Ray Nagin City Quotations

The reality of Katrina didn't really strike me until the first time I flew up in a helicopter and saw areas of the city that I had ridden my bicycle as a youth being fully flooded.

There have been too many people who have said we were dead. There were too many people who said we were way too divisive. There were too many people who thought this city should go in a different direction. But the people, the people have said they like the direction we're going in and we have run number one today.

I had laid out like an eight-week to ten-week timeline where we could get the city back in semblance of order. It's probably been pushed back another four weeks as a result of this,

I'm going to announce a phased repopulation plan that is going to deal with some of the areas that were least hit by the hurricane and had less water, and then within the next week or two we should have about 180,000 people back in the city of New Orleans,

We have the most significant challenge of any city in American history and they are dismissing ideas ad nauseam, ... Nobody is coming up with better ideas or alternative ideas, and it's really kind of teeing me off.

Now, with a single step, city departments, businesses and private citizens can access a tool that will help speed the rebuilding of New Orleans into a better, safer and stronger city.

We are prepared as a city to put on the best Mardi Gras that we have ever seen.

I know a lot of you are frustrated. I am frustrated, too. But 80 percent of our city went under water and we have a lot of work to do. And the only way we are going to get that done is if we stick together.

The city of New Orleans is in a state of devastation. We probably have 80 percent of our city underwater. With some sections of our city, the water is as deep as 20 feet.