transcript of november 17, 2011 meeting minutes

8/3/2019 Transcript of November 17, 2011 Meeting Minutes

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Louisiana National Register Review Committee Meeting

November 17, 2011, 1:30 p.m.

Capitol Park Welcome Center

702 North River Road

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Transcript of Meeting Minutes pertaining to Levees.orgs nomination

Chairman Glenna Kramer: Ladies and Gentlemen.

Id like to call the meeting back to order, please. The next item on the agenda is the 17th

Street Canal

and Inner Harbor Navigation Canal Breach Sites, New Orleans, Louisiana. May we have the

presentation, please?

Applicant Sandy Rosenthal, member of Levees.org: Thank you, members of the Advisory Committee. I

know this is a lot of work; we appreciate your being here. Thank you to Nicole Hobson-Morris and

thanks to Pat Duncan.

Before we begin, I have here a copy of the meeting minutes from August, and in the meeting minutes it

states that our nomination needed to be it states in the minutes that the US Army Corps of Engineers

unexpectedly showed up and informed that staff that it did not own the breach site at the Inner Harbor

Navigation Canal. This meant that the owner had not been notified of the nomination.

Dr. Rebecca Saunders: Excuse me. Could you speak up just a little bit or reposition the microphone or

turn the volume up?

Mrs. Rosenthal: Its stuck to the table.Can you hear me now?

Our nomination was rescheduled for today because the US Army Corps of Engineers showed up

moments before the meeting and unexpectedly informed the staff that it does not own the Inner Harbor

Navigation Canal, which is the subject of our nomination, and we were tabled until today. Since then,

further record checking showed that we were right, that just as we told Ms. Duncan that the Corps does

own the Inner Harbor Navigation Canal, and so I would like to ask Ms. Hobson-Morris, when she gets

back, that if that could be reflected in the minutes

Chairman Kramer: Excuse me. The Committee was obliged to do that because it was not clear that the

proper owner at that time had been nominated [notified]. That is what happened, that it was not clear.

Mrs. Rosenthal: Yes, and we agreed that was the thing to do, and I wanted to make sure that is

reflected in todays minutes.

Chairman Kramer: Well I think that is in the minutes, that we were informed that the owner of the, at

that time known to them, the owner of that property had not been properly notified, and we are under

suppression to even speak to you about that.


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Mrs. Rosenthal: And we agreed with you that that was the thing to do, and Im sorry, I must be a

terrible communicator. What Im saying is, we wanted to be sure that those facts were in todays

minutes because not everybody here was at the meeting in August.

Chairman Kramer: What facts is that? That we had to table it because we understood that the owner

had not been properly communicated [notified]?

Mrs. Rosenthal: No. No. I want it to be reflected that it turned out that Levees.org was correct and

that we had given the proper information to Ms. Duncan.

Chairman Kramer: Well, I dont think that that treats on our business today. We are just doing the best

we can with this, so if I..

Gary Cooper: Glenna, excuse me. What shes saying will be in todays minutes.

Dr. Saunders: It does without saying.

National Register Coordinator Patricia Duncan: Mrs. Kramer?

Chairman Kramer: Yes

Ms. Duncan: Im the one who writes the minutes and I will be happy to make such a statement in the

minutes unless you guys have a problem with it.

Chairman Kramer: Will I think we all understood that already, so, we have no problem with that, Ms.

Rosenthal. We have no problem with that.

Ms. Duncan (aside to Mrs. Rosenthal): I write the minutes for the Committee and I do my best to make

them as clear and truthful and cant hear as possible.

Mrs. Rosenthal: We appreciate it very much.

PRESENTATION BEGINS NOW refer to copy of PowerPoint presentation.

