• E-mail
• Print
• Comment
• Font Size
• Digg
• del.icio.us
• Discuss article

Nagin vows not to call WTC site a hole

Posted on: Friday, 1 September 2006, 14:01 CDT

By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters) - New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin vowed never again to call the World Trade Center site a "hole in the ground" during a visit to New York on Friday to let investors know his hurricane-devastated city is reopen for business.

Nagin stopped short of again apologizing for using that description of the Twin Towers site -- where 2,759 people died in the September 11 attacks -- during a U.S. television interview that aired last week.

"I tell you what I will never do again is refer to that site as a hole. It's a sacred site that is presently in an undeveloped state," Nagin told a news conference to launch the New Orleans Rebirth economic development tour.

Nagin had drawn criticism for his remarks in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" when asked why it was taking so long to clean up New Orleans a year after Hurricane Katrina, which killed 1,339 people and caused $80 billion in damage.

"You guys in New York City can't get a hole in the ground fixed and it's five years later. So let's be fair," he said on "60 Minutes."

Nagin apologized for the comment on Sunday.

A year after the disaster New Orleans has shrunk to about half its pre-Katrina population of about 450,000 and many expect it to stay small as poorer, mostly black residents struggle to return.

"It's very difficult to deal with an emotional tragedy, a natural disaster and a man-made disaster of what New Orleans and New York went through and it just takes time to get to the point where you actually move quickly," Nagin said.

"There's no quick fix. It just takes time and unfortunately we in America we like the fast-food mentality."

Nagin was in New York to give a series of presentations to lure investors back the New Orleans, which he said is home to the world's fourth largest port.

"We are reinventing the city from scratch," he said. "New Orleans is open for business and our recovery is moving forward every day."

Source: REUTERS

More News in this Category