. The mother ship sent down someone to help us winnow the list of projects and rewrite the others so they were stronger. Stronger in this case means they were more clearly tied to damage and recovery from the hurricane.

When Benjamin first arrived we had a big fight because we did not want to do anything without talking to the Citizens Recovery Committee. We felt it would betray their trust and our cooperative relationship. Eventually, following the bosses lead (the boss said there was no time to get the CRC together), we accepted it on the theory that the other projects were good projects, they would just not go to FEMA and the Mississippi Recovery Authority for funding.

To explain some background, all our projects are being scored against a recovery value tool. It is a series of questions like:
Is the project related to damage from the hurricane
Can the project be done in the next five years
Does it leverage multiple sources of funding
And each project gets rated one to three based on the answers. Part of why HQ wanted us to change our projects was because many of them scored low.

Well, the CRC members were furious that we would take such liberties without them. We had never discussed the recovery value tool with them and they felt betrayed. The reality is that the projects did not change that much. We eliminated a few and tweaked a few, combined a few, but nothing major.

You have to understand, they have spent thousands of hours following the process that we laid out, a process of citizens being in charge, and to have the rules change at the end without them – they were having none of it. So we spent an hour in the meeting from hell where they yelled at the boss and the guy from head quarters. In the end, one of our greatest champions, someone that has spent hundreds of hours volunteering to get the county headed in the right direction, the guy that gets up at the start of every public meeting and does a speech how he hates FEMA but we are a special part of FEMA and the county’s ally, he storms out and says, I need to work on my own damn life. The unspoken message is that he has he regrets the time he spent following our process.

It was the worse day since I have been here.

Movie Star

There are lots of films being shot right now in Biloxi. In my hotel, there is a crew filming an independent film about debutantes that did not get to celebrate their balls. Also, Minnie Driver came into the middle eastern restaraunt where I was eating the other day.

But that is not why I so named this entry. It is named for work.

It was Duanny’s last day (they did their final presentation at 6 today), so the team kept having requests.

I like helping Duanny’s people. They are sharp, engaged and appreciative. Their tent is next to our trailer, and I stopped by a few times today to give them a change to ask any questions they had before their presentation.

I felt like a movie star. Every time I went over four or five people rushed over and asked me questions or wanted me to help with something. A movie star, or maybe, the better metaphor is I felt like the janitor when the toilet is over flowing. The questions range from, what are the best programs to pay for recovery to where can we get some trash bags. Still, they were good conversations and I am happy to try to help.

The end is nigh

Today felt like the beginning of the end.

I moved out of my apartment and in to a hotel. More about the hotel later, but moving out of the apartment was sad. It felt permanent, like there was no going back. Also, we got the order to buy our tickets home. That sure makes the end feel near.

Everyone is packing up and making future plans. Even though everyone was still there (I mean except for the people that left a few weeks ago), the office felt empty.

I have decided to stay a few extra days and help my alma mater with a historic preservation project. Then, I go back to my home town and figure out what I want to do with life. That is the subject for another blog.

PZ

I met with Liz Plater-Zyberg, the PZ of DPZ.

I like her a lot. She is the chair of the University of Miami School of Architecture. She is trying to figure out the next steps for the County to rebuild. I had a very good conversation about strategies to use. I guess I felt like she was more open to discussing ideas.

Duany is very personable and is a a good listener, but it is almost that he takes the information you give him and makes quick judgements about how it affects the rebuilding. He is sharp so often his instincts are right, but still, converasations with him are not the most satisfying.

While I like much of what DPZ is proposing, I am worried that it is not appropriate for the county. Pre-storm, 75 percent of the houses sold for less than $100,000. The county was blue collar bubbas and coon asses. They shopped at Walmart and were happy doing it. They fished and hunted and drank beer. They coached little league.

I am worried they will not fit in in the new Jefferson Davis.

