Editor And Publisher: Origins of the New Orleans Catastrophe in Bush Administration Budget Cuts

Here's an article from Editor and Publisher that cites pre-Katrina articles about funding cuts in levee projects.

"When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA.

Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside."

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle.

On June 8, 2004, Walter Maestri, emergency management chief for Jefferson Parish, Louisiana; told the Times-Picayune: "It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the price we pay. Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us."

The funds necessary for finishing the levee projects are quite meager compared to the estimated at US$200 billion for New Orleans reconstruction. That's BubbaLogic for you!