An ANNIVERSARY APPROAHES

New Fence Section, Baton Rouge LA 6/2006

from the ongoing series Baton Rouge Blues

all reproduction rights reserved William Greiner

The Katrina Year
A New Orleans Home Is Reborn, With Persistence

NEW ORLEANS — It no longer stinks at 7023 Fleur de Lis Drive.

There are plenty of awful smells in the ruined houses nearby — the ones still showing high waterlines and fluorescent orange door scrawls that announce whether corpses were found inside.

At No. 7023, though, the lawn is green with neatly trimmed centipede grass, and the flower beds burst with pansies, impatiens and marigolds. There is no mud inside or out, not a trace of a waterline, and the front door is, simply, white.

It looks as if the house had somehow been untouched by the waters that, one year ago, burst with fury through a breach just three blocks away in the 17th Street Canal and inundated the affluent Lakeview neighborhood. But in fact, there was no escape for this house, or for 134,000 others in New Orleans.

excerpt from The New York Times 8/23/06

By JOHN SCHWARTZ
Published: August 23, 2006