Work

The last two days have been more fun. Now that it is clear that we are just improving our projects and not starting over, we have been busy getting our work done. It makes me happy that we are addressing some long standing issues that made our plan weak. I am glad to have a better product to deliver.

Also, I have been helping the consultants (including Duany) with their work. They actually act appreciative of my help, which is great.

Finally, there were two projects that needed to be described at the last minute and I was assigned to do them, and everyone was really happy with what I wrote.

The projects are a central part of our plan. The two I was writing are 1) some steps to help the Parish get the capacity to addresses it's current challenges 2) a plan to create a town center.

Plans

Today was supposed to be the day that those in charge explained the plan. They were supposed to unveil the implementation stategy with a list of specific jobs that we could apply for. Of course, nothing came out.

Here is my plan.
Tomorrow I move out of my apartment into a super fatty hotel.
www.soniathouse.com

On the 20th, my last day as a FE-MAN, we will rent a penthouse and have a big party (assuming we will can work out some details). We will charge the room to FEMA (because it will officially be our hotel room).

The next few days I will volunteer to help some historic preservationists rehab a historic market. Then, I will go home.

On the off chance that FEMA offers me an interesting job I will consider coming back.

That is all.

Hippies Set Standards - No Contractors

The Hippy Food tent has kicked out consultants and contractors. The County has leaned on FEMA and FEMA required the hippies to stop serving food to contractors. The County wants to steer business to the wiener mobiles (the food trailers that are currently the closest thing the county has to restaurants). The hippies don't like the change.

It is a shame for us for a couple of reasons. One, there is no other place in the county to get anything besides greasy fried food. Two, there is no other place to get vegetarian food. Three, there is no other place that has seats (besides a picnic bench by the highway). Four, we all donated to the hippies when we got food there, supporting their efforts. Five, the wiener mobiles have huge lines at lunch and often run out of food. Six, all the wiener mobiles shut down early and are closed on Sundays.

Oh well, I will have to start bringing my lunch.

Driving

Driving in Biloxi is confusing. To start with, there are sinkholes that resemble the moon’s craters and debris everywhere. What’s worse, there are tons of stop lights that are out and are replaced with stop signs that are put up on temporary bases, a few feet high. These are difficult to see in the best of times, but sometimes they are impossible to see. Suppose a car is waiting to make a left at an intersection. You may have no idea that it is blocking a stop sign. What is even more confusing is that some of the stop lights have started to come back on. So now you have stop signs and stop lights at the same intersection.

Below is a guide about what the conventional wisdom is to do as the stop lights get turned back on:

You have a solid yellow light and a stop sign – This is a weird one, because in real life you are never supposed to have a solid yellow light. The math goes: one confusing symbol and one stop symbol. Stop sign wins. Most people treat it as a stop sign.

You have a blinking yellow light and a stop sign – This is the most common situation. One vote for go slow and one vote for stop. This confuses people. Some average the two and go very slow but do not stop. Some play it safe and stop.

You have a working green light and a stop sign – This is the most gut wrenching decision of all. One vote for stop, one vote for go, a tie. Self interest usually wins. Most people go. Be prepared for the opposing traffic to interpret it differently. Be prepared for the person in front of you to stop if you go, and be prepared to be hit from behind if you stop.

Starting over

We spent the weekend rewriting the Jefferson Davis plan. For the past two months there have been major problems that we have ignored and the central office finally laid down the law.

There were a few issues the central office freaked out about:

1) Our vision statement and goals were written after our projects. In a normal planning word, the vision comes first, then the goals, then the projects.

2) The projects that we identified had little relationship to the disaster. We wrote about how the County needed a county wide free wireless internet access. What does that have to do with flooding and high winds? How does that help the county get over the disaster.
It doesn’t.

3) The projects did not follow the proper form. The central office wanted goals to be simple, county wide goals like, build 10,000 housing units. Everyone wrote long complicated justifications for the projects in the goals section.

(Part of the reason people messed up the goal section is because of the design of the form where you list the projects.
The form goes
1) Name of project________
2) Goal__________
Humans are predisposed to write a description of the project in the first large empty box.)

