Monique Verdin is a resident of St Bernard Parish and a native daughter of southeast Louisiana. Her collection of photo and video documentation, exposing her homeland and indigenous heritage, began over a decade ago. Verdin has intimately witnessed and captured the backlash of Louisiana’s environmental loss and the marsh-level realities of global climate change that challenge the bayou communities of her homeland. Her photography has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and is included in The Good Pirates of the Forgotten Bayous, Yale University Press (2008) and Nonesuch Records’ Habitat for Humanity benefit album Our New Orleans (2005).

Monique is in the process of updating her website and will be posting regular updates from the affected parishes.

We Delta Dwellers living in the bayou communities of South Louisiana wait with uncertainty as a black tide rolls in.

Five thousand feet below sea-level BP’s Deepwater Horizon well continues to leak hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. They tell us they are weeks away from implementing a quick fix that they are not sure will work and months away from drilling another hole to siphon the leaking well.

South Louisiana is famous for end-of-the-road highways, leading down fingerling ridges reaching south towards the Gulf of Mexico. On Friday, April 30, I drove to Venice, the southernmost drivable dead-end along side the Mississippi River in Plaquemines Parish to watch the sunrise and see if I could smell that sweet Louisiana crude washing into the delta.

Later in the afternoon, I ventured down the road from my house to the little Isleno fishing village in St. Bernard Parish known as Ysyclosky and another dead-end known as Shell Beach, overlooking the decommissioned saltwater dagger called the MRGO (Mississippi River Gulf Outlet).

In Ysyclosky, Brad Robin, an old podnah of my fathers, watched as deckhands unloaded the last sacks of oysters from the Ms. Donna Ann. “I’m an oyster fisherman today,” he said, “but I don’t know what I’m going to be tomorrow.”

Selena and Josie Gonzales, senior citizen friends of mine who have fished oysters for over 40 years fear what the black tide of oil will bring to their lives and to the lives of those around them. Mrs. Selena said she thought it might be the end of the world, citing 2012 prophesies.

On April 24, I was at a Blessing of the Fleet in Pointe au Chenes, our ceremonial celebration to usher in the shrimp season. The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries opened the season last week, 3 weeks early, so fishermen would have a chance to harvest before the estuaries are inundated with oil.

Fisheries in St. Bernard Parish were closed as of yesterday, May 1, 2010.

My neighbors Phillip and Jason are two brothers born and raised in St. Bernard with deep Delacroix Island roots and strong ties to the marshes and waterways that surround it. One is a fulltime commercial crab fisherman the other a fireman who fishes on the side.

The fisherman brother was not allowed into the water yesterday, losing out on his crab trap investment. BP is training fishermen to harvest hazardous material in an attempt to save their way of life. For the last two days, the fireman brother has been diligently working on his crab boat, the Devil in Disguise, converting it into an oil clean-up vessel.

The weather here on south Louisiana’s coast is oddly similar to tropical storm weather, grey skies and spitting rain mixed with strong erratic winds. The south wind continues to blow out of the south at 30 mph, churning the oil storm’s gulf waters.

We wait with uncertainty as the Black Tide rolls in.

Oil Storm permitting, we are planning a Black Tide Blues Bash on Pensacola Beach, Florida, at the Paradise Bar and Grill on Friday, May 7, 2010 from 6-10pm. The event will be a fundraiser for Gulf Restoration Network and Voice of the Wetlands. Their work is more important now than ever.

Houma blues boys Josh Garrett and the Bottomline will be playing and Zack Smith and I will be exhibiting Wetland photography.

The LSU/VA project has been mired in controversy since its inception in November 2007, when Mayor C. Ray Nagin signed a deal with the Veterans Administration to provide land currently occupied by homes and businesses “construction ready.” Now, over two years later, these proceedings on street closures mark the first public hearing and formal action by any municipal body on the proposed hospital complex. Opponents brought two years’ worth of anxiety and frustration with them to the hearing on February 23.

