Trip,
I'm pretty sure jazzfest will go off on schedule. Right now the city leaders are shooting for enough recovery to have a full on Mardi Gras in February. Many of the large hotels in the quarter are open already, housing recovery and construction personel.
The Maple leaf is indeed open now with a fairly large schedule of shows. The other large clubs should open soon. I saw today that Tipitina's will host new year's eve with Galactic. St Charles and the garden district really didn't flood too bad. The wind blew down some trees but oaks are tough, I'm sure they are ok. The oaks in my neighborhood did ok even aftre being under salt water for 3 weeks.
New Orleans will survive and hopefully be better than ever. Check out
www.nola.com for more info.
peace,
mojo