So, in any case, with four days until the projects are to be finalized, the central office freaked out and sent a team down to make us rewrite the vision, goals and projects. This would be fine because it would have made the plan better.

The part where it melted down was the person they sent down had no tact. He flipped to a blank page on a flip chart and said, this is where we are starting. We are throwing out everything you have done so far and starting over. Literally those were his words.

Not surprisingly, we all responded aggressively. The projects in our plan were chosen by the citizens and approved by the council. It would be a betrayal of the locals to throw that all out and write new plans behind closed doors.

So, we argued for hours about this and we fought every step of the way because we thought he was trying to start from a blank sheet, as he said.

In the end, all the central office wanted us to do was come up with better goals, dump the stupid projects that had no relation to the disaster, rewrite the others to emphasize how they contributed to recover, and fill out the forms correctly. Still a lot of work, but no where near as bad.

I have to say, this shit is draining. We spent 17 hours in meetings over two days this weekend when all they had to say was say, here are our three issues. You minds well call 15 hours of meetings about making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

We had a huge, gut wrenching fight because the person was to stupid to speak tactfully.

I need to get out of this mad house.

Thinking like an Architect

One of the things that is most surprising about Duanny’s firm is that there are not planners. They are urban designers and architects, but honestly, don’t know how to do basic planning things. They make neighborhood plans, but do it from an architects point of view.

For instance, there is no one on staff that knows how to use GIS to make maps or do analysis. What’s worse, they do not even have anyone who knows how to look up data on the census. (Looking up data on the census is not tough; I could show someone the basics in 15 minutes). Many do not know the difference between median and average. It is fine if most people don’t know this distinction, but for people trying to ensure residents can buy houses, it is very important.

Another example, when Duanny presented his drawings there was no road on the northern end of the County. There is no road there now, but there is funding to add the road and most people like the idea. Someone at the last public meeting said, Why is there no road. Duanny said, OK I will add it to the drawings. Same thing with a golf course. Someone asked why there is no gold course and Duanny said, I’ll add one to the renderings. Planners are much more deliberate about such decisions.

Meetings are run like an architect would run a meeting. Duanny stands up and talks the whole time. People ask questions. Duanny answers. People that did not get called on did not have a chance to ask questions. I would have at least provided comment cards so these people could ask their questions and get answers later or in writing. Not Duanny.

Article about Duanny

This article gives a good summary of the event.


Town planner Andres Duany, one the founders of the movement against urban sprawl, presented what he called the most radical proposal to redesign Jefferson Davis County to a packed crowd in the courthouse Friday night.
After a two-hour discussion about the cost of elevating houses and what might happen to the levees, Duany unveiled a drawing that he said incorporates the elements of new urbanism that has been a central theme in well-developed cities in the last 20 years.
It shows large detention ponds near the 40-Arpent Canal and neighborhoods of raised lots based around centers that are pedestrian-friendly and have more green space. The raised lots would allow the streets to act as channels to drain potential flood waters.
"I am going to show you what this could look like as a 21st-century community," Duany said as he prepared the crowd. "You could go from a city that was behind, like a city in the 1960s, to a city of the future. I don't want you to get frightened or lynch me or anything."
But the crowd reacted with quiet murmurs, and several said they liked the idea of more green space despite some concerns.
Walter Leger, an Arabi attorney who is a member of the Mississippi Recovery Authority and the co-chair of the Jefferson Davis Citizens Recovery Committee, said he was thrilled with the turnout Friday and the crowd's reaction.
"There are several hundred people here who seem to be asking more questions about the future of Jefferson Davis County rather than the buyout possibilities," Leger said. "I think what he presents is a vision of Jefferson Davis that couldn't have happened without Katrina."
Duany and a team of about 20 designers and planners have held a series of meetings to get residential input and to help devise a rebuilding plan for the County.
The work being financed by the Mississippi Recovery Authority is a blueprint, the planners stress.
Duany, of Duany Plater-Zyberk Architects and Town Planners, said residents will ultimately decide whether they want to buy into the plan.
Using information from residents and public officials, Duany said he heard a common theme, that people love their community but they would improve it if they could. Many asked for more green space, he said.
His theory of town planning, known as "new urbanism" has been implemented in many Florida cities since 1980 and most recently in New Town St. Charles, Mo.
Duany said many cities change over time, but in Jefferson Davis, that happened in one day where not one home was spared from the devastating flooding of Hurricane Katrina.
Duany said Jefferson Davis has had a stagnant population of about 65,000 for the last 10 years and failed to grow during the nation's greatest building boom of the last decade.
"That is a sign of community that is not healthy from the point of an outsider. There is a chance here. The devastation here is the greatest of any Counties or counties I have seen. Biloxi is not ground zero for destruction, Jefferson Davis County is."
Duany said the residents could redesign their neighborhoods into a modern, more efficient community.
But while some said they liked the concept, they were worried about the specifics of whether the series of canals would hold up or how long the plan would take.