Mrs. Rosenthal: As of November 14, the applicant, Levees.org. has collected over 4 dozen letters of

support, that should be nearly 4 dozen letters of support, we must be truthful, representing large

groups and their constituencies. Some of the people and organizations who have submitted letters are

Senator Landrieu and Mitch Landrieu, Douglas Brinkley, historian and author ofThe Great Deluge; John

Barring, historian and author ofRising Tide, Walter Issacson, historian and author ofSteve Jobs. We did

not know when he submitted his letter that he was writing the biography of Steve Jobs. Scott cant

hear, president of Tulane. And I also would like to add because it is not present up there? that we have

received a support letter from Governor Bobby Jindel, U.S. Congressman Cedric Richmond, a letter from

National Trust for Historic Preservation, a letter from Mr. Jackson, president of the Lower 9th

ward

Home Owners Association, cant understand. And Mr. cant hear Jr., also of cant understand.

We have copies of all 43 of these letters, and I would like to leave the originals here with the Louisiana

Office of Historic Preservation and we would like for a copy to be sent up to Washington D.C. cant

understand.


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Thank you very much. We appreciate it.

I would also like to mention one more thing before we ask for people to give supporting talks for this

nomination.

Dr. Saunders says something in background that cant be understood.

Mrs. Rosenthal: All of you have received a copy of this letter from Colonel Fleming of the Corps. And we

would like to take a moment to address cant hearcomments.

Chairman Kramer: Let us allow their comment on that as well and if we may at this time entertain the

people who have come to speak for this, and then we will let him address that, and then we will let you

comment on that as well, in the light of fairness.

Mrs. Rosenthal: OK.

Chairman Kramer: And I know that you have a number of people here so and we ask that they hold it to

a couple of minutes each so they will all have a chance and then we will do it that way.

Mrs. Rosenthal: OK that sounds wonderful.

Ms. Duncan: And may I ask that each person who speaks say your name clearly so I can get it in the

minutes, please.

At this point the DVD of a speech at the August meeting by Nick Harris, Executive Vice President of

Dillard University was run. Sound quality did not come across well enough to transcribe on our recorder.

However, a copy of this DVD is attached. Mr. Harris was strongly in favor of the nomination.

Chairman Kramer: Do you have people here present who would like to address the committee as well?

Mrs. Rosenthal: Only one, to my knowledge, who doesnt seem to be here yet.

Chairman Kramer: We will proceed then [with the DVD], and then we will do the other gentlemen.

Thank you.

DVD resumes with comments of Bradley Vogel of the NationalTrust for Historic Preservation. Mr. Vogel

also strongly supported the nomination.

Chairman Kramer: Thank you very much.

Mrs. Rosenthal: Roy cant understanddoesnt seem to be here, so I guess Janet.

Janet Phillpott [spells her name]: I was a commissioner of the New Orleans . Under Edwin Edwards

and Buddy Roemer, so I was there during the construction of the levees New Orleans Levee Board.

During that period we were told: 1) that we were to provide the money necessary for the levee

construction that the Corps of Engineers sought but the Corps of Engineers would design and supervise

the levees that were provided. In addition, we had an outside engineer that looked at what was being

provided but I want to stress that we could not design the levees and we could not supervise the levees.


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We were merely told to provide the money required and during the period under Buddy Roemer and

Edwin Edwards there was no time that we told the Corps that we did not have the money that they

requested.

Mrs. Kramer: Thank you very much, Ms. Phillpott. There being no further comments then, may I ask,

sir, from the Corps of Engineers.

Mike Swanda, representative of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: Well, first of all, my name is Mike

Swanda, and I work in the Natural Cultural Resources section planning. Corps of Engineers. My staff

and I are responsible to inspect all Corps of Engineers projects to determine if any significant cultural

resources will be impacted by our activities in accordance with Section 106 and 110 of the National

Historic Preservation Act, which Im sure most of you are familiar with. But before I get into that, first of

all I must tell you how embarrassed I am and how sorry we are of the mistake we made in the

ownership issue that was brought at the last meeting. Unfortunately, the nomination wasntI wasnt

aware of the nomination until two days before the review board meeting. It was in our office but in the

wrong section of our office and so there was a mad rush to kind of get things together and a mistake

made in real estate when they said we didnt own it. So Im here once again because I knew a lot of

people took a lot of time and effort for the last meeting to be here all for not, just to have to come backtoday. So I want to thank everyone for returning and I want to convey how sorry I am personally that

that has happened. But Im here today to tell you, with a letter from Colonel Fleming that yes, indeed ,

we actually do own the property, the north side, northeast side breach site location. Cant

understand today.

