REBIRTH BEGINS, BUT WHERE WILL IT END? WHERE THE SAINTS COME MARCHING IN.

Byline: BILLY WITZ NFL 

What does the NFL mean to a community?

In most cases, it's a question that's strictly academic, the answers that come from franchise shills, politicians and economists too often ending up in rounded-up numbers and fuzzy logic.

In Los Angeles, the business and political leaders who want to see pro football return to L.A. claim it would be a boon to the area around the Coliseum. The same goes for Anaheim, where city leaders envision an NFL stadium as the final side of an entertainment pyramid -- along with Disneyland, the Pond and Angel Stadium.

It all sounds good on paper, but really, Los Angeles is in its 12th season without the NFL. And what does that mean to the region, besides having better viewing options?

Football is simply an entertainment option, and here it's among many.

It was hard, then, to figure that in a place like New Orleans it would be any different. There are, after all, more real problems for the people there -- starting with finding roofs over their heads, jobs to pay the bills, and wondering with every rain drop whether the levees will hold this time.

When the Saints prepared last week for their first game in the rebuilt Superdome, even the city, business and team officials who were touting the $185 million project as a catalyst for the city's recovery had the good sense not to oversell it.

``Like my daughter put it, this is bread and circus,'' said Marie Parque, who owns The Pearl Oyster Bar and Restaurant on St. Charles Avenue at the edge of the French Quarter. ``There are so many other things that are important that it's a distraction from what's going on in the rest of the city.''

Is it a good distraction?

``That depends,'' the genteel silver-haired woman said. ``If you've lost your home and are in the process of putting it back together, I don't know if you're excited about all this.''

Then Monday happened.

All over the city, people dressed in black and gold. They filled bars and restaurants, then the streets around the Superdome, not just forgetting their troubles for a few hours but remembering that they weren't alone. It turned out to be less a distraction than a release -- one they hadn't had in 13 months.

After the Saints' Steve Gleason blocked a punt for a touchdown two minutes into the game, fans turned to randomly high-five and hug one another, a scene of unmitigated joy that, according to written accounts, played out in neighborhoods citywide. Gleason said afterward that his only regret was not being able to run up the aisles and join the celebration.

Tomorrow will come, as it always does in New Orleans -- Ash Wednesday following Fat Tuesday -- and even Reggie Bush won't be able to sprinkle gold dust and make the city's problems go away.

Torey Magee, a one-man construction crew taking a break last week from stripping his mother's flooded one-story brick home in New Orleans East down to its foundation, wondered how the Superdome could be fixed so quickly when it took seven months for him just to get a FEMA trailer -- and another two weeks to get the keys.

Over in the lower Ninth Ward, Lance Edwards wondered much the same thing as he stood outside the portable trailer from which he sold BBQ ribs and pork chops. It was one of two businesses open along a several-mile stretch of St. Claude Avenue, one of the lower Ninth's main thoroughfares.

The rest are boarded up, abandoned shops and homes. Other areas of the city are also largely vacant -- Lakeview, Gentilly, New Orleans East and St. Bernard -- but nowhere as empty as the Lower Ninth, where even the sight of the white FEMA trailers is rare, and about the only thing in working order are the stop lights and street lights.

Edwards says he still has high hopes for the area. He envisions a black middle-class neighborhood there someday, one that's built not with handouts but with a hand cutting red tape and insurance checks. Just what the Superdome got.

``The message to the city leaders should be that if you can fix up the dome, which was torn apart, shredded,'' Edwards said as he gestured across the street to the lifeless, neglected block, ``then you can fix this.''

Whether that promise is fulfilled is a long way off. As the answer evolves, so, too, will the way that Monday night is remembered.

Saints owner Tom Benson, ever since he was dragged back to New Orleans kicking and screaming by former commissioner Paul Tagliabue, has sunk millions into the rebuilding effort. But it's also worth remembering that he's in the middle of a lease that will pay him $186 million from state coffers, and that since Katrina the Saints seem content with those terms.

The NFL poured its marketing might into making the game a national showcase, and it has contributed to local youth programs and scheduled an owner's meeting next month in New Orleans -- all welcome steps.

But through it all, nothing was mentioned about a Super Bowl -- not until the Saints have a long-term lease, anyway. And no promises were made about the future.

The Saints' lease expires after the 2010 season, which is about the time the NFL expects to have a new stadium in LosAngeles.

What the Saints mean to one city may no longer be academic, but the same cannot be said for another question facing the NFL: Do you know what it means to miss NewOrleans?

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- Dave Goldberg/AP