America's North Shore Journal

Washington Post Xavier University, the nation’s only historically black Catholic university, expected half its 4,100 students would return this semester; instead 3,110 are back on its restored campus, surrounded by uninhabitable houses and boarded-up shopping centers. Tulane University expected three-quarters of its 12,500 students and got 88 percent. Loyola University’s current enrollment of 4,436 amounts to 81 percent of its pre-Katrina total. By comparison, officials estimate that less than a third of New Orleans’s former residents are living in the city. “Students may be the optimistic people in New Orleans, given how many have chosen to return,” said Norman C. Francis, Xavier’s president for 38 years who now also heads the Louisiana Recovery Authority. Indeed, while administrators struggle with logistics, budgets, staff cuts and fundraising, students seem to be adapting to life in … Read entire article »

Shreveport Times Because Lafayette’s fiscal year ends Oct. 31, the expedited funds delivered Sept. 22 ensured the city-parish government’s books will be in the black when the audit is complete. Lafayette expects to be paid all outstanding claims long before this fiscal year ends. But in St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Cameron and Orleans parishes, where the tax base was wiped out or vastly reduced, governments will face some tough times. New Orleans has received $100 million in loans to get by and has another $20 million loan in the FEMA pipeline. “I don’t know what’s going to happen when that $20 million is gone,” Legislative Auditor Steve Theriot said. Examine the process, and it’s no wonder FEMA can be so slow in paying claims: From the moment a local government files a claim under … Read entire article »