This was a very difficult and challenging nomination to review. My staff and I, Office of Counsel,

Engineering Division, Operations and Maintenance, all are very interested in the IHNC levee location and

the events that occurred there and the construction that has happened there since. There is no

question, I think we agree all in this room and at the Corps of Engineers that the events that occurred

there were extremely significant and had a major impact on the lives of the people not just in New

Orleans but in the rest of the country as well. So I dont think that point is in dispute. Where we foundour difficulties, and this is at the district level, cant hearhow federal properties are nominated and the

process the Corps of Engineers follows with cant hear . We generally try to look as closely at the,

well, we are the federal government, we follow guidelines and rules and regulations. And of course the

Bulletin 15 guidelines that establish the procedures that one follows to provide data, to provide

information to properly evaluate its qualifications to be cant hear. And this includes several

challenges. So we all got together and discussed this with Colonel Fleming and weve come up with a

letter. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to get letters out of the Corps of Engineers in a cant hear

manner, so I apologize for you all not getting this sooner. But in it, it does provide our additional

comments on the nomination; and Id be happy to paraphrase or share comments or read the letter,

for folks who have not seen it in the audience, whatever you would like me to do.

Chairman Kramer: (seems to ask Committee for opinion.) I think paraphrasing it would be satisfactory.

Mr. Swanda: Well, to begin with, our first commentwell, to begin our letter we do confirm that the

property is on federal land under control by the US Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District. And

that we were not going to provide specific technical comments on the 17th

Street canal breach site

because we do not own the property. So speaking specifically to the IHNC east side north breach site,

we believe that the site integrity evaluation in the narrative in the nomination form needs to be

strengthened. It is our view that the site is not easily identified along what is now a recently


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constructed, 4000 feet long, monolithic concrete T-wall and earthen levee berm. As noted in the

narrative, the northern boundary of the breach site is adjacent to a section of the original pre-Katrina I-

wall and is visually discernable at the northern boundary. The southern boundary is not visually

recognizable. And if you go out and stand at the site today you can see a continuous 4000 foot long run

of massive concrete, I wall and T wall that runs the entire length between Florida and Claiborne avenue.

And if you werent aware that the site was there, there really would be no way to tell, if you were new

to the area, to walk up to that location and actually know where the site is located. And so what Id like

to see, what we would recommend, is that the guidelines provided in Bulletin 15 that require a more in-

depth discussion on how a site retains or does not retain integrity, and there are seven aspects of

integrity, that we all follow to determine if a site has integrity, and this is very difficult because we are.

Well, Im notSandy is nominating an event that occurred at a location and so I think Id be interested

to see what the Review Board Committee feelswhat integrity are we evaluating? The boundaries of

the site that we are looking at, nothing within those boundaries is more than six years old. Since Katrina

breached the location, engineers have gone in and completely removed everything that was in that

down to 15 feet below surface and replaced it with a T-wall which is a massive deeply foundation

floodwall and replaced that with all new material, all new berm material and obviously filled in the

breach. So, in terms of the regulations, and property type and its period of significance, how does one

evaluate integrity in this case? The breach does not exist. Arieal photography that you can see and thephotography that was available after the breach occurred clearly shows what the breach is. It is a hole

in the wall where flood waters came through scoured cant understandsand deposits, there were

within the boundaries of the property. None of that exists now. It doesnt exist. So it is difficult in

terms of the integrity, the technical aspects of determining integrity, how to evaluate that. So our

recommendation is to carefully go back and identify exactly what technical aspects of the integrity we

are talking about. Is it setting, is it materials, what exactly is it, and there clearly define how each of

those seven aspects of integrity are met or not.

Our second comment has to do with the information and the opinions of the authors that were cited in

the nomination in terms of this historic context. As we all know, cant hearin Sandys presentation, that

much has been written on the events that occurred during Hurricane Katrina and there are many, manydifferent points of view on how and why those levee breaches occurred during that storm. And in fact

those very statements and comments that some of the statements and comments that were made in

the nomination are the current subject of litigation that is ongoing and does continue in federal district

court and the next trial, I believe, is this July. So we would like to re-emphasize that the narrative needs

to be carefully reviewed and edited to make sure that personal opinions and any contested facts are

really not presented as fact. That the statements that are opinion should be edited so that we have a

clear and factual description of historic context from which then we then can determine eligibility.