Ironically, the City Planning Commission erred on the side of generosity when applying the rules governing public meetings as dictated by the Commission’s Administrative Rules, Policies and Procedures. It gave adjacent property owners 25 days notice of the meeting date rather than the 10 required. It advertised in The Times-Picayune starting on Feb. 12, exceeding the 3 day requirement. It extended the speaking time limit for those opposed and in favor from the required 25 minutes to 1 hour and 15 minutes.

And yet, for several procedural reasons, the hearing left the public feeling shut out and demanding redress:

• The period to submit written comments was first advertised to the public the Friday before Mardi Gras (Feb. 12), and Ash Wednesday (Feb. 17) was the deadline to submit written comments. The only day City Hall was accessible to the public was Feb. 17.

• The staff report was technically available Thursday, Feb. 18, but since the staff reports are not available online and City Hall is closed on Fridays, it was difficult to access before Monday, Feb. 22- 5 days after the close of the comment period and one day before the hearing.

• With a limit of 2 minutes per speaker, and with the period to submit written responses closed, the staff report was shielded from any meaningful scrutiny or comment regarding inaccurate, incomplete or otherwise misleading details, yet was the document that the members of the City Planning Commission relied on to make their decision.

• According to the hearing minutes, of the 35 people who signed up to speak in opposition to the closures, 20 were able to speak with within the allotted 40 minute time frame (limited to 2 minutes each) and 15 people were denied the right to speak, despite the hearing’s advertisement which stated that All interested parties will be given the opportunity to be heard in reference to this request.

• A staff member gave a verbal accounting of the report after the public comment was concluded, so that anyone who might have questions to raise after hearing that summary was precluded from commenting. According to Yolanda Rodriguez, Executive Director of the City Planning Commission, “It is not customary for the public to comment on the staff’s verbal presentation to the Commission.”

Certainly, the City Planning Commission should have had a greater role in this project from its inception; now it is feeling pressure to expedite the process. In comments directed to its members on the 23rd, Mary Howell, a lawyer whose office is a block outside the VA footprint, said, “Fairness has not been part of this process. Somehow, y’all got left out. You have been a bystander to this, and that’s something that has harmed us from the beginning. You have an important role to play. Please don’t abdicate it.”

Abdicate they have, in a move with all the hallmarks of a municipal government facing the prospect of a project deemed “too big to fail.” Commissioner Joe Williams stated, “I for one can say I’m not happy about involving the Planning Commission so late in the process,” he said. “But we sit here almost five years after the storm. … At some point, we have to say it’s time to move on.”

No one wants to appear to be an obstructionist when a proposal promises great economic and social benefit for the city. But evading public input does nothing to quell concerns. Simple changes in the timing of notice publication, instructing attendees on the protocol for public input, and honoring the procedures as advertised would make civic participation more likely and more productive. For any process to work, all parties must act in good faith.

The bank and automotive bailouts a year ago taught us that process matters. If the existing process is short-circuiting public input, the process needs retooling. Moving forward on projects promising public benefit before legitimate questions from the public are answered won’t make a flawed project better, and won’t make the questions go away.

Last year, a consultant from Miami’s Beacon Council, a public-private economic development enterprise, advised the New Orleans City Council to put quality of life issues first and foremost in efforts to recruit outside investment. After all, the consultant said, corporations are made up of people and people come with families.

While the investment opportunity may look tantalizing to corporate leadership, it still has to pass “the spouse test.” Spouses of employees will want to be sure there are quality schools, nearby groceries and safe neighborhoods before they make the move.

To draw new money into the local economy and keep it here earning dividends, we must capitalize on our strengths. As a recent Travel and Leisure survey of America’s 30 Favorite Cities demonstrates, our music, food and architecture are certainly world-class. And in an increasingly homogenized world, entrepreneurs and skilled workers are more likely to invest and settle in communities that preserve their distinctive local character.

But character is not enough.

We must be a community with a well-educated labor pool, low crime, excellent schools and financially stable families.

In other words, we must have a healthy local economy firmly in place.

The Urban Conservancy, in partnership with urban retail analysis firm Civic Economics, recently released its study, Thinking Outside the Box: A Report on Independent Merchants and the New Orleans Economy.

