NEW ORLEANS – Former New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin, ushered in to the mayor's office as a reformer and a 'non-traditional' politician, but now indigent and disgraced, reported to federal prison Monday to begin serving a 10-year sentence.
Nagin rode up to the facility in Texarkana in a small white car around 11:45 a.m. He was accompanied by some family and spent a long time in an embrace with them before entering the facility.
"Nagin stole our hearts on the way into office, and broke our hearts on the way out," said WWL-TV Political Analyst Clancy DuBos, in a commentary prior to Nagin's sentencing.
Nagin rode into office with a wave of support against popular former NOPD Supt. Richard Pennington in 2002. He was still much in public favor three years later, until Hurricane Katrina struck.
The ill-prepared city suffered mightily and all in charge of the aftermath suffered in the court of public opinion, but, none more so than Nagin, who had moments of bizarre behavior and whose key players in the rebuilding, like former recovery czar Ed Blakely, couldn't deliver a recovery fast enough for the anxious populace.
Nagin rode into office with the support of much of the city's white population, he was re-elected with the overwhelming support of black residents, who saw him as someone fighting for their rights to return in the face of others, who rumor had it, wanted to restructure the city.
In fairness, few probably could have moved as quickly on the recovery as the public desired and Nagin did try to quell expectations with an early pronouncement that a full recovery would take 10 years. Still, as tales of Nagin's alleged corruption began to unfurl, especially the idea that it occurred at the city's time of greatest need, many began to change their perception of Nagin from merely bumbling, to someone who took advantage of the recovery to try to set his family up in business and to take lavish trips on the dime of those trying to win city business.
Unlike many of the recent politicians who have come under corruption investigations, Nagin did not enter a guilty plea and receive a reduced sentence, instead he maintained his innocence (and still does) and, while not receiving the 15 to 17-year sentence many expected, he will still go to prison for a much longer time than his colleagues.
Just this week his former technology chief Greg Meffert, who allegedly arranged many of the trips and perks lavished on Nagin, and himself, received a 30-month sentence, and Mark St. Pierre, the man who lavished many of those gifts, saw his sentence dropped from 17 years to a little over 5.
When Nagin reports to the federal prison in Texarkana Monday, it will be the closing chapter of a 12-year odyssey that began with so much promise, took a violent and bizarre turn, and ended as a chapter of city history that most would like to just forget.