And the only other comments, Ive just got a technical comment, Ive got information on the proper

owner of the property, should be listed as the United States of America and all of that should be put in

there and some changes in terms of the title of the property. That is basically what we ..

Chairman Kramer: All right, thank you very much, sir. We appreciate it very much. I think that at this

time we have hear a nomination that has been placed before the Committee and at this time we need

to open the floor for comments from the committee.

Wayne Coco: Mrs. Kramer, I have two comments. I have yet to see any document or hear whether the

owner of the 17th

street canal or the IHNC has come out in public support of this nomination. Is there a

written document of support from the owners of either one or from both of these breach sites?


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Ms. Duncan: No, sir, there is not.

Mr. Coco: Secondly, my other question relates to the area of significance. It is listed as disaster under

other and I certainly dont know what the NPS considers legitimate categories that would fall under

other. Do we have any guidelines as to what types of things might fall under other?

Ms. Duncan: No, sir, we really dont.

Mr. Coco: Do you know if the NPS knows or has them?

Ms. Duncan: Well, we have talked, I, have talked to our federal reviewer several times about this

nomination, and he is the one who told us to use other, but I have never seen anything written up, nor

have I ever heard of anything that deals with that issue.

Mr. Coco: Those are my two comments.

Chairman Kramer: Thank you. Are there other comments from the committee?

Dr. Saunders: Let me ask this in terms of the site boundaries. Archaeologists are just obsessed with site

boundaries. If the breach is not there, which it obviously isnt, where will you put the marker and how

will that be determined? Where would such a marker go?

Ms. Duncan: Are you talking about?

Dr. Saunders: Because the breach is not where the two the old wall and the new wall come together,

correct? The breach is interior to that. All that has been replaced. Im just asking. Where would a

monument like that go?

H. J. Bosworth, Jr., member, Levees.org: Im H. J. Bosworth, Jr. cant understand The breach is..the

breach site at the IHNC is about 200 feet south of an existing flood control structure. At that existing

flood control structure there is a hump or a driver, automobile ramp, a vehicle ramp over what used to

be the flood control structure flood control system and it drops into an area that is supposed to

become a lock project that the Corps has been working on for a year or two. And the most appropriate

place for a marker would be 100 feet north of that north breach site. That would be a place where

people could walk up and see it. They could see the canal, the lower 9th

ward, downtown, the bridges,

all of these different panoramas that you can see at that site. It would be a beautiful place for it you can

see it, there it is. You know. You put an X on the new wall, I dont think there would be any people who

would like that too much. But, that would be our recommendation.

Chairman Kramer: is there a historical marker at the Inner Coastal Canal, I mean the Industrial Canal

there or just over on the 17th

Street area?

Mr. Bosworth: At this point we have one at the 17th

Street Canal Breach site and at the London Avenue

breach sites. The process that Sandy and I went through to gather local support and then, mumbles

actually the locals came to us, and right now in the Lower 9th

Ward in the vicinity of the INHC breach

there are not a lot of people there to sort of congregate or come together since there entire

neighborhood for a mile in each direction was somewhat destroyed.


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Chairman Kramer: OK, thank you. Anybody else from the committee here has any questions? Any

comments to make?

Mrs. Rosenthal: May I please respond to this letter?

Chairman Kramer: Pardon me?

Mrs. Rosenthal: I havent had a chance to respond to .

Chairman Kramer: Can the committee finish its comments?

Mr. Bosworth: Oh, excuse us.

