State takes over New Orleans.

Hurricane Katrina was the flood that broke the New Orleans schools back and left most of the schools under state management.

The state Department of Education has until June to devise a five-year plan to manage 102 public schools starting in the 2006-07 school year, in addition to five schools that were already in the "Recovery School District" before Katrina hit last August. The schools in the recovery district have been failing, i.e., in terms of accountability scores, for four or more years. Three of the five schools that were already in the recovery district before Katrina hit were to have opened in January.

"The hurricane exacerbated the problem," says Meg Casper, education department spokeswoman.

The state is meeting with New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, the Louisiana Recovery Authority, set up by Gov. Kathleen Blanco, and with the community to get input, Casper says.

The education arm of the mayor's Bring New Orleans Back Commission reportedly envisions considerable control to principals, slimming down administration and offering parents choices between district and charter schools. It's unclear when schools reopen, but they will be run by outside organizations, nola.com reports.

A year ago, the New Orleans Parish School Board approved a $16 million contract to have a firm take over the board's finances, as the district reportedly had corrupt and wasteful record-keeping and that accounting for employees required a worker-by-worker audit, according to nola.com

The New Orleans Parish School Board was to reopen two schools this school year and another 17 were to reopen in January, along with other charter schools reopening.