[lbo-talk] Levee Fixes Falling Short

Dennis Claxton ddclaxton at earthlink.net
Mon Mar 6 17:25:05 PST 2006


It's really a perfect world in Bushland. Say government can't do anything, then don't do anything, and then say I told you so.

Levee Fixes Falling Short, Experts Warn

By Joby Warrick

The Washington Post

Monday 06 March 2006 Corps rejects claim of substandard soil.

New Orleans - The Army Corps of Engineers seems likely to fulfill a promise by President Bush to rebuild New Orleans's toppled flood walls to their original, pre-Katrina height by June 1, but two teams of independent experts monitoring the $1.6 billion reconstruction project say large sections of the rebuilt levee system will be substantially weaker than before the hurricane hit.

These experts say the Corps, racing to rebuild 169 miles of levees destroyed or damaged by Katrina, is taking shortcuts to compress what is usually a years-long construction process into a few weeks. They say that weak, substandard materials are being used in some levee walls, citing lab tests as evidence. And they say the Corps is deferring repairs to flood walls that survived Katrina but suffered structural damage that could cause them to topple in a future storm.

rest at: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_B030606X.shtml



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