In a story that appeared on Wednesday's front page some residents of the Iberville public housing development talked about their fears that today's scheduled implosion of the nearby Pallas Hotel will make them sick or aggravate the asthma or other respiratory problems they already have. The 17-story hotel is being brought down to make room for the University Medical Center the state is building.
Concerns about airborne particles prompted state officials to offer hotel rooms for residents who live within a 600-foot radius of the demolition site, but the Pallas Hotel and Iberville are separated by 725 feet. So, before Wednesday at least, there was nothing special being planned for folks in the 400-apartment complex. The state's plan was reminiscent of the good old days in Louisiana when at some restaurants there'd be nothing but open air separating the non-smoking section from the smoking one.
But forget about the residents' health worries. Some readers were more worked up over a Rusty Costanza photograph that accompanied Wednesday's story. He showed an 8-year-old boy at the development busying himself with an iPad. That's a relatively expensive piece of technology. Predictably, outrage ensued.
Readers called and emailed reporter Katy Reckdahl to express their anger. One less caustic correspondent was clearly worried at what the reporter might think of him for raising the issue: "Not to rush to comment. I hope this is nothing more than someone gave him the iPad as a gift and he is using it for educational means or just playing games ... I hope I am not over thinking this. I am not prejudice (sic) -- this just did not look right."
I imagine that at some point or another all of us who aren't poor have decided which items poor folks, especially those on government assistance, should be allowed to have. And which items they should be denied. Fancy rims have been known to set me off. Maybe for you it's gold teeth, Air Jordans, the latest mobile phone. City Councilwoman Stacy Head used her taxpayer-funded phone to send an outraged email when she saw a woman using food stamps to buy Rice Krispies treats. What right do the poor have to sweetness?
I could try to defend myself and say that I think it's ridiculous for anybody in any income bracket to buy rims, but that's rather beside the point. I'm not my best self when I'm sitting in judgment and managing other people's money, and I doubt you're at your best when you do.
The idea that most people in public housing are living the lush life has persisted for at least as long as presidential candidate Ronald Reagan started using the offensive "welfare queen." But you ought to take a walk through the Iberville if you think its residents are living like royalty. Walk through and see if you'd exchange their thrones for yours.
The sight of a kid in public housing with an iPad doesn't offend me. Actually it gives me hope. So many poor people have no access to the digital world. They fall behind in school because of it. They miss the opportunity to apply for certain jobs. Yes an iPad is an expensive gadget, but we can't deny its usefulness. As computers go, an iPad comes cheaper than most laptops and desktops.
It might help to think of poor people as being as fully human as everybody else and as no more or less flawed. But if we are to believe a voicemail left for Reckdahl, they're lazy and litigious, just bad people through and through: "I think you missed the point ... that in the Iberville projects, the able-bodied welfare recipients that infest that place are waiting in line for (personal injury attorney) Morris Bart and this implosion to go hit the taxpayer once again, so you watch and see what happens, and of course you'll see I'm right.
"They need somebody to come in there and pick 'em up by limousine and take 'em to the Windsor Court or something like that. And they're still gonna sue anyway. Cuz that's what they do."
Note the use of the verb "infest." Some folks don't even think of the poor as people. They think of them as bugs.
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