Cleaning Up Louisiana; Fire Danger Near Los Angeles
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Some "open for business" signs may be out today in New Orleans, but the stores probably will have to wait for customers. Business owners from several -- actually mostly all areas of the city will be allowed back in today. Those areas include the Garden District and the French Quarter. Residents from those neighborhoods will also be allowed to return, but that will happen tomorrow. In the meantime, the initial clean-up of the Superdome is all but finished. Crews worked around the clock for nearly three weeks to gather up about 3,000 tons of debris. Now the assessment and repair can begin. But Mayor Ray Nagin has a warning about the clean-up and federal funding.</s>MAYOR RAY NAGIN, NEW ORLEANS: Pay attention to what the national media is doing right now. They're basically painting the picture that New Orleanians and Louisianans are not able to effectively with the hundreds of billions of dollars that are getting ready to come down. And they're going to try and play up our colorful past.</s>COSTELLO: And while Mayor Nagin is welcoming business owners back to the city, the Louisiana governor, Blanco -- Kathleen Blanco, is taking care of other business. This afternoon, she'll discuss rebuilding the state's economy during meetings in Baton Rouge. Blanco also spent time on Capitol Hill talking about jobs with the Senate Finance Committee.</s>GOV. KATHLEEN BLANCO (D), LOUISIANA: This is my first visit to Washington since Hurricane Katrina. I'm here because the proposals you are considering are about creating jobs. And that's what we need. That's exactly what we need in the face of this massive suffering and heartbreak: jobs. We need jobs to bring our people home and restore our economy.</s>COSTELLO: It isn't going to be easy to get the state of Louisiana up and running at full force again. For more on that, I'm joined by WWL Radio News Director David Cohen. And he is right outside of New Orleans. And that is actually a heartening sign, your location, Dave.</s>DAVID COHEN, NEWS DIRECTOR, WWL 870 AM: Well, thank you. Yes, I'm in Metairie, one of the suburbs of about 8 to 10 miles right outside of the city now.</s>COSTELLO: You heard what the mayor said. He said that he's afraid that the federal government is going to control all of the aid coming in to New Orleans. What is the thought on the streets there?</s>COHEN: Well, I think that people share the governor's and the mayor's point that, listen, if we're going to rebuild New Orleans and rebuild the economy of south Louisiana, they really feel like it should be New Orleanians who are getting those contracts. It should be Louisiana folks who are doing that work. There's a lot of concern here amongst the politicians and the people that the contracts are going to folks in Washington. They say they feel that the feeding frenzy in Washington now with billions of dollars of no-bid contracts are going out to out-of-state companies and out-of-town workers. Many foreign workers, in fact, are now in New Orleans doing much of the work. They say, hey, we've got to rebuild New Orleans. Shouldn't you be giving those contracts and those wages to New Orleanians so that they can start making a semblance of life again?</s>COSTELLO: Let's talk about the governor, Kathleen Blanco, because she was on Capitol Hill yesterday. And it was interesting to see the contrast in the styles between Governor Blanco and Mississippi's Governor Haley Barbour. I mean, he came right out and he said, we don't need the feds to be involved in our recovery effort. We can do it for ourselves. So, he was kind of echoing what Mayor Nagin said. How are your governor's actions going over there?</s>COHEN: Well, the mayor wants federal help. He just wants it in the form of cash, not in the form of decision-making. The governor is trying to be more of a diplomat and say, hey, let's work together and get this done. She also, though, has expressed the sentiment that we don't want anyone coming in telling us what to do. But we do need the federal help. This is important not only to our economy, but the nation's economy that we do this right and start to get people back to work. The biggest problem here right now is so many businesses are open or ready to open, but they can't find enough employees to run their businesses. The workers aren't coming back, because, so far, there is no housing for people here. And there's a lot of anger among the lay people and the politicians right now. Why hasn't FEMA set up any temporary housing? Not a single piece of temporary housing, not one of those thousands and thousands of trailers that have been rolled down here have been opened up yet for people to live in. They say that's absolutely necessary to develop a workforce and get people in jobs.</s>COSTELLO: Yes, tent cities aren't enough. The former FEMA chief, Michael Brown, ripped Governor Blanco. She responded to that criticism in front of a Senate committee this way. Let's listen.</s>SEN. KENT CONRAD (D), NORTH DAKOTA: I saw, Governor Blanco, you were criticized yesterday heavily by Mr. Brown. I'll just give you a chance here, if you would like to, to respond to that.</s>BLANCO: Senator Conrad, I appreciate that. But today, I came really to talk about job creation. I think there will be plenty of time to talk about other issues.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good for you, Governor Blanco. This is not about blame. This is about how to get this job done here. I appreciate your response.</s>COSTELLO: So, she's moving on. She's taking the high road. How is that playing in New Orleans?</s>COHEN: It seems to be playing well. I think people here really are tired of all of the finger-pointing and blaming. It was very emotional after the storm. It went for days and days. There was the feeling that we couldn't get the help that we needed down here. Everyone remembers Mayor Nagin's tearful plea to the nation and a rather graphic plea for the nation for federal help in search and rescue and food and water delivery and things like that. People here are ready to put that behind them and just go about the task of rebuilding their lives, rebuilding the economy, rebuilding the homes and businesses. And I think that people appreciated Governor Blanco not getting into a verbal sparring match. She did put out a press release a day earlier taking issue with some of the things that the former FEMA director, Michael Brown, had said. But she didn't publicly comment on it. She just put it out in writing for people to see that she disagreed with many of his statements.</s>COSTELLO: David Cohen from WWL of New Orleans. Thanks for joining us this morning. Evacuations are under way near Los Angeles. That's because wildfires are threatening to destroy entire neighborhoods. New fire crews are set to join the fight at first light. Dan Simon is near the scene of those fires. He joins us live now. Dan, describe the scene for us.</s>DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Carol. I actually see the flames roaring in front of me. It's quite a spectacular sight. And ash is basically falling heavily on the parking lot where I'm standing. We are in Chatsworth, California, which is on the northern fringe of Los Angeles. We know that 700 firefighters are battling this blaze; 130 homes have been evacuated. So far, about 3,500 acres have been charred. This all unfolded yesterday. There were some strong winds in the Los Angeles area, and that's what has really pushed this fire. But as I said, firefighters really have their hands full with this one. We know that at least two structures have caught fire, and hundreds of people have been evacuated -- Carol.</s>COSTELLO: Yes. How near is this fire to homes? And how many homes could be involved?</s>SIMON: Well, we're talking about at least 100 homes that are very close to the flames. We know that, as I mentioned, two homes have caught fire so far. Firefighters are doing their best to protect those homes. But the good news today, the winds are not supposed to be as strong. So, firefighters hopefully will get a handle on this thing. But yesterday was really, really a tough day, because those winds were picking up, but overnight not quite as severe. So, we'll just have to see what unfolds today.</s>COSTELLO: Dan Simon reporting live from Chatsworth, California. The latest round in the debate about intelligent design. Is it science? Is it religion? Does it belong in the classroom? That may be decided in a courtroom, and maybe it will go all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court. And later, the man they call the "Hammer" is now in a vice. Tom DeLay and the criminal charges he's facing. But first, here's a look at what else is making news this Thursday.