The New County

Duanny presented his vision for the new Jefferson Davis County. It involves moving to safer ground, creating lots of green space, turning big roads to parkways, creating lots of walkable neighborhood and digging lots of canals and using the dirt to raise the ground everywhere else.

And the verdict was, people were open to it. They had lots of good questions, how long would it take, where would they live in the mean time, how much would it cost, how to pay for it, how to help people afford it, but were open to it.

The guy is very good. He can lay out a vision and get others to believe in it.

We will see what happens in the coming days.

Survivor – Biloxi

Survivor – Biloxi

The Jefferson Davis Tribe has lost another member, Joe, this time to a medical injury (tooth problem) and are down to nine. All of the other members have left the tribe quit (their contract was up and they chose to go home). In contrast, the Biloxi tribe has been losing challenges and has had several members kicked off the island. Most recently, Peter, their lawyer was given the boot.

It is not clear which team will survive past March 20th. Some commentators favor Biloxi, because it is a bigger, though less well respected tribe. Other commentators think that the tribe will be combined, a classic Survivor’s twist.

Local Government Not at its Finest

This will give you some idea of the level of competence of the local government.

To start with, the state is not releasing FEMAs money to the County to pay the contractors who are removing debris. Evidently, the contractors did not keep timesheets! The contractors have done $40 million worth of unpaid work and have stopped working until they get paid! So, trash (mountains of moldy drywall, refriderators, sheds, cars, you name it) has started to collect on the sidewalks!

Here is another example. The feds set aside 7.5% of all disaster relief money to prevent, or minimize future disasters. Jeff Davis County has $11 million in its own pot and then can apply to the competitive grant proposal for TONS more. The money can be used to buy out residents in flood prone areas (and demolish their homes), raise houses so they do not flood, add safe rooms to public buildings, or do small scale levee, canal or pump work.

The grant is the most complicated form I have ever seen. It is HUGE and requires cost benefit analysis and detailed engineering information. It also requires home owners to volunteer to participate, so you need a list of names of willing participants.

The county has until April 1st to get their grant in for the $11 million. They have not started yet!!! What is worse is that there have been two four day trainings on how to apply. The County missed the first one, but we got them to agree to send a Community Development person to the second. But then Boss Hogg decided that he was going to make some changes in staffing so it did not make sense for the people to go to the trainings, so no one went!!

So now, the deadline is looming, we are going home and they have no one that knows what to do.

What is worse is that they don’t even know what projects they want to do. You can’t write the grant until they identify what it should be for! I was at the Council meeting today (my boss finally agreed that I could go to Council meetings) and they started talking about. A colleague and I impressed the urgency on them and they agreed to have a special meeting on Monday to identify what projects they want to use the $11 million for.

I have to say, part of the blame goes to us. We should have been working with the County from the beginning to avoid this situation.