Data collected from Magazine Street merchants on taxes, revenue, charitable giving and payroll shows local retailers, when compared with leading chain competitors, generate twice the annual sales, recirculate revenue within the local economy at twice the rate, and, on a per-square-foot basis, have four times the economic impact while consuming a fraction of the land.

Implications for New Orleans’ redevelopment are enormous. The study demonstrates that investing in locally owned businesses is a cost-effective way to grow the New Orleans economy and is compatible with development patterns in existing commercial districts.

The city can stimulate wealth creation and retention by developing a coordinated strategy that focuses on local businesses growth and retention as a prerequisite for business attraction.

Full retail occupancy along St. Claude Avenue, Freret, Canal, and Oak streets and our other commercial corridors is one indicator of success in stimulating local economic growth and stabilizing surrounding neighborhoods. Enforced procurement practices demonstrating New Orleans’ determination to build from within by sourcing with local vendors first and whenever possible will accelerate such a transformation. So will a more responsive City Hall that facilitates rather than impedes local business success.

Firms whose business models require continual expansion in order to avoid collapse will always invest in New Orleans, and every other population center with a pulse. We will never want for Walgreens, Family Dollar, or Dollar General stores. They need us far more than we need them. And residents tired of blighted and vacant commercial spaces will shrug their shoulders and say, “Oh, well. It’s better than what was there before.”

For the long-term health and vibrancy of our city, we need to attract firms that are investing in New Orleans because of its unique qualities, not in spite of them. Such firms will strengthen existing economic investment, not cannibalize it the way formula retailers requiring homogeneity and taxpayer-funded subsidies do.

Ultimately, however, the the robustness of our local economy is what matters most. Strong place-based businesses are key to the survivability, livability and prosperity of every community. And as quirky as New Orleans is, it is no exception to this rule.

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A condensed version of this article originally ran as a guest editorial in CityBusiness on October 5, 2009.

Of the three, the least obvious and most pervasive threat of the three is internet retail. Consumers are drawn to the convenience and savings that tax-free online shopping provides, but don’t realize that their community pays for these savings in three significant ways.

First, low-income families carry an unfair tax burden since credit card and internet access, and therefore tax-free online retail, are most available to higher income brackets. Thus, the most regressive form of taxation becomes even more regressive.

Second, the community loses needed tax revenue to fund public services including police protection, healthcare, and schools. Internet retailers with no physical presence or “nexus” in a state are not required to collect sales taxes on purchases. In theory, consumers are required to keep track of their online purchases and then pay the appropriate amount owed in sales tax as “use tax” on their state tax return. In practice, this “fair use tax law” is nearly unenforceable. A 2009 University of Tennessee study estimated that uncollected sales taxes on e-commerce cost Louisiana $269 million in 2008 and predicts those losses will rise to $396 million by 2012.

Finally, exempting online retailers from collecting sales taxes puts bricks-and-mortar businesses at a competitive disadvantage. In Orleans and Jefferson parishes, where sales taxes approach ten percent, companies like Amazon, the nation’s 20th largest retailer, are granted, in effect, a nearly 10 percent price advantage over local businesses.

A consumer who buys a camera for $2699 at Lakeside Camera Photoworks, for example, will end up spending $2935 including taxes. Online, that same purchase will not entail paying sales tax, putting Lakeside at a $236 price disadvantage. Jefferson Parish and Louisiana lose out on $236 in taxes and Lakeside Camera will lose out on the sale. The $329 gross margin Lakeside would have made on the sale of that camera would have gone to training salespeople, and paying rent, utilities, advertising and other costs locally. Instead, it will enrich a different community. The out-of-state vendor’s gain is Lakeside Camera’s-and Jefferson Parish’s-loss.

It’s time that Louisiana level the playing field for all retailers. Other states have already taken steps in this direction. This year, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and New York passed laws requiring many large online retailers to collect sales taxes for purchases within their borders. (All three states exempt smaller online retailers.)

