Missed Opportunity?

The Essence Festival (http://www.essence.com/essence/emf/) is currently the talk of New Orleans. Moved to Houston one year ago courtesy of Hurricane Katrina, the festival returns to the Crescent City this year for its 13^th go round, and for some, none too soon. Per an article in today’s Times-Picayune (http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-8/1183623813216720.xml&coll=1), many fans weren’t thrilled with how the event came off last year. That’s not surprising. New Orleans and its atmosphere, particularly the musical side, would be hard to replicate for any city.

I decided to spend Thursday afternoon at the seminar session at the Convention Center so that I could at least get a taste of the atmosphere, flavor and energy. Sponsors, guest speakers, authors, celebs and even politicians (Hillary) spend the first two afternoons of the Festival providing what’s billed as the Empowerment Seminar Series and Celebration. It didn’t disappoint. The crowds were large, there was enough energy in the air to fill 10 convention centers and the Convention Center itself looked great inside (impressive considering that it was home to some of the most horrific scenes - along with the Superdome - witnessed in the days following the storm). Unfortunately, the above wasn’t applicable to all of the areas or booths at the seminar.

I almost decided to not touch on this, and to focus only on the positive. But like my Posting below (Letter of False Hope, 7/3/07), I can’t help but be frustrated that people aren’t using this huge event as a way to raise awareness and to garner more help for the greater New Orleans area. There are thousands of visitors in town (the hotels up and down Canal St. are nuts right now) for Essence and so why not take advantage of that and reach out more? There were small attempts. One of the speaking sessions featured a panel of Katrina Survivors, each with a different connection to the storm (resident, victim, case manager, etc.). The crowd for that was sparse, however (see pics below). And there was a row of booths set up for volunteer and non-profit organizations, but you could have counted on one hand the number of people over in that area at any one time (again, see the pics below). Meanwhile, the booths or areas for Coke, Budweiser, McDonald’s and Sony boomed with wall to wall people.

There’s no question that a festival like this should be positive, fun and uplifting. People don’t need to constantly wallow in the misery that Katrina has caused, and the residents here need outlets and diversions. But isn’t that what the concerts at night at the Superdome are mainly for? Couldn’t there have been a bigger push to remind people, particularly those visiting from out of town and at least during the daytime sessions, to not forget Katrina and to promote the rebuilding, community and volunteer efforts? I think the city, and Nagin, are blowing it on this one.