http://www.inthesetimes.com/archives/tags/natural+disasters/ In These Times features award-winning investigative reporting about corporate malfeasance and government wrongdoing, insightful analysis of national and international affairs, and sharp cultural criticism about events and ideas that matter. en-us Expression Engine jessica@inthesetimes.com seamus@inthesetimes.com Mon, 28 Aug 2006 05:00:01 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/2794/after_the_deluge/ In New Orleans, the history of work in this country over the last 15 years was compressed into six months," says Saket Soni, an organizer for the New Orleans Worker Justice Coalition, one of several groups reaching out to workers in the post-flood city. To give workers a voice in its reconstruction, he says, the Coalition must somehow bring together new Latino immigrants with displaced New Orleanians, mostly African Americans, who are still struggling to return to the city. Before the levees broke, Latinos made up three percent of New Orleans' population. Today, they've risen to 20 percent, as immigrants seeking work in demolition and construction have arrived from other U.S. cities and from south of the border. A study… Natural Disasters race economy Fred Weir Thu, 21 Jun 2007 05:00:00 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3238/the_plight_of_new_orleans_workers/ More than half of New Orleans workers have been victims of labor abuse, according to a new report from Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ), a nonprofit that mobilizes U.S. religious communities on workers' rights. Despite these frequent violations of labor law, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) concluded 37 percent fewer wage and hour investigations last year than in the previous year. "Working On Faith: A Faithful Response to Worker Abuse in New Orleans" analyzes IWJ's 2006 surveys and interviews with 218 workers in a variety of jobs from construction to retail to bank tellers. According to the report, workers have experienced abuses including wage theft (47 percent), exposure to dangerous substances at work (58 percent), being unfairly fired or disciplined… environment labor natural disasters Fred Weir Fri, 24 Aug 2007 05:00:00 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3316/mining_roves_katrina_legacy/ Karl Rove isn't called a "mastermind" for nothing. He announced his resignation at the perfect time--right before the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, which hit the Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, 2005. The media talked about his role in the CIA leak investigation, the U.S. attorney scandal, GOP election victories (and failures), and the Iraq war--all important topics. But they largely ignored his management of the administration's bungled response to Hurricane Katrina. We all remember "Brownie," the incomprehensibly incompetent FEMA director Michael Brown, who had no idea evacuees were using the New Orleans convention center as an evacuation shelter. But Rove was the man President Bush quietly put in charge of overseeing the administration's response plan. Rove had no expertise… administration natural disasters Fred Weir Tue, 04 Sep 2007 05:00:00 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3289/climate_change_refugees/ It has already started. The first ripples from rising seas are inundating low-lying areas, threatening coasts and islands. Climate refugees around the world are fleeing regions beset by violent storms, extreme temperatures, melting glaciers, spreading deserts, swelling oceans and other escalating effects of global warming. Billions of people are at risk and the number is growing. Environmental stress forced more than 25 million to migrate in 1998, according to a Red Cross and Red Crescent study--roughly the same number that fled armed conflict. Even though specific events often cannot be pinned to global warming, the scientific evidence that climate change is radically remapping our planet forms a cumulative, consistent and alarming pattern. Everyone but the head-in-the-sand dolt and the hand-in-the-industry-pocket… environment global warming natural disasters Fred Weir Wed, 05 Sep 2007 05:00:00 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3300/scorned_on_the_bayou/ George Barisich has been shrimping and oystering in the Louisiana bayous--"everywhere I can float," he says--for 40 of his 50 years. He harvests oysters in brackish water (mixed salt and fresh) since they grow only in a certain salinity, and he catches shrimp from eastern Mississippi to western Louisiana, mostly on inland bays and lakes. He's one of 6,000 commercial fishing license holders in Louisiana, although since the 2005 hurricane season only 1,500 of them have been able to return to work--the boats of the rest were destroyed. And there'll always be a spot on board for his sons if they decide to follow in his footsteps--as he did in his father's. But, he says, "a crash is coming," probably… environment natural disasters Fred Weir Tue, 23 Oct 2007 05:00:00 -0500 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3376/katrina_through_rose_colored_glasses/ History is written by the powerful and the articulate. Chris Rose, a columnist for New Orleans' Times-Picayune, has painted a powerful and articulate historical landscape in his book 1 Dead in Attic. His canvas is post-Katrina New Orleans. His palette is the absurdities and horrors of a town with its entrails splattered on the sidewalk in the midst of a heat wave. It's not a pretty picture. The book is a memoir of sorts, written in episodic fashion. Each chapter comes from columns Rose wrote in Katrina's aftermath. His topics range from the role of refrigerators as a gauge of public civility to his outrage at the outsiders he calls "racial jihadists--of both colors who think that murder is what… books natural disasters race Fred Weir Wed, 16 Jan 2008 05:00:00 -0600 http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3504/first_came_katrina_then_came_hud/ The temperature in New Orleans was uncharacteristically cold in mid-December, dipping into the 30s. As thousands of homeless people living in encampments huddled in blankets, housing activists from around the country converged on the city to protest the demolition of more than 4,500 units of public housing, once at the epicenter of New Orleans' low-income African-American community. In late November, the Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) had approved $30 million in contracts to demolish the B.W. Cooper, C.J. Peete, Lafitte and St. Bernard projects. Public housing residents, lawyers, religious leaders and activists who attempted to stop the demolitions met police head on. But their efforts succeeded in delaying some demolition and gaining significant national support. On Dec. 20, however,… housing natural disasters new orleans Fred Weir