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News & Media
New Orleans Battles Aging Infrastructure
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UPI.com NEW ORLEANS, Dec. 17 (UPI) -- New Orleans officials say one area of the city's post-Katrina recovery efforts, involving the community's sewer and water networks, is lagging. City leaders say the 100-year-old system of underground pipes, pumps and power plants, one of the nation's oldest, was showing its age even before the 2005 hurricane's floods hit and problems became worse once they subsided, USA Today reported Friday. Municipal officials say the city will not be fully recovered from Katrina without a massive, multibillion-dollar upgrade to its sewer and water systems. Federal funding is only covering a patchwork of make-do repairs and the city is without the resources to undertake the effort alone, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said. "When the city is sitting on age-old infrastructure, something's going to give. That's true around the country," Landrieu said. "Congress and the federal government have not made it a priority. We're falling very, very far behind." Aging water and sewer systems across the country need urgent upgrades, said Ken Kirk, executive director of the National Association of Clean Water Agencies. With the federal government in deficit-reduction mode and local municipalities across the country battling budget shortfalls, necessary investment appears unlikely anytime soon, Kirk said. "We are in a critical situation," he said. "If those systems break down, you go back to a time when people didn't have running water or toilets and where breakouts of major diseases like cholera were common. I don't think anyone wants to go back to that time." |
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