Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Posted on 09/08/2005 11:36:07 AM PDT by TaxRelief
I sent an email to Alvarez and Marsal (business managers of New Orleans Public Schools) and asked them why they did not make the school buses available to evacuate the citizens of New Orleans.
Their answer:
Thank you for your question. School buses were not used as all the NOPS transportation employees were also individuals who evacuated the city. Thanks.The answer is cryptic, but to the point.
Boy, what can you say to this? When the going gets tough...the wusses head for the hills! It became every man and woman for him or herself, and the children be drowned. Bah, I am so disgusted at this...
Like only employees could drive the buses. What a crock! But thanks for asking and posting the reply.
They could have just left the keys.
This was a classic case, by the way, of bloggers outperforming the media. Has anyone (heck, even at Fox News or on talk radio) pursued this angle? It seems terribly simple to e-mail them. And anyway, how were they able to respond? They have internet access?
Excellent, excellent job.
It's starting to sound ominously like the State/Local government drew up plans for such disaster, then simply filed them away without telling anybody else about them. ;(
All the politicians made sure to get themselves out too.
Bump for MSM attention (long-shot alert!)
Um, if they drove the busses with evacuees, wouldn't they be evacuated then also? Along with, oh, say, thousands of other people?
These folks were idiots. Let the drivers bring their families.
Those individuals could have occupied the driver's seat in the schoolbus, as they were leaving the city.
God bless that kid.
The media doesn't want to pursue this because it obviously takes away from their ability to bash FEMA and blame Bush. That's why Hastert wants a joint Senate/House investigation, because nobody else is going to get to the truth about why so many people suffered and/or died.
Like the 15-year old kind who managed to commander a bus and drive 60 people to Houston.
They (the employees) could have evacuated the city in the buses with people on them.
Duh.
Perhaps they were concerned about their employees' safety. (ie-the phantom bad guy who would kill everyone on the bus.)
OK it official: the term "Chinese's Fire Drill" will now be called a "New Orleans' Hurricane Drill"
Uh, you reckon at least one driver would've evacuated with his/her bus?
This is the contact form:
http://www.alvarezandmarsalnops.com/form.html
And then there's the explanation that the School Board wouldn't allow their buses to be used at all
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1479615/posts?page=44#44
Same bump, same long shot!
Not just employees, but AFSCME members.
NO apparently had no "first responders" wonder what they spent their allocated dollars for "first responders" on?
What a doofus response!!! But then, maybe he wouldn't have allowed other city employees to drive those buses.
Indeed. Yet, he's gotten very little press.
He said he went into the bus shed and all the keys were hanging there on a wall. He went and got a bus and started picking people up!
And also, picked up people walking along the highway. That young man had that bus packed to the roof and was the first bus to the Astrodome!
What a courageous young man and only 18 years old and had never driven a bus in his life!
Please send your original email and it's response to Rush, Sean Hannity, etc. I think this is very important news that should be shared with the general public.
Maybe these people have their own houses and vehicles and families to worry about without having to bailout Nagin and the rest of the city over its non-plan. If there were an actual plan, those drivers who would participate in evacuating would likely also have a means of getting their needs taken care of, too, knowing they would be busy evacuating other people at the same time.
I don't blame the school bus drivers for getting out of Dodge. No one told them to stick around. The mayor, in the worst case, should have/could have rounded up other city employees to drive at least some of the buses in this case. But with no plan and no support from the mayor, I'd leave town, too.
Thanks for posting. I am continually amazed at the replies I've heard from liberal Democrats as to WHY those buses weren't used. It isn't like you need to graduate from Bus Driving 101 to operate one, not like they were complicated jet airplanes, how hard could it be. As I pick up my kids from school every afternoon, I notice MOST of the bus drivers look like ordinary Mom's driving buses as their part time job and NOT a specially trained captain or co-pilot at the nearest airport. I'd take my chances of escaping on a bus even with an "inexperienced" bus driver with NO bathrooms vs. experiencing the wrath of a category 4 or 5 hurricane.
Deana
Jabbar Gibson deserves some sort of award for doing the right thing. Must be something about that last name that brings out the good in a person.
"...Hastert wants a joint Senate/House investigation..."
I think Hastert knows that if it is left to the rhinstone Senate cowboys any investigation will be no better than the 9/11 Commission 'work'.
And Hitlery wants an 'independent' 9/11 style commission so they can pack it with the likes of Blanco and Nagen.
