Repopulating the city has been steady but gradual, with neither the rapid return of most evacuees hoped for by some optimists nor the long term "
ghost town" desertion of the city feared by some pessimists. In early 2006, the
RAND Corporation estimated that, even in 2008, the city's population would only be little more than half what it was before the storm hit; however by July 2007 the city's population was estimated at about two-thirds (or close to 300,000 residents) of that before the disaster. Flooded-out areas presented more problems. The city had no comprehensive plan for what to do about flooded areas. Thousands of property owners have been gutting and repairing their property, some in the lowest lying areas of town. Contractors and workers from out-of-state and other countries came in great numbers doing
demolition and
reconstruction work, some filling hotels and rental property, others living in
trailers and
tent cities set up in city parks and
parking lots. Sportscaster
Mike Tirico incorrectly generalized on
Monday Night Football in September 2006, some areas, like the
Lower Ninth Ward and
Gentilly, still looked as badly damaged as the day the storm passed through. However, in each of those neighborhoods thousands of truckloads of debris were removed, hundreds of unsalvageable houses demolished, and work on gutting and repairs has been constant since the city has reopened. While the evacuation prior to Katrina using
contraflow lane reversal was the most successful rapid evacuation of a major city in the history of the United States, too little attention was paid to those with a car, credit cards, road experience and/or family out of town. Mainly due to their poverty, these residents lacked the resources to relocate somewhere else, or even the resources to evacuate the city. Therefore there was a great inequity in who was able to evacuate the city and who was forced to stay. The
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers set up the "Blue Roof Program" of putting blue
tarps over damaged roofs. The tarps kept out rain until more permanent roof repairs could be made. Thousands of blue tarps were seen throughout the city; however, a number of official restrictions meant some residents were unable to benefit from this recovery program. Likewise, a number of subcontractors paid by the Corps only did "easy" low-pitch one-story roofs, choosing not to return to do more difficult roofs. Some New Orleanians lived for months in homes with sizable holes in their roofs. Among the popular handouts at Red Cross relief stations were 5-gallon buckets, many put to use as rain catchers. Six months after the storm, many of the hastily placed blue roof tarps were in tatters, leaving those homes vulnerable again. Many people did not succeed in getting permanent roof repairs from such reasons as long waiting lists for reliable contractors and waits for insurance payment. has complaint about no electricity painted on side; April 3, 2006 Seven months after the storm, two-thirds of the requested
FEMA trailers (designed for short term emergency housing immediately after a disaster) had been delivered. Many of these trailers, however, could not be occupied or, if occupied, were not properly functional. Delays of weeks or months in hooking up electricity and water to trailers were common, and mechanical and bureaucratic problems prevented use of the trailers. In June 2006, the State of Louisiana finally awarded a contract to DRC, Inc. of Mobile, Alabama to remove thousands of abandoned cars strewn throughout New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
Rebuilding, social justice, and community life Residents were authorized to return to examine homes after the storm on Monday, September 5, 2005. In downtown New Orleans, several places were indeed producing power. Due to contaminated water and uninhabitable conditions, the Mayor ordered that all citizens be evacuated by September 6.
