Three years after the storm
Today marks the three year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Rather then dwell on what has not been done, what is far from being accomplished and the devastation that still plaques the city, my approach to today is more about celebrating the positive energy that has come out of tragedy. I do this not to forget the disaster, but rather to recognize the resilience of an amazing community who, left to basically fend for themselves, has made tremendous progress. They said they would come back, they would rebuild - and they certainly are doing their best to do so.
To see examples of exciting projects happening in the 'new' New Orleans, visit social inovation organization Alldaybuffet's New Orleans 100 Project, an initiative to "highlight and encourage discussion about 100 of the most innovative and world-changing ideas to take root in the city since Katrina."
Also read my post on greensear.ch about sustainable re-building practices. Here is an excerpt:
Today marks the three year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina’s landfall and devastating destruction of the city of New Orleans and the surrounding gulf coast region. As an outside observer, one who fell in love with the culture of this unique place from the first time I visited, it has been hard to watch the slow pace of recovery, to hear the heart breaking stories of the systemic failure of both national and local disaster relief and to realize that much of what the people there have had to endure post-Katrina simply never should have happened. However, in the midst of the chaos of recovery, something positive has started to become very clear; the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast region represents an historic opportunity to actually change the infrastructure of a city from the ground up, to do things differently and perhaps, with the correct combination of innovative ideas, sustainable practices and local involvement, to do them better.