Tag: BP oil spill

Six years ago, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf coast. The impact of Katrina and government bungling continue to inflict major pain on the people left behind. It is impossible to understand what happened and what still remains without considering race, gender and poverty. The following offer some hints of what remains.

In a region where nine out of 10 residents are white, the cleanup workers are almost exclusively Black men. NAACP President Ben Jealous wrote to BP CEO Tony Hayward demanding to know why Black people were over-represented in “the most physically difficult, lowest paying jobs, with the most significant exposure to toxins.”