Frederic Schwartz, the architect selected by the citizens of New Orleans and the New Orleans City Planning Commission to replan one-third of the city for 40% of its population explained how the opportunity for rebuilding the city could be a chance to strengthen social justice and community life: The planning of cities in the face of disaster (natural and political) must reach beyond the band-aid of short-term recovery. Disaster offers a unique opportunity to rethink the planning and politics of our metro-regional areas – it is a chance to redefine our cities and to reassert values of environmental care and social justice, of community building and especially of helping the poor with programs for quality, affordable, and sustainable housing. As lead planners for District 4, the district that includes the "largest concentration of public housing in the city" (Iberville, St. Bernard, Lafitte, and B. W. Cooper), Schwartz challenged his team to make "every effort to involve the residents and the community in the planning effort," while ensuring that the design of the new housing "could maintain the look and feel of surrounding neighborhoods with a mix of both modern interpretation of historic typologies and new urbanist models." Another high area, much of which escaped serious flooding, was the set of Lake Shore developments between
Lake Pontchartrain and Robert E. Lee Boulevard, built at a higher level than nearby land from mid-20th century dredging. Due to the direction of the storm and the movement of storm surge, the West Bank section of the city, Algiers was spared flooding and became the first part of the city itself to officially reopen to residents. Reconstruction of each section of the area has been addressed in the Army Corps LACPR Final Technical Report which identifies areas to not be rebuilt and areas buildings need to be elevated. The Technical Report includes locations of possible new levees; suggested existing levee modifications; "Inundation Zones"; "Water depths less than 14 feet, Raise-In-Place of Structures"; "Water depths greater than 14 feet, Buyout of Structures"; "Velocity Zones"; and "Buyout of Structures" areas for five different scenarios. The Corps of Engineers will submit the report to Congress for consideration, planning, and response in mid-2009. After the storm, residents began repopulating the city, and with that came more inequity. During this rebuilding period of New Orleans a larger percentage of White residents returned back to the city than did Black residents. This was attributed to the fact White neighborhoods, like Lakeview, bounced back a lot faster than most Black neighborhoods, like the Ninth Ward. This is in part because of the length of time to get utilities like water and electricity working in these communities; reliance on public transit and public schools; and the lack of flood insurance. Furthermore, White people returning to New Orleans at higher rates than Black people was attributed to an unwillingness of planners to rebuild low-income housing. In September 2005, the Washington Post noted former 10-term Republican Congressman
Richard H. Baker from
Baton Rouge reportedly told lobbyists, "We finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans. We couldn't do it, but God did", and criticized his lack of concern for the lower income residents. FEMA caseworkers were charged with the responsibility of helping evacuees find housing and employment. Caseworkers had to help some former residents realize that moving back was unrealistic because some of the city was not being rebuilt. This created a diaspora as many evacuees wished to return to New Orleans but were not able to. Large areas of the city's public housing were targeted for demolition, inciting vocal protests from some, including architecture critic
Nicolai Ouroussoff.
Homeless residents A challenge facing New Orleans was the exceptionally large homeless population created by Katrina. The number of homeless people living in New Orleans doubled to 12,000 people between the hurricane and mid-2007. With a post-Katrina population of 300,000 people, this meant that 1 in 25 people were homeless, an extremely high number and nearly three times that of any other US city. Most of the homeless were Katrina evacuees who returned to higher rents or who fell through the cracks of the federal system that was to provide temporary housing after the disaster. There were also some workers who came from out of state for the post-Katrina rebuilding boom but who subsequently lost their jobs. Compounding this problem, the number of beds for the homeless in the city decreased from a count of 2,800 before the storm to 2,000 as of May 2008. In January 2009, the New Orleans Legal Assistance Corporation's Homeless Department reevaluated the homelessness rate. They found that the post-Katrina homeless population decreased by 64% since the last survey two years prior. UNITY of Greater New Orleans reported 1,188 homeless people after their 2018 Point-in-Time count performed in January. As of 2018, New Orleans has maintained a "functional zero" in veteran homelessness for three years. Going forward, UNITY's efforts are focused on support for chronically homeless people with physical and/or mental disabilities.
Neighborhood and community-based organizations Neighborhood and community-based organizations played a significant role in the reconstruction effort after Katrina. Neighborhood associations and resident-leaders from communities across the city established an information-sharing network called the Neighborhoods Partnership Network (NPN) where they shared lessons learned through the rebuilding process with each other as well as information about important upcoming citywide or neighborhood planning meetings, resources (on volunteers, tools, programs and application processes, etc.), and calls and offers for help and collaboration. Network members shared information and resources identified through the network with their own communities and neighbors. Early on, members also used NPN as a way to identify and collectively point out issues and collective priorities to local government officials and agencies and propose possible solutions. The network eventually established a newspaper,
The Trumpet, that was circulated locally to disseminate information, highlight and celebrate progress, and to facilitate connections for collaboration.