Things to Do in the Final Days

I have been keeping busy answering requests for the DPZ planning team. They bombard me with questions about data or where they can get things. I have also spent some time trying to make sure their work is received well and is carried forward after they leave. To this end, I have set up meetings between Duanny and the County Council as well as between Duanny and the Citizens Recovery Committee.

Normally I would not be allowed to have such freedom to things like this, but the boss is preoccupied with getting our Long Term Recovery Plan in to the HQ. Recently a HQ designed a tool to evaluate the recovery value of all the projects we identified. The tool asks lots of questions like, “Does this meet an urgent need” “Are there multiple sources of funding” and “Does the project address an issue that is directly tied to the storm.” All this gets plugged in to a spread sheet and out pops a number between 1 and 3. In theory, the higher numbers are in the best position to get federal funding.

Like all things from HQ, a simple exercise turns into a big fuss with 12 hours of meeting and tons of excess discussion. The good part for me is that, as I said, it has distracted everyone else and let me have some freedom.

Demobilization

Another person from the Biloxi office was sent home. Evenidently he was also overdue to go home, but never knew it. He left the same day that his HR person tracked him down. I have decided the proper solution is to not call my HR person for any reason and not answer my phone when she calls.
Along those lines, here is a memo I recieved from my HR contact...

I received a master list of demob dates for TACs (Technical Assistance Contractor aka me). Those TACs who were on the list have been notified of their demob dates, if you are uncertain or have a question please call or email me. The TACs that did not appear on the list are to assume that their demob date is March 20th. However, this date can be moved up or you could be asked to extend your deployment beyond this date (Mind you March 20th is 10 days away. What is the point of making everyone change plans and quickly pass of work if it is only a few days difference? Why not allow an orderly transition?). LTCR management will review the status of remaining projects and determine from that point who would need to extend their stay and who can be demobilized. Should management decide that your demob date will change, I will contact you to alert you of a new date.

Duanny

Duanny of DPZ is perhaps the leading figure in the New Urbanist (NU). NUs like traditional neighborhoods where you can walk from houses to stores, there are porches, the streets are pedestrian friendly, etc. One of the criticms of NUs is that they are not pushing architecture in a new direction. That they just recylce old ideas and old styles. My personal feeling is that I will take good old ideas over bad new ones, but ideally I would like to see some high quality modernist developments where the buildings have appropriate form for the human environment.

I pushed Duanny on this point to see his reaction. I expected a empasioned defense of the traditional architecture that he designs with. In fact, he said, "She me five quality modernists buildings in Biloxi that promote street life, that have appropriate massing, that have a healthy relationship with the street, and I will do a design charrette around them."

I was impressed with his answer.

Doing it Right

Duanny has jump started conversations that we should have completed months ago, namely what part of the county should become green space and how to get new houses built. Our Team Lead has been too afraid to try (and honestly is not a planner or architect so he does not even know how). Along the same line, our team lead has avoided talking with the County Council or the largest land owner, a nonprofit foundation. He thought it was up to the Citizens Recovery Committee to take the lead on initiating conversations. The problem is that we are the experts and the CRC looks to us for guidance about when to talk to the government.

The other thing that Duanny is doing very well is giving people a reason to move to safer ground in the County. Duanny correctly pointed out that if you tell people they can not rebuild their house and do not show them an alternative, they will be pissed off. They will feel that they are being kicked out. (This is what we were on the road to do).

His idea is show them a place to move in the county that is so nice that they will want to move. The options would be to stay in their dangerous ugly subdivision surrounded by vacant lots and ghosts of neighbors, or move to higher, safer ground, new houses and a much better urban form. Everyone will want to move. That way, you avoid the New Orleans break down where people are saying, “I’ll shoot you if you try to take my land.”

DPZ - first impressions

The D of DPZ is Andreis Duwanny. He is one of the most prominent proponents of New Urbanism, or the idea that neighborhoods should be walkable, have neighborhood stores, and should have houses that are friendly to the street.

