Learn from Cuba says New Orleans mayor

Learn from Cuba says New Orleans mayor

Wednesday 21 October 2009
Tom Mellen

Visiting New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin praised Cuba's disaster response system on Tuesday, acknowledging that the islands's socialist authorities "do a much better job than we do."

Mr Nagin, who arrived in Cuba last Friday along with 15 officials from police, fire and port agencies, has met Cuban civil defence authorities and seen presentations on how the whole island mobilises during disasters.

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina flooded 80 per cent of New Orleans, killing more than 1,600 people.

Last year, hurricanes Gustav, Ike and Paloma all pounded Cuba, killing seven.

Mr Nagin acknowledged that "one of the biggest weaknesses we had during Katrina is it wasn't clear who was the top authority.

"Here in Cuba you don't have that problem. The government says: 'This is what we're doing, these are the resources we are going to deploy,' and it pretty much happens."

In Cuba, Revolutionary Defence Committees organise communities at neighbourhood level, providing social services as well as helping with evacuations.

"They do a much better job than we do on knowing their citizens at a very, very detailed level, block by block," Mr Nagin declared.

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/world/Learn-from-Cuba-says-New-Orleans-mayor

Off with his head!! America is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

In Cuba, mandatory means just that. It isn't like here where you have "the goshdarn government isn't going to make me leave my home" people, or those who have no means to get out of the way. They don't mess around with that. Didn't Dubya once say things would be a lot easier if this were a dictatorship?

in Southern California this year, especially La Canada Flintridge were very well organized. They either got out or, in at least one case, organized the neighbors to protect their homes from the fires. Americans can be very well organized and work together extremely well.

New Orleans was an unusual case probably because the water flooded not just due to the storm but unexpectedly because of the breaks in the levees and walls separating homes from the river. People were not given much warning at all really. They couldn't do much at the community level. The failures were at the top levels of our federal government for the most part.

had indicated the weakness of the levees that broke. Hardly unexpected.

that's all this is.

I mean, he's the mayor and all.