Relief agencies Initially, a total of 63,000 troops added in the relief effort - 18,000 active-duty troops and 45,000 National Guard. These provided hot meals, packaged food, bottled water and other supplies like diapers, mops, and dust masks. The
Salvation Army also had many stations giving food. Temporary free clinics provided some medical care. Towards the end of 2005, the relief centers were wound down, starting with those in functioning parts of the city. Red Cross meals continued at a much smaller scale into 2006 from trucks traveling around the worst-hit and poorest neighborhoods. The
Southern Baptist Convention sent feeding units to New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast the day after Katrina struck New Orleans. Since this time, the Southern Baptist Convention through its
North American Mission Board established an ongoing project called Operation Noah Rebuild, (not to be confused with the Operation Noah sponsored by the City of New Orleans) which has hosted thousands of volunteers and teams from all over the United States. The volunteer teams helped in the reconstruction efforts in New Orleans and the surrounding parishes. First Baptist Church of New Orleans worked hand-in-hand with
Habitat for Humanity with the Baptist Crossroads Project, in an effort to rebuild homes in the Upper Ninth Ward.
Common Ground Collective had two relief centers in the
Ninth Ward of New Orleans, providing food, clothing, and a tool library. The larger center was in the Upper 9th Ward, with a smaller one in the worst hit part of the
Lower 9th Ward. They also helped gutting houses.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began bringing in load after load of food and water for local members and residents to several areas of the city. Thousands of church members came in on rotating weekends to help clean up debris, gut houses and cut up fallen trees all over the city. In addition to the home repairs, the church full-time counselors were available to provide mental health assistance; and church employment centers—offices that aid with finding jobs—opened their doors to everyone, regardless of religion.
Habitat for Humanity has been active in building homes at an accelerated pace since the storm. Initially, the organization had volunteers gutting homes; but since returned to its primary mission of fighting poverty housing.
Catholic Charities also was very active with volunteers repairing damaged houses and churches throughout the area.
Camp Hope in
Violet, Louisiana housed volunteers in the Hurricane Katrina recovery effort of
St. Bernard Parish since June 1, 2006. , January 2006. The
Jazz Foundation of America is a non-profit organization that helped New Orleans musicians directly by paying the first month's rent for new homes, getting nearly $250,000 worth of donated instruments to musicians, giving pro bono counseling, advocacy, legal counseling, and creating a long term employment program that put displaced musicians back to work performing free concerts in schools and nursing homes, in eight states. In 2005 The foundation held an auction to benefit musicians affected by
Hurricane Katrina Thanks to the generosity of the foundation's chairwoman, Ms.
Agnes Varis, they were able to create employment programs which have made it possible to keep the artists and their music alive in New Orleans. Lieutenant Governor
Mitch Landrieu (who later became Mayor of New Orleans) declared that Louisiana housed America's soul, and its revival was of paramount importance. As New Orleans began reviving its local businesses, the reestablishment of the city's restaurants, particularly mom and pop eateries, received fervent local and national support. New Orleans's cuisine has largely maintained its cultural distinctiveness, linking its citizens with the city's creole roots. Long before Hurricane Katrina, 'local' food in New Orleans represented a framework for discussing America's racial binary—a paradigm in which the city has generally attempted to resist. Thus, even if race prevented a portion of New Orleanians from "[acknowledging] that they do, indeed, share one culture", culture became recognized as "something shared around which the city's residents could rally" during an arduous rebuild. By emphasizing the restoration of not only New Orleans's economic but also its
cultural capital, the city yielded the additional benefit of a reinvigorated
social capital. holding up his son after winning Super Bowl XLIV. ==Conspiracy theories==