Toxic Neglect: The Plight Of Poor New Orleans

"In the real world, all communities are not created equal. If a community happens to be poor, black, or located on the 'wrong side of the tracks,' it receives less protection than communities inhabited largely by affluent whites in the suburbs. Generally, rich people tend to take the higher land, leaving the poor and working class more vulnerable to flooding and environmental pestilence. Race maps closely with social vulnerability and the geography of environmental risks.

At the same time, much of the death and destruction attributed to natural disasters is in fact unnatural and man-made. "There is no such thing as a 'natural' disaster," Case Western Reserve University history professor Ted Steinberg writes in his book Acts of God: The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster in America. What many people call natural disasters are in fact acts of social injustice perpetuated by government and business on the poor, people of color, disabled, elderly, homeless, and non-drivers-groups least able to withstand such disasters. Flooding in the New Orleans area largely resulted from breached levees and flood walls. A May 2006 report from the Russell Sage Foundation, "In the Wake of the Storm: Environment, Disaster, and Race After Katrina," found that these same groups often experience a second disaster after the initial storm and that pre-storm vulnerabilities limit their participation in rebuilding and recovery."