It’s a very good sign that the mission of Levees.org is being fulfilled when reporters far far from New Orleans resist harmful inaccurate Katrina ‘shorthand.’

Leonard Pitts Jr. of the Miami Herald didn’t even use the word Katrina in his piece about Warren Buffet and New Orleans. Excellent.

Inaccurate Katrina ‘shorthand’ is harmful to metro New Orleans’ recovery. Katrina ‘shorthand’ is describing the flooding of regional New Orleans as caused by Katrina rather than the truth, that poorly built levees gave way before the water reached design and construction specs.

Had the Army Corps of Engineers given metro New Orleans the levees that Congress authorized, the region would have had little more than some lost shingles, soggy carpets and wet ankles, said Bob Bea co-chair of one of the Independent Levee Investigation Team (ILIT) done after Katrina.

Leonard Pitts Jr. hereby has earned the Levees.org Seal of Approval. Here’s hoping that more reporters follow suit and resist harmful inaccurate Katrina ‘shorthand.’

Until the American people see that the flooding of regional New Orleans was a man-made event, we cannot expect them to see that rebuilding makes much sense.

Blog post by Sandy Rosenthal, founder of Levees.org www.levees.org 3-7-10