April 2008 is month 32 since Katrina. It is once again crayfish season and the little buggers are good! Mid-April sees the river reach flood stage and for the first time since 1997, the Corps has opened the Bonne Carre spillway to maintain the Mississippi River's flow past New Orleans at no more than 1,250,000 cubic feet per second of water. The water level in the river is at 16 feet above sea level, far higher than the floods that Katrina brought to town.

The floods bring unsettling news. Once again the restoration of coast Louisiana is getting short shrift as mega-tonnes of sediment flow past the city, past the wetlands and are deposited over the edge of the continental shelf into the abyssal depths of the gulf. Diversions could bring this much needed restorative to the dying marshes, but they have not been built, are not open and are not working to deliver silt. Just imagine how the picture would look if big diversions just below the city were dumping freshwater and silt into the wetlands. Notice also the flow from the Atchafalaya depositing silt well to the west.

Instead the focus remains on more and bigger levees. The image shows the silt pouring into the Gulf and also shows a smaller deposit in southwestern Lake Pontchartrain because the Bonne Carre Spillway is open. In the past fisherman and ecologists have complained when the spillway is opened, but not so this year as they have come to realize that although the river waters will depress fishing this year, they lead to bumper crops in  future years.

At least we'll be safer in our cars. New Orleans introduced automated enforcement of traffic lights at four intersections starting April 1, 2008. Poydras and Loyola, Carrollton and Canal, Carrollton and Palmetto, and Carrollton and Earhart have been outfitted with nine new cameras. The city says you'll only earn one of the $100 tickets (plus administrative fee) if your car enters the intersection after the light turns red. This means if you enter the intersection on yellow and the light turns red you'll be OK (maybe).

President Bush named a new restoration Czar to replace Donald Powell.  Doug O'Dell, 59, who was the commanding general for the 4th Marine Division in New Orleans between 2004 and 2007, replaces Donald Powell, who ran the rebuilding office since its creation in November 2005 until last month when he returned to his native Texas. He's also working on replacing Alphonso Jackson as Secretary of HUD. It appears Jackson has had his hand in the cookie jar.

The Corps dropped a bombshell when they announced that new computer models show that 20 miles of Jefferson and St. Charles Parish lakefront levees were unsafe in a 100 year storm.

Jindal is shaking things up quietly in Baton Rouge while the feds continue to indict local politicians. This month Mose Jefferson and Derrick Shepard were both indicted. Betty Jefferson is expected to be next. No updates on Bill Jefferson as he continues to serve in Congress. Orleanians can proudly point to their Congressional delegation as one of the most maligned in history.

The latest housing news is that the Road Home is now evaluating whether several thousand checks were issued in error to unqualified beneficiaries. This news comes on the heels of their big pay raise from $750 million to $912 million. If you are found to have been issued a check in error, you will be required to return the money. The average recall is expected to be $30,000 but ICF says they could reclaim as much as $150,000. Remember nothing is ever final until the Fat Lady sings, and government doesn't even have to observe that rule.

Twenty-five New Orleans area Catholic Parishes will be closed, merged and or downgraded due to changes in New Orleans population and the churches ability to staff parishes with clergy.

President Bush dropped by on April 22 to meet with The Canadian PM and the Mexican President for a quick update on NAFTA. Every cop in the area was assigned to riot duty to quell the expected protests. The protests did not materialize, however traffic was snarled to no end.

A few days later John McCain dropped in a for a Lower Ninth Ward walkabout during which he said, "“never again will a disaster of this nature be handled in the terrible and disgraceful way that it was handled."  Wow, can he say that? He even went on to place the blame on the President. Consider where the President was on August 25, 2005. He stopped in Phoenix to present a birthday cake to John McCain of all people. Then recall where the Louisiana National Guard was that day. They were in Iraq, where McCain would have them stay for another hundred years.