I don't think this really has anything to do with Alvarez & Marsal's actions or lack thereof. They are under contract to perform certain management functions for the school district. That doesn't give them the authority to order school bus drivers to stay in the city when the mayor and governor have announced a mandatory evacuation, or to order them to drive buses for a non-school related purpose, given that the city's official evacuation plan contained no such provisions.
The city's lack of a rational evacuation plan is way beyond the scope of Alvarez & Marsal's responsibility or authority, and chaos was no doubt already well underway by the time anyone from Alvarez & Marsal realized that 1) the city had no effective plan, and 2) such a plan would have necessitated the use of school buses (though not necessarily of the regular school bus drivers). Some cities contract out for school bus service, so it's possible that the buses aren't owned by the school district or the city, and that the drivers aren't employees of the district or of the city.
A&M is a world-class turnaround manager. They aren't stupid -- they would neither skip out on their responsibilities in a situation like this, nor jeopardize their continued corporate existence by trying to take charge of the emergency evacuation of a city without any authority. Blaming A&M makes even less sense than blaming Goerge Bush.
I think what's most damning about this statement is that these city employees apparently knew well enough to get out of town, but the mayor's office dragged it's feet getting the word out on the street.
I'd like to know if the Bus Drivers Union contract has anything about being emergency evacuation participants in it.
But...but...but... in the official NOLA hurricane evacuation plan, the school buses were designated for use to take people out! If all the drivers were among those who were ordered to high-tail it out early on, who was supposed to drive the buses in the actual evacuation? (paging Jabbar Gibson, Mr. Jabbar Gibson)
Interesting... so all the rabid liberals on the NOLA school board could not see (or did not CARE) that their fleet of buses represented one of the best "Noah's ark" possibilities for saving tens of thousands of the NOLA poor in the event of a catastrophic hurricane. And school district officials sent all of their employees out of the city (rather than having bus drivers use buses, which would also save said employees), leaving their fellow citizens to drown like rats or huddle in the squalid conditions of the Superdome and Convention Center. It is guaranteed that the NOLA school board is nearly 100% Jesse Jackson and MOVEON clones.... and these are the same kind of vicious leftists who want to "BLAME BUSH" for everything!!!!!!!!!!! UNREAL.
Tell them to compare it to what happened after 9/11 in NY and ask them... "Who do you want running your government?"
The Republicans ain't great, but compared to the Rats... There ain't NO COMPARISON!!
I knew it! NOPS abandoned the city and the poorest members thereof. As it was the end of the month, rather than the beginning, there was no money for gas to escape.
They are just employees, they didn't take an oath or anything. I would take care of my family first, also. I would not subject my family to being in a school bus with 60 strangers, for an unknown amount of time either.
Why the congress? Why not a team of prosecutors? A lot of people need to hang for this and I don't mean that metaphorically. A lot of someones have got to pay, and I think it needs to start with that wicked, rotten, corrupt mayor. I think he gave orders that the refurgees were not to be given aid, not even water and I think he needs to spend a good long time in the pen for that. Blanco I think is just clueless. I don't think she meant to get anybody killed, it just worked out that way.
"Like only employees could drive the buses. What a crock! "
If they (City of NO) let anyone other than certified school bus drivers operate those vehicles, they could have(and would have)been sued. Thank shyster lawyers and bureaucrats for that conditioned response. IMO, people should have helped themselves by organizing and driving the busses. Isn't there a photo going around of just such a citizen? And wasn't he arrested for his act of humanitarian kindness?
This, to me, is the issue with them. If the city didn't have this in the contract, then I can't blame the drivers. It's not like the police force quitting. I'd LIKE to think they would have done the job if it was expected of them, but we don't know. At any rate, the city was unprepared. A designated group of off-duty police could have been tapped to drive these buses even if it's not in the labor contract. They had 48 hours to get it done, even if they couldn't drive all the buses at once.
Great job! BTTT.
Then they didn't want to let him in. Must have had the misfortune of running into a Red Crescent volunteer.
You are correct. And they probably hated Nagin for not being leftist enough.
I guess the governor and the legislature in La didn't care enough to step in during the year of negotiations.
Ultimately, people can't be saved from themselves.
If you can't find'em, grind'em.
Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
The evacuation was during the weekend, so they would had to call the bus drivers in to drive the buses. I can't blame the school board, it falls on the mayor to make the decision so that arrangements can be made.
The Evacuation section of the Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan doesn't even mention the buses.
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