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District Faces Unprecedented Recovery Task

Crisis-Management Firm Taking Stock of Damage to New Orleans' Schools

The New Orleans public schools, already on the ropes, were dealt a knockout blow last week by Hurricane Katrina.

With some parts of the city under 20 feet of water—and its transportation, water, telephone, and electrical systems inoperable—there were no firm estimates of when schools in the 60,000-student system might reopen.

For any school district, cleaning up after a hurricane and flood is a Herculean task. But the New Orleans district, observers noted last week, already was hobbled by financial instability, political infighting, allegations of corruption,...