I was prepared not to like him, to think that he was an arrogant architect who liked to dress in black and offered cookie cutter solutions to problems. My initial impression was too positive, he was clearly the prince and would call out commands, “get that phone number,” “put batteries in this…”

I have softened as I have watched him. The first big event he did was a public meeting, with 1000 people. The part that impressed me is that he is straight with people. He will give an answer even if it pisses people off. Some lady asked if they get to vote on the final plan about where to rebuild. He said, “I think you know the answer to that question. The answer is this is a democracy. You elected representatives and they will decide what to do. If you don’t trust them, you have no one to blame but yourself. If you don’t like what they decide, you can vote them out.”

He seems generally committed to helping the County and for the first time in a long time I am feeling hope that the County can come back.

Long hours

I have been working 12+ hours the past couple of days. We have to turn our final plan in shortly, the consultants (at least those that are still hired) have to turn their final plan in (and I need to get them lots of data before they do) and DPZ, a nationall y known design firm has showed up dor 10 days of intensive meetings and workshops.

DPZ showed up in a full length bus, almost 20 people strong. They descended on our trailer and started making demands. Where could they get maps, can they make copies? They are high maintainence. But in their defense, they are only here for 10 days so they need to get a lot done.

Honestly, I am happy to be busy and like working with them.

Fickle FEMA Gods

So, it has been an eventful day.

A colleague will be sent home tomorrow. He called one of the HR people to ask a question and they said, you were supposed to go home two days ago. He said, no one told me. They said, no matter, be on a plane tomorrow. He said, I have meetings and work all day. People are counting on me. They said, no matter, be on a plane tomorrow. He leaves tomorrow.

In other developments…The consultants that I am supposed to be managing were sent packing on Saturday. FEMA HQ agreed that their work was essential for the County, but felt as a matter of principal federal money should not go to local initiatives, like figuring out which parts of the County should be redeveloped. It was such a matter of principal that FEMA was ok sending these guys home in the middle of their work, once again leaving the County high and dry, or wet and moldy as the case may be.

The irony is that the FEMA bosses pointed out that there is a pot of money from FEMA that the County can apply for to hire the consultants to continue on the same project. I am not sure what principal was so important that it is worth jeopardizing the County’s recovery. The principal is you must apply to the correct pot of money?

In any case, the consultants were sent packing. Then today, FEMA changed its mind and rehired some of the consultants. This is a little weird - here is the story. The consultants were coming up with a model that showed the best part of the County to have houses. FEMA wants them to come up with the model in abstract terms, not considering Jeff Davis County situation at all. That way, it won’t be the feds paying for local issues. The thing is, it is no good to come up with the model in a void. We are not dealing with a simulation; this is a real disaster where people’s people are molding away and entire families are sleeping on friend’s couches. What good does it do to design a model in some fantasy land! In any case, about half of them were rehired on Monday to continue working on the same project, except now it is not based in Jeff Davis County, now it is simply a theoretical exercise on the computer

I have to say, to their credit, the consultants working on the flood protection plan said that they would finish the plan at no charge to feds or the county, because they thought it was so important. And the two people from the one firm that is being paid for with local money (so they can continue without a problem) are totally shaken up. It is very clear that they believed in their work and were doing it to help the county (I am sure also to get paid, but from the tone of their voice, it is clear they are very concerned about the county’s well being).

They have never seen the FEMA sausage machine up close like the rest of us, so they react with appropriate indignation that FEMA could have such disregard for local welfare. All of us have been through so much that it is just one more indication that the current management at FEMA does not give a damn about local welfare.

Not Good

This can't be a good sign. Boss Hogg was wearing his, "FEMA can kiss my ass" t-shirt (and what a big ass it is) at the latest public meeting where the Citizen's Recovery Committee (with our assistance) presented the list of potential project. The projects are part of the Jeff Davis Long Term Recovery Plan.

Actually, despite the bad omen and the disagreements about some of the projects, I think 90 percent of the projects will be approved unanimously.