Chairman Kramer: Thank you very much. I think that you certainly are very perceptive and you have

worked very hard on this. I think that you can tell that this is a very uncomfortable document for this

committee to review. And the reason is that we are somewhat puzzled and somewhat in awe of the

amount of time and research that is represented in this nomination. And it is sort of difficult for us andin all good and honest spirits, we have tried very, very hard, I have and I think others have to, to sort

through all of the issues that you have in this document. You have many, many issues that are, shall we

say, other than simply putting a historic marker on a place thatI mean that, everyone of us will agree

that this historic marker is wonderful, it is positive, it represents as the gentleman said who was here

before, a renewal of New Orleans. Tourists are interested. It represents remembering the loss of life

and everything else like that. But beyond the purview of this committee is the issues of engineering, the

issues of oil company devastations, the issues of many other things that, five or six or seven issues that

you bring into this nomination. And in all good spiritI mean, you could make it easy for us. We could

say, well have a plaque here for this event that happened and it does a wonderful thing. But we have a

document here that as a committee we have to send to the NPS and in it are issues of fault, of

engineering, are issues of different kinds of soils, and what have you. Breaches that, I mean there arefive I-wall breaches that are breached and you have two of them. Breaches that went all along the

coastal road..what do you call it, the main channel that goes all the way out to the Gulf.

Mrs. Rosenthal: MR-GO.

Chairman Kramer: I mean there are 50 breaches here . And so what we have here is much more than

we are accustomed to dealing with as a committee that marks historic locations. And it is not the

message, its the messenger. And it is a document that we have to say we approve of everything that is

in this document and this is what we want to send to the National Park Service. And we have, I think

individually and together, a very difficult time sorting out the main issue. If that, and we are struggling

with this. And everybody here thinks, well yes, of course, it is a monumental place and people want to

walk up and see it. We want to say we dont ever want this to happen ... This is a loss of life. But you

know, pages go on about levee failures and canal failures and pumps and all of this kind of stuff that,

frankly, the expertise on this committee is historic. And so, we have a problem with the nomination.

Mr. Bosworth: OK, so may I address the committee?

Chairman Kramer: Certainly.


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Mr. Bosworth: When Sandy and I first decided to do this, we thought, OK, we will nominate these

breach sites, we will pick two representative sites, and well get a consultant, and we hired Mark Barnes,

and we said OK Mark, this is what we want to do. How do you think we should proceed? So he said

were going to write a history of how we got here. And in order to explain how New Orleans got here,

got to where we were six years ago, he decided to discuss the development of the New Orleans

drainage canals, the navigation canals, and how they all developed and how they all came about and

then as he wrote he began to ask us, OK what about this issue, what about that issue. We would fill in

the blanks and write a little bit more. Whereas we started with a document that was I guess less than

20 pages long now its pushing 50 and, honestly, we tried to do something nice and simple when we

began. But with input from Mark, and with input from Pat, and with input from James Gabbert on the

national level, the nomination continued to grow, pages were added, pages here, pages there, and what

it has become is sort of a history of the flood protection and drainage and development and navigational

system in the City of New Orleans to layout background to explain why in the world are they here, how

this happened, how does a place like this even exist? So we provided everything that Mr. Gabbert, Ms.

Duncan, and Mark would request from meeting on meeting, we provided this how many times?

Mrs. Rosenthal: We dont even know how many times. Probably a dozen.

Mr. Bosworth: And here we are. We throw ourselves on the mercy of the committee, saying were just

trying to tell the story and the message is the message and the message was created by several writers

and several people in the realm of Im an engineer and sort of the president, vice president of the

Louisiana Historical Society. I appreciate this group and it grew to what it is. We feel as though what

weve got is a good document, the documentation is very thorough. James Gabbert from your national

entity was very careful to make us to request that we define each and everything that he thought was

maybe a little iffy, and thats how the document got as large as it did. And that is the background.

Sandy would you like to add anything.

Chairman Kramer: Well.

Ms. Duncan: Mrs. Kramer.

Chairman Kramer: Yes?

Ms. Duncan: As your National Register Coordinator I would like to address a couple of your concerns,

not to sway you one way or the other but to give you background information. There are two issues I

want to address. One the integrity issue which Mr. Swanda raised and the other the question of some

of the content of the document.

Chairman Kramer: OK.