Meanwhile, 41 states and the District of Columbia have signed on to the Streamlined Sales Tax Project, a coordinated effort to align sales tax policies. The goal is to make sales tax rules so similar across states that it will be easy for large online retailers to collect taxes nationwide (which all national chains already do, using widely available software). With sales taxes more uniform nationally, theses states plan to call on Congress to pass the Main Street Fairness Act, which would make it possible to extend the requirement to collect sales taxes to all retailers with more than $5 million in annual sales.

Of the 45 states that have a sales tax, all but four have signed on to this multi-state initiative. Louisiana is one of the states that has not.

As we work to convince Louisiana lawmakers that our local businesses deserve a level playing field, it’s crucial that we remember that the money we “save” by shopping online is in fact no savings at all, but a drain on our region’s ability to create jobs, generate wealth, educate our children, and provide essential services.

Article by Dana Eness and David Guidry. Dana Eness is the executive director of The Urban Conservancy and can be reached at dana@staylocal.org. David Guidry is second-generation owner of Lakeside Camera Photoworks and can be reached at david@lakesidecamera.com.

With this project, Mid-City gains a low-density, single story, single-use construction much like any of the other 50-odd Walgreens stores already saturating the New Orleans market and the 7000 other stores nationwide. It will conform to a prototype of 14,500 square feet and a single lane drive-through pharmacy Walgreens uses in the New Orleans market.

We can reasonably expect the final product to have slight design modifications that acknowledge the dense, walkable streetcar-oriented neighborhood of restaurants and businesses surrounding it. But design modifications such as landscaping and building placement closer to sidewalks are not sufficient to add momentum to the area’s renaissance or serve as a catalyst for walkable urban development.

Developers sidestepped the active and often contentious community engagement that accompanied the construction of the Walgreens at S. Carrollton and S. Claiborne two years ago by devising a design for the Mid-City site that complies fully with the Carrollton overlay and all zoning requirements. Since a waiver wasn’t required, neither was community input.

The Walgreens at Canal and Carrollton illustrates that even when development is done “right,” that is, in compliance with existing review standards and zoning regulations, the result can be underperforming in its ability to provide the host community not only inspiring design, but also quality job creation, tax revenue, and sales revenue recirculated within the local economy.

In 2006, faculty and students of the Urban Planning + Design program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City engaged in research and analysis of the Mid-City neighborhood as a cultural heritage tourism node, with the assistance of The Urban Conservancy, members of the Mid-City Neighborhood Organization, and the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy.

Recommended adaptation of the Walgreens site conformed to neighborhood plans and were sensitive to flood mitigation. The team recommended transit-oriented development of a signature building or buildings on the parcel with limited parking reflecting the intention of a walkable restaurant district and streetcar route adjacent to it. The building(s) would accommodate multiple street-level commercial spaces—including, conceivably, a Walgreens with housing safe from flooding on floors above the retail.

Such a design would also provide space for small business start-ups, a critical component given the strong pattern of local business commitment to Mid-City’s recovery. The development would have been more consistent with Mid-City’s vision of a pedestrian and bike-friendly, mixed use neighborhood and with the proposed zoning for that high-visibility intersection as reflected in the April 2009 draft of the Master Plan land use map.

As a community, New Orleans needs to give itself permission to raise the bar on our expectations of what our neighborhoods deserve and should expect from new development.

One tool other communities use to good effect is the community impact review which requires projects of certain sizes to submit economic impact analysis evaluating whether the project will adversely affect existing retailers in the area; its net impact on jobs and job quality; and its impact on tax revenue and city costs.

Another tool at our disposal is the Master Plan and Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance. The City Planning Commission intends to issue a Public Hearing Draft on September 14th. The public will have one month to review it. A final citywide forum will be held and structured as an open house workshop in mid-September and will give the public an opportunity to ask questions.

The feedback provided by the public on September 14 won’t change a thing at the corner of Carrollton and Canal. But it will be a step in the right direction for better, higher impact development throughout the city in the future.

Walgreens can and does make significant exceptions to its design prototype. See examples here.

Business Council members Leslie Jacobs and George Wilson, and Managing