What Rob Couhig really thinks about New Orleans
From Stu Bykofsky: Flooded Midwest getting fixed faster than the ‘city that forgot to care’:
Will America’s breadbasket be fixed faster than America’s party town, brought to its knees by water-overwhelmed levees in August 2005?
Rob Couhig, 59, thinks it will, partly because of Midwestern self-reliance. He thinks they’re not about to sit around, wringing their hands, waiting for the government to bail them out, which, he says, sadly, was what his beloved home town did - and still does.
A no-nonsense corporate lawyer in an open-collar white shirt, Couhig is a commissioner on the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority, and is thought by some to be one of the smartest men in town.”
“Talk-show host Robinette, a Cajun who devoted countless on-air hours to the danger of flooding before and after it happened, says that the city’s high ground, which was spared the flooding, exactly matched the boundaries of the original city. “If the engineers of 200 years ago knew those areas, you shouldn’t build there.”
This came in response to me asking if it is wise to rebuild the entire city.
To the same question, lawyer Couhig gave me an answer as long as a Ryan Howard home run, but didn’t directly answer.
“You’re saying ‘no,’ aren’t you?” I asked.
Couhig didn’t reply, but he smiled. I guess there are some things that you don’t want to be quoted as passing through your lips.
The columnist gets things wrong too, assumedly from his chat with Garland Robinette:
One who believes this to be true is 65-year-old Garland Robinette, a former TV anchor and now popular talk-show host on WWL-AM, which earned its bones by remaining on the air with emergency information after the TV stations drowned and the local paper couldn’t get delivered.
In fact, the T-P stayed on line the whole time and was publishing within a couple of days. WWL-TV stayed on air continuously. Both won the most prestigious prizes in their respective fields for those feats; the T-P got a Pulitzer in 2006 and WWL-TV got a Columbia-DuPont prize in 2007.
Rob Couhig can be emailed at: couhigre@couhigpartners.com
Garland Robinette can be emailed at: grobinette@entercom.com
You can email the column’s author, Stu Bykofsky at stubyko@phillynews.com or call 215-854-5977, which is his direct line.
This column came out of a columnists conference held last week in New Orleans. Lt. Gov. Landrieu and Mayor Nagin spoke to the assembled ink-stained wretches. The organization that put it on, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, has high hopes for lots of columns to come out of the conference:
NSNC Annual Conference Main Page
Since New Orleans’ attempt to recover from being virtually destroyed by Hurricane Katrina is one of the most dramatic stories of our generation, we’re expecting some great columns to come out of the conference.
We plan on collecting these columns (with permission, of course) and assembling them in an attractive book. Current plans call for proceeds from the sale of the book to go to help the recovery effort, which still needs help almost three years after the storm and flood.
If the rest of the columns are like this one, it’ll be a pretty thin book.
Update:
I emailed Mr. Bykofsky with my request for a correction on his statements about the Times-Picayune and WWL-TV’s post-storm performance, both of which won them the top awards in their respective fields. Here’s his response:
From: Bykofsky, Stu <bykofss @phillynews.com>
Subject: RE: What Philadelphia (and possibly Garland Robinette) has to say about the local media after Katrina
To: mcbrid35@yahoo.com
Date: Tuesday, June 24, 2008, 10:36 AMI got your voicemail Matt.
You didn’t have to go to the NSNC Code, the Daily News has its own policy on corrections.
I didn’t say the Times-Picayune didn’t publish. I said, “the local paper couldn’t get delivered.” Not the same thing. That is correct and no correction is warranted.
I did not say TV stations went dark, although I implied it. Three of four — as you show below — did go off the air. I will suggest that as a correction to the editor who handles that. It might be more of a clarification.
I did not say Rob Couhig is the smartest man in town. I wrote, “is thought by some to be one of the smartest men in town.” I have two qualifications in that statement, and I stand by it. You would be among those who don’t think so.
I hope you understand the difference between a column, which is supposed to be opinionated, and a news story, which is supposed to be objective. Your voicemail made mention of “a number of errors.” Given I devoted over 1,000 words to the subject, I am happy with the result, although unhappy with the one small error. I have heard from others in NOLA who liked, and appreciated, the columns I did from there. So far, just one other email complaint, from a “nolajoe, clearly an employee of WWL-TV, who called me an “asshole.”
I deleted him, but respond to you because you were civil.
I am sorry for your loss in Katrina and hope you understand my mission to NOLA was to help by highlighting the volunteers, done in the two previous columns.
Best wishesStu
P.S.: Are you an employee of WWL? Just wondering. It changes nothing. Facts are facts.
I wrote back with this:
From: Matt McBride
Subject: RE: What Philadelphia (and possibly Garland Robinette) has to say about the local media after Katrina
To: “Bykofsky, Stu”
Date: Tuesday, June 24, 2008, 11:11 AM
Stu,Rather than simply hitting “Forward,” I thought it best to ask if I could send this along to other residents and concerned citizens of New Orleans?