Ms. Duncan: Lets do the integrity first. When we told, meaning me, when I first told the National Park

Service reviewer that we were working on this, his first question was, Is there integrity? Nicole

Hobson-Morris and I went out to both sites, camera in hand, and looked at them, took lots of pictures,

and analyzed to the best of our ability, understanding that nobody had ever dealt with this before.

Chairman Kramer: Right


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Ms. Duncan: As to whether or not we thought there was integrity and for us the bottom line on the

integrity was, could you recognize the site? If somebody went to the site today could they recognize it?

That is a litmus test we always use here in the Louisiana SHPO. Mr. Swanda is right in saying that we

should have addressed it the way the National Register addresses it with the seven aspect of integrity

design, workmanship, materials, location, etc, there are several of them, and that can be done. But the

bottom line for us was can you recognize the site where it happened, and I have to respectfully disagree

with the Corps about whether or not the location is recognizable. We believe it is. We sent a report

with photographs to the NPS giving them our opinion that the sites do have enough integrity to qualify

for the register and not only our federal reviewer, Mr. Gabbert, but the Keeper of the National Register

looked at the report and agreed that the sites have integrity. Now you as a committee have a right to

disagree with them if you so choose, but I have to again respectfully disagree with the Corps. It is my

belief that the integrity of the sites is there. So that was the first thing I wanted to share with you.

Secondly, Im a little confused about what parts of the document you feel are clouding the issue or that

dont contribute to the background you need to understand the situation. And if it should be that you

so order me as a staff to do so, I would like to work with you to help clarify that. But again, many of the

things that are in there are in there because I honestly felt they needed to be to provide background like

Mr. Bosworth said on how we got where we got. You cant expect somebody, oh in Maine, to pick upthis document and read it and understand what we in Louisiana all understand because we live with the

issues of drainage, and flooding, and navigation every day. Somebody in central Maine may not have to

deal with drainage canals and such. I know as Im not a native of Louisiana as you guys all know, and I

didnt understand this stuff. Had I not worked with Sandy I wouldnt understand it half way as well as I

do now. But I had them put some of the stuff in there because this nomination has to be understood by

John Doe who doesnt live in Louisiana and doesnt understand this issue. Maybe I did overkill, and

maybe if you so order we can work together to help me understand what your problems are so that I

can then address them. But that is what is behindI see that Mr. Lewis wants to ask me something.

Lynn Lewis: That was my problem with the document. I think it is overkill in the document. Because in

the first read through of this whole document, which is like you said is nearly 50 pages, it was veryconfusing on trying to keep track of those two sites that were originally nominated or stated at the very

beginning of the document. You lose track of where they are in all this narrative. And you are saying,

when you said it, you said somebody from Maine. If they pick this document up, they are really going to

be confused. I know about that much about New Orleans, but I knew enough about it to try to figure

out where you were in all of this process, and it got very, very, very confusing. And I think thats my

problem with this document, is the confusion there. And to bring up all these issues as Mrs. Kramer

said, you know, to point blame at the Corps on what went wrong and whatever. I think it is a given that

something went wrong because the thing fell down. Its just a given. Its like beating a dead dog to

death again, Just beating, and beating and beating, And I think you lose sight of what are you really

nominating here? What are you really nominating in this thing? And I think it gets lost in this

document.

Chairman Kramer: Actually, the nomination of this site on the National Register doesnt seem to be the

end that you are seeking. It is confrontational in many issues, and it seems like there are so many issues

here that are at play that, maybe we are not the committee to assess the damage that the Palmetto

Street pump did, and that, oh, I mean, I know a lot of that New Orleans, but all of those things. But to

come in here and say that all of these things happened and that it is somebodys fault, and it keeps

coming back to Its somebodys fault. And if you would just make it easy on us, you know, to say that

we want this place to be known, we want people to know where it is, we want to recognize the loss of


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life and everything else like that, without feeling that somehow or another we are saying shame on this

person or shame on that person, or this, that and the other. And its very uncomfortable. Its a very

uncomfortable document to read.

Mr. Bosworth: It was an uncomfortable thing for everybody in New Orleans to go through, too.

Chairman Kramer: Yes it was. My godson lives right behind the 17th

Street breach and I know how

uncomfortable it was.

