New Orleans’s chickens are returning home to roost. A groundbreaking civil suit began in federal court in the Crescent City Monday to consider claims by property owners that the Army Corps of Engineers amplified the destructive effects of Hurricane Katrina by building a poorly designed navigation channel adjacent to the city, according to the New York Times. The suit claims that the channel was flawed in its design, construction and operation, and that those flaws intensified the flood damage to the eastern parts of the city, areas largely populated by Black residents. The federal government argues that Hurricane Katrina would have devastated the region whether or not the channel had ever been dug. —BB