No, I do not work for WWL-TV. However, I understand the extreme stress the employees there were under, as well as the recognition they received from their peers and the community at large.
Matt
He then wrote back:
From: Bykofsky, Stu
Subject: RE: What Philadelphia (and possibly Garland Robinette) has to say about the local media after Katrina
To: mcbrid35@yahoo.com
Date: Tuesday, June 24, 2008, 11:18 AMIt’s very kind of you to ask, Matt.
Yes, you may forward, as is.
I have already forwarded a request for a clarification to the public editor. I hope it will run. I have no problem admitting errors, when I make them. I do hope you will go to phillynews.com and take a look at my two previous columns.
Best wishes,
Stu
I then wrote back with a long email taking issue with his characterization of New Orleans’ people as having received warnings, but not taking heed. I pointed out no one had said the levees would burst below their design loads (including the T-P in their 2002 “Washgint Away” series). I also noted that southeast Louisianans evacuated in record numbers, and also bought flood insurance in record numbers, and backed both statements up with citations.
Mr. Bykofsky wrote back:
From: Bykofsky, Stu <bykofss@phillynews.com>
Subject: RE: What Philadelphia (and possibly Garland Robinette) has to say about the local media after Katrina
To: mcbrid35@yahoo.com
Date: Tuesday, June 24, 2008, 12:35 PMMatt, I don’t have time to quibble indefinitely. I have a Thursday column to write.
T-P editor Jim Amoss told me the paper did countless stories. Which I knew before I asked him.You cannot take the term “no one” literally. I think the general reader understands that.
Best wishesStu
P.S.: I just got off the phone with Eli Ackerman. Nice guy, we had a nice chat. But I must get back to my future columns.
The online version of Monday’s column will be amended.
In fact, that correction has now been posted:
CLARIFICATION:
Stu Bykofsky’s Monday column implied all four New Orleans TV stations were knocked off the air by Hurricane Katrina. In fact, WWL-TV remained on the air and broadcast continuously.”
Stu Bykofsky: Flooded Midwest getting fixed faster than the ‘city that forgot to care’
Again, Mr. Bykofsky’s email is: stubyko@phillynews.com
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Way to go.
Matt,
Great work with this ‘columnist’. I am suprised that anyone has the gaul to dismiss his bias and say that a ‘column’ is an opinion and an article is different. In my world, a man’s word is just that. Interesting that a reporter has a convenient way out of showing bias.
Couhig is clearly a tool and out for his own $$ at the expense of our city. I am sure Nagin thinks he is one of the smart ones in town, but we all know how bright C. Ray is. It is strange that this writer from PA put any stock in his mischaracterizations of us. We all should know that some writers live for copy to be ‘picked up’ as that is more important than painting a truthful picture.
I believe the ‘columnist’ was indeed properly described by the other person ‘nolajoe’ that emailed him.
I don’t understand what Bykofsky is trying to express in his column. He starts out by arguing that New Orleanians are not like those hardy, self-reliant folks in the Midwest. This is not at all true as Bykofsky has to know–New Orleanians have rebuilt in the face of total failures from the state, local and federal government (ie, everything from the disastrous Road Home program to our leaky levees). Then, Bykofsky goes onto argue that New Orleans should have a smaller footprint–which is fine but he doesn’t flesh out the argument at all. In fact, all he manages is this odd sorta-quote from Couhig on the rebuilding issue: “To the same question, lawyer Couhig gave me an answer as long as a Ryan Howard home run, but didn’t directly answer.” I’d love to know what Couhig said in his “long” answer.
So I’m not at all sure what Bykofsky is trying to say in this column. Seems he’s saying ‘Yes, the federal government failed New Orleans but New Orleanians are lazy and couldn’t rebuild like the great Midwesterners.’ This is doesn’t make a lot of sense and in fact the ideas contradict one another…
I stopped listening to that new radio station, that Couhig was on quite a while ago. I remember that the best he could do for a radio show was read the newspaper and give his his interpretation of whichever column he wanted. I did not find it impressive. Then, you have these morons that come on in the evening who wanted to skewer the UNOP for the cost of projects. It didn’t seem to register that the spending was clearly phased. This announcer was Nagin’s CAO! Forester is his name, Gary Forester. Then I decided to play the station a few months later and the same one was speaking very disparagingly about Al Gore after he had won the Nobel Peace Prize. Of course they dismissed any legitimacy of such a prize. Now what, they play Rush (not the Canadian rock group that gave us Tom Sawyer and countless other great rockers).
Is this what we want for community radio in New Orleans? Let me throw another one in, Bo Walker going on about how his kid can draw better than Picasso. Now that guy is really informed. I want to get my information through that filter of ignorance all day long!!