Mr. Bosworth: We just tried to explain what happened after the fact, battles occurred, people died.

Chairman Kramer: Are there any? Yes, John?

Dr. John Hall: Would it be possible, it may not be possible, but to reduce what we have in sort of an

abstract of what was going on and say these are the places where we think the monuments assigned

ought to be

John Sykes: But there is no signage, we are not giving signs.

Dr. Hall: Whatever they are.

Mr. Sykes: We are nominating sites, spots to the Register. We are not building a monument, were not

putting up signs. We are putting..these are nominating sites.

Dr. Hall: Of events?

Dr. Saunders: Can you nominate a site to the Register if the landowner does not approve?

Ms. Duncan: Technically that is a whole other complication.

Dr. Hall: Well, Im just saying.

Dr. Saunders: Im sorry you have to be the cant hearhere.

Mr. Coco: The question has already been raised by me, and I have to say that I cannot vote for this

nomination knowing that the owners of these sites are not in support.

Several people talk at once.

Mrs. Rosenthal: We were not told that we had to request a letter. Had we known that we would have.

Mr. Coco: I think a written document

Ms. Duncan: No. No. Hold it, hold it, hold it, hold it.

Nicole Hobson-Morris, Director, Division of Historic Preservation: Let me just say that for the record.

Ive spoken with the Levee Board. We provided them with a copy of this nomination. IThe president

of the levee board. And he in turn advised me that they would make no comment and they did not


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want to be present at the Review Committee meeting. He feltthey didnt want to express a feeling

one way or the other with regard to the

Mr. Coco: So they are not in support?

Several people talking over each other.

Mr. Lewis: They are not in opposition either.

Ms. Hobson-Morris: They are not in opposition either. They are just not providing any sort of

comment. They will not stand in the way of it moving forward, is what he basically said.

Mr. Coco: Does the Corps of Engineers feel the same way?

Mr. Swanda: Well, from our point of view, we have to follow regulations in terms of listing our own

federal property to the National Register, and in our case there is a federal preservation officer at

headquarters. One is in the Army side and one is in the Corps of Engineers side of the office, and as I

understand it, frankly the district has never found themselves in this position before so we are kind ofmuch like you all are today, searching our way through this process. But what happens is, is that,

frankly, the Corps of Engineers New Orleans District felt for several reasons that we couldnt formulate

an opinion on eligibility because of the issues that we raised today. Much like you, we felt that the

nomination went far beyond what was necessary to determine eligibility and went into areas that really,

we felt, are currently being litigated. So in our view some of the facts stated in the nomination, to some

in our office, are not necessarily true.

Chairman Kramer: Well, excuse me, I hate to interrupt you. But we cannot take any litigation into

consideration at this time but thank you anyway.

Dr. Saunders: But were this edited so that some of the more controversial things

Mr. Swanda: Let me continue.


Mr. Swanda: So, we couldnt say based on the integrity issues we felt, and I disagree with the

assessment, because Ive been at the site as well. You can define the northern boundary but there is no

way to tell other than pacing it off where the site really does end. But that is for the committee to

determine, and for the Park Service, I assume. But once the decision of the Review Committee today is

made and our comments from the district have been provided, granted they dont show support or non-

support we just dont know yet, frankly, in accordance with the regulations if it is eligible. That package

is then sent by the SHPO to the federal preservation officer and at that point because his perspective is

from a national perspective. We are listing a federal property and for the same reasons and for the

same events and for the precedence it sets. This goes way beyond in my view the precedence of just

listing an event. Every important event that happens daily in this country has a location. And some can

be at the national level, some can be at the state level, and some can be at the local level. And be

prepared, or maybe the Park Service should be prepared, for any event that happens on a daily basis.

This one is six years old now. Now Im not arguing the point how important the event is.


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Mr. Swanda: It is technical. I get off the track. Let me backtrack. So anyway, all your information, your

decision, and our district letter that weve provided, and Sandys views and comments. It is all packaged

together and sent to the federal preservation officer at the Corps of Engineers. He then engages in

further conversation with my district commander, maybe with others at headquarters who have an

interest at a national level. Weve got issues with.

