Katrina claims.

Well I was reading the USA Today about how the people in Louisiana are filing claims against the Army Corps of Engineers for over 477 billion dollars. Just about the entire cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Here is the question I have. It’s pretty simple. WHAT THE HELL FOR? Now I know I’m not an extremely educated man, just a community college degree is all but I don’t think that the Corps of Engineers told all these people that they had to live in an area that was 7 feet below sea level, right next to the sea, in an area regularly hit with major hurricanes. It’s pretty much a given that no matter what you do to try and stop it eventually that area will be wiped out. I’m sure that’s why property owners were required by whoever held their mortgages to have flood insurance. I know when I had my house in Clarks I was required to have it since I was in a “flood plain”, even though it had never flooded there in recorded history and I was certainly well above the level of the freakin’ ocean. I had to have it though since I was in an area on a map. If they want money out of someone they need to sue their insurance company. If they didn’t want to pay for flood insurance then maybe they should CHOOSE to live someplace else. I’m so sick of people making stupid choices of their own free will, not taking the proper precautions to protect themselves from the possibilities and then crying that it’s someone else’s fault and they want a government check so they can go right back to making the same stupid choices that they were making before. As far as I’m concerned New Orleans can just sink into the sea forever.

Original article below if you want to read it.

Katrina claims stagger corps
By Brad Heath, USA TODAY

New Orleans and Louisiana, swamped when the city’s storm protections failed during Hurricane Katrina, demand the federal government pay a damage bill that is more than double the entire cost of the massive Gulf Coast rebuilding effort.

So many claims have been filed against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that the agency needs at least another month even to tally the floor-to-ceiling stacks, spokesman Vic Harris says. Among the more than 70,000 damage claims filed is one for $200 billion by Louisiana’s attorney general and another by New Orleans for $77 billion.

Those two alone are more than double the $110 billion Congress approved for Florida and the Gulf Coast after Katrina and two other hurricanes struck in 2005. The amount is more than half of what the military has spent fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Homeowners could seek damages of an additional $200 billion or more, says Jerrold Parker, a lawyer whose firm is trying to organize a class-action suit against the corps.

“Just looking at the place, it’s clear that there’s tremendous damage,” he says. “The fact is, everyone knew the protections were inadequate.”

The damage claims allege the corps is to blame for much of the devastation New Orleans suffered when Katrina overwhelmed the levees and flood walls. The water destroyed thousands of houses and emptied whole neighborhoods, some of which are only now beginning to rebuild.

People and governments that want to collect from the corps for that damage are first required to file a two-page claim form.

New Orleans and Louisiana seek broad requests for costs after Katrina but don’t list specific damages.

Louisiana’s claim contends that the corps built New Orleans’ levees improperly and kept open a controversial shipping channel that allowed the hurricane’s storm surge to hit the city more directly, says Kris Wartelle, a spokeswoman for the attorney general. Several studies since the storm have concluded storm protections were inadequate. One, prepared for the state this year, found that the corps underestimated the threat from hurricanes and even miscalculated sea level.

Harris says it’s unclear whether the government will have to pay. The corps contends that the levees were not solely its responsibility and that the shipping channel it designed did not worsen Katrina’s punch. The corps has not paid any claims.

Sorting out the claims almost certainly will take years, though Harris says officials can reject some immediately, either because the applicant filled out the form incompletely — in a few cases not at all — or because they didn’t live in areas that flooded.

“There’s a laundry list of things where it’s easy to figure out they’re not eligible for any money,” he says.

The corps must either pay or reject each of the claims. Those whose claims are rejected can take the agency to court. Parker says his firm represents more than 3,000 people who want to sue.