New Orleans's Top Priority

ASK ANYONE in New Orleans or from New Orleans. Read the New Orleans and Baton Rouge newspapers. Listen to Louisiana politicians. All of them say the same thing: Few people will move back, and no true reconstruction will begin, until the federal government commits itself to rebuilding the federally constructed levees whose failure led to the flooding of the city in the first place. Nobody wants to live in a place that is certain to flood again and where nothing permanent can be planned.

Most of those concerned also agree (even if not all say so publicly) that not every levee in the city needs to be built to levels sufficient to protect the city from a Category 5 hurricane, and that not every hamlet in the Louisiana bayou is going to receive hurricane protection. People as varied as Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), New Orleans Rep. William J. Jefferson (D) and lawyers from the advocacy group Environmental Defense say it is possible to come up with a moderate plan. Such a plan would include reconstruction of the New Orleans levees to a "true" Category 3 level -- which they did not reach before -- and the restoration of coastal wetlands. It would cost not hundreds of billions of dollars but between $3 billion and $5 billion over the next five years.

Unfortunately, neither the urgency of the levee issue -- which surely trumps all other forms of reconstruction -- nor the growing Louisiana consensus has been reflected in the budgetary debate about Hurricane Katrina. Several weeks ago, the White House proposed to Congress that it reallocate $17 billion of the $62 billion originally appropriated for immediate hurricane emergency needs to other uses, such as reconstruction of military facilities, highways and hospitals. Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, responded by asking that an additional $17 billion also be reallocated, with the largest chunk going to homeowners in Louisiana and Mississippi who did not have flood insurance. Amazingly, neither of their proposals included sums sufficient to rebuild the New Orleans levees, even to Category 3 levels.

But negotiations over this are continuing. All sides say they are willing to compromise. Congress should therefore do the right thing: Drop the plan to pay for flood insurance for those who don't have it, since that will discourage others elsewhere from taking out flood insurance. Eliminate the projects that aren't essential. Spend the money where it is most urgently needed: on restoring the levees and on studying how to improve them. The White House should do the right thing, too: The president must make a statement committing his administration to reasonable, moderate but genuine hurricane protection for New Orleans. Not to do so soon is tantamount to admitting that New Orleans will not be rebuilt.