Chairman Kramer: Thank you. One more minute please, sir. Would you summarize. One more minute.

Mr. Swanda: Oh, Im sorry. So that decision will then be made at the headquarters division, and he is

the certifying federal officer who signs that document.


Mrs. Rosenthal: Thank you. We really appreciate all the time and effort you are spending on this

important nomination. On the letter from Colonel Fleming. There are three points that they make. The

first one about integrity we have already discussed. Mumbling, cant understandwe have alreadydiscussed integrity. We are going to go straight to B, where Colonel Fleming said there have been

published reports of different views and analyses on how the something here I cant understandflood

waters breached the levee system. But we know they havent cited examples and more importantly, the

Corps has not disputed any of the facts. But however, we are happy to offer to contact the Corps and

ask them to give us citations and give us examples of facts that they dispute, just with the caveat that

we have it cant understand and then you all cant understand.

Chairman Kramer: I think that is between the two of you, right? Then she mumbles something I cant

understand.

Mrs. Rosenthal says something I cant get.

Chairman Kramer: If you are disputing with them.

Mr. Bosworth: We are not disputing anything. Then he and Sandy talk over each other.

Mrs. Rosenthal: No, No, No. Im sorry, I must be a terrible communicator. This nomination is facts. It

is nothing but facts. There is no cant understand, no opinions. Every word in that nomination cant

understand checked, and documented and backed up with resource data. The Corps has said that, has

made a statement that there are differing opinions on studies and different views and analyses but not

provided examples. And the important thing is that the Corps of Engineers has not disputed any of the

facts of our nomination.


Mrs. Rosenthal: The Corps has not.

Mr. Coco: Madame Chairman, I would like to call the question.

Mrs. Rosenthal continues to try to talk.


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Chairman Kramer: Thank you. I think that our time apparently has expired as far as the Committee is

concerned. And if there are no other comments and we will take this into consideration. We have a call

for the question by Mr. Coco. The question has been called. Before us is a nomination to place on the

National Register the New Orleans Levee Breach sites, 17th

Street and the Inner Harbor Navigation

canals. All in favor of placing this on the National Register in the form that it is presented here, may I

see a show of hands yes. All those opposed. It is opposed at this time.

Ms. Duncan: Hold on, please. I need to get everybodys names down.

Chairman Kramer: In favor of, Mr. Sykes, Mrs. Turner and Dr. Hall. And opposed Coco, Lewis, Martin,

Cooper, Sanders and Williams. At this time this has been rejected.

Dr. Saunders: Can I just say that I would support a nomination that was edited. I would love to support

this nomination. But I think it could be edited in such a way that. It wouldnt take a lot of work.

Chairman Kramer: Like I said, you could make it easy on us.

Mr. Cooper: Cant understand what he says at first. I think we need to remove the unresolved issues.

Dr. Saunders: Things that It is not important to the nomination why the levees failed.

Mrs. Rosenthal: What? What?

Dr. Saunders: Its not important to the nomination why the levees failed. I mean I can tell you care

deeply about why the levees failed, and so do I.

Chairman Kramer: We all do.

Dr. Saunders: But it is not necessary.


Dr. Saunders: And it is just going to create problems with the Corps, and all kinds of other things, and it

is just not necessary.

Mrs. Sue Turner asks to be recognized.

Chairman Kramer: We have already called the question. Does it apply to this?

Mrs. Turner: I would just like to make a comment.

Chairman Kramer: Please do.

Mrs. Sue Turner: I think the way things have progressed, I personally think of this nomination like the

nomination of many battlefields, Civil war battlefields, any battlefield. There is no way to give the full

history of all the consequences that effected why the site is even being considered. Had it not been for

the flood and the levees failing, would it mean what it does? And think about the book, Rising Tide.


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How many years away is it. And here is a whole book being written about the levee system, about the

politics. I mean, I think we will be discovering things for years, but it will always be essential that the

breach of the levee at this location was a part of the devastation of the city.

Chairman Kramer: Thank you very much, Mrs. Turner.

The committee moves on to other matters.

transcript of november 17, 2011 meeting minutes

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