Bush Urging Caution Before Reopening New Orleans

Mayor Nagin's ambitious (and possibly foolhardy) desire to repopulate New Orleans before the town is really ready for it is making a lot of federal officials nervous, including President Bush:

President Bush on Monday questioned the plan to allow residents to return to New Orleans, saying there are too many concerns about additional flooding and safety in the city.

"We want this city to re-emerge. As I said, I can't imagine America without a vibrant New Orleans. It's just a matter of timing," Bush said. "We're cautious about encouraging people to return at this moment of history."

Bush spoke as residents began trickling back into the city Monday morning as part of a reopening plan by Mayor Ray Nagin one ZIP code at a time. Over the next week, the Uptown neighborhood, the Garden District and the historic French Quarter are set to reopen to residents and businesses at Nagin's invitation, bringing about one- third of New Orleans' half-million inhabitants back.

Bush said there is "deep concern" about the possibility that Tropical Storm Rita, which was headed toward the Florida Keys, could head into the Gulf of Mexico and drop more rain on New Orleans. If that happened, he said he has been warned that the city's levees could not hold and would be breached again.

In addition, Bush said there are significant environmental concerns. New Orleans still lacks drinkable water, and there are fears about the contamination levels in the remaining floodwaters and the muck left behind in drained areas of the city.

"We have made our position loud and clear," Bush said. "The mayor is working hard. The mayor _ you know, he's got this dream about having a city up and running, and we share that dream. But we also want to be realistic about some of the hurdles and obstacles that we all confront in repopulating New Orleans."

The president said he "absolutely" would intervene personally on the matter with Nagin, and that he meant for his public comments to make sure that the mayor gets the point.

I guarantee you that if Nagin lets a bunch of people back in NOLA, and then another storm hits which results in more flooding and the need to evacuate the city once again, it won't be Nagin who gets criticized. It will be FEMA and the president who takes the arrows, and I don't think they're willing to be the scapegoat for the mayor's next fiasco.

Doctors are also concerned about the "next disaster" which will occur if people come back before the town is ready:

Doctors are bracing themselves for what they call a "second disaster" as New Orleans-area residents return to their devastated city.

While environmentalists warn of the long-term danger to health from possibly polluted floodwaters, and rumors of disease swirl, front-line emergency doctors say the actual health danger will come from accidents.

"The second wave of disaster is when you welcome the people back and the infrastructure of the city is not in place," said Dr. Peter Deblieux, an emergency room doctor at downtown New Orleans' Charity Hospital.

Officials in New Orleans and surrounding Jefferson Parish began allowing residents to return over the weekend and say everyone can come back by mid-week. But residents whose homes were not completely destroyed will confront fallen trees, wrecked roofs and streets full of nails.

Someone will have to clean it up.

"We will see the chainsaw people -- lacerations of the left thigh, lacerations of the left forearm," Deblieux said in an interview. "There will be people falling off the scaffolding."

A hasty return to NOLA is not a good idea, and somebody needs to rein the mayor in a bit.

UPDATE: Mayor Nagin is starting to see the swamp at the end of the tunnel:

The mayor of New Orleans may be having second thoughts.

His spokeswoman says Ray Nagin is now re-thinking the timetable for bringing people back to the city. She says that's because of "external factors," such as a tropical storm that's headed toward the Gulf of Mexico.