Offensive emails

My friend got in big trouble (and was almost fired) because she passed along an email that said, lets all show up in life preservers when Bush is in town to call attention to the need for better levees. She had to send a letter of apology to everyone she emailed.

I just got this email on my federal (department of homeland security) email, from another federal employee. It was sent to hundreds of federal employees. No letter of apology as of yet....

This Pastor has guts!! Thought you might enjoy this interesting
Prayer given in Kansas at the opening session of their Senate. It seems Prayer still upsets some people. When Minister Joe Wright was asked to open the new session of the Kansas Senate, everyone was expecting the usual generalities, but this is what they heard:

"Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values.

We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery.
We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.
We have killed our unborn and called it choice.
We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable.
We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building
self esteem.
We have abused power and called it politics.
We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.
We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it
freedom of _expression. We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called
it enlightenment. Search us, Oh, God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every
sin and set us free. Amen!"

The response was immediate. A number of legislators walked out during the prayer in protest. In 6 short weeks, Central Christian Church, where Rev. Wright is pastor, logged more than 5,000 phone calls with
only 47 of those calls responding negatively. The church is now receiving international requests for copies of this prayer from India, Africa and Korea.

Commentator Paul Harvey aired this prayer on his radio program, "The Rest of the Story," and received a larger response to this program than any other he has ever aired. With the Lord's help, may this prayer
sweep over our nation and whole heartedly become our desire so that we again can be called "one nation Under God."

If possible, please pass this prayer on to your friends. "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for everything." Think about this: If you forward this prayer to everyone on your e-mail
List, in less than 30 days it would be heard by the world. How many People in your address book will not receive this prayer....do you have the Guts to pass it on?






Holley

Stupid micromanaging boss

In theory, I am supposed to be managing the gaggle of consultants that FEMA has fired.

My boss and I were meeting with them. The consultants were back on their favorite topic, how to get more money out of FEMA. We were talking about printing the plan they are writing. Currently, there is no money for printing, so they can go back to FEMA for more money.

The consultants start totaling up the money to print 100 copies of the plan. Forty black and white Pages, ten cents a copy. Three color pages, $2 a copy. Binding, $4 a plan. Then they talked about how they were going to have a collating party where all these consultants that charge $100+ an hour would get together and sort pages and bind the plans.

Now, back home, my firm is small potatoes. We do a couple of thousand dollars worth of printing a year. Still, we pay 6 cents a copy for black, 50 cents a copy for color and the printer binds for maybe $2 a plan. When you have a decent printer, it always looks better to have them assemble everything. To pay all these people $100 dollars per person per hour to collate and bind plans is a waste of money.

I said, we should be able to get lower and just have the printer do everything.

The boss said, no let them do it in house. It will be better that way. One, it is a stupid waste of money. Two, it undercuts any credibility I have. Oh well.

Consultants

I have been busy as of late helping two groups of consultants that are coming to town. The first, DPZ, are going to do a design charette, where they spend a week helping the community figure out what type of architecture they want to see in their country.

The second group of consultants is working on a plan about what part of the country will be redeveloped and what part will go to green space.

I have to say, it is very nice to be busy. Mostly, I have been running around gathering data and sending it off to the consultants, which is fine.

I am especially looking forward to DPZ’s work. They are one of the top firms in the nation at what they do. I think it will be pretty interesting to see how they structure their activities.

I am fairly concerned about the other group. They are going to produce a plan that says a large part of the parish is off limits to development. They will back this up with a rigorous, logical analysis. The problem is, when you tell someone they can not rebuild their homes, they don’t care about logic. They react from their gut.

I have been advocating a interactive process where we work with the public to help them understand the harsh choices that the county has to make. I argue that in decisions that are emotional and value based, you need to involve the public from the beginning. You can not present a finished product and ask people to except it. I am concerned we will meet the same fate as New Orleans, where the plan went down in flames.

Oh well.