Landrieu Says New Orleans Must Go Beyond Recovery Mindset

By Eileen Fleming

New Orleans, La. – Landrieu says that in the five years since Hurricane Katrina, it's become obvious that progress is not a given.
"We are no longer recovering. We are no longer rebuilding. Now, now we are creating."
He says that while help will be gratefully accepted, it's up to the people of New Orleans to improve their own city.
"Change must come to this troubled yet beautiful, this impractical yet lovely, this gorgeous yet challenged place that we call home."
Those challenges include clearing about 60,000 blighted properties, a troubling violent crime rate and a police department under several federal investigations.
For NPR News, I'm Eileen Fleming in New Orleans.