Cops, blacks clash
Violence bordering on a riot broke out in New Orleans on Thursday (Dec. 20), both outside the City Hall and within its chambers as a predominantly black mob protested a plan to demolish public housing buildings which are now unsalvageable thanks to damage inflicted by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The City Council was meeting to approve the federal government demolition plan.
Fighting between vocal protestors and police broke out inside the council chamber as the council convened, leading to a forty minute delay. Meanwhile, violence spread among the crowd outside, with riot police gassing and Tazering protesters. Cops chained City Hall doors shut against the mob, and made arrests.
The federal plan calls for demolishing four all-black “low income” subsidized housing projects, C.J. Peete, B.W. Cooper, Lafitte and St. Bernard. Before the hurricane, the developments were renowned for spectacular levels of crime, but were abandoned in the wake of the disaster. Overall, Hurricane Katrina destroyed about 200,000 homes in New Orleans alone, most of whose residents were black, leaving the city — whose white neighborhoods were often on high ground — much whiter than before. This led to widespread “fear” that New Orleans would no longer be a “Chocolate City,” and the campaign to “save” the destroyed projects has taken on an explicitly black racist tone.
Image: Hurricane Katrina destroyed about 200,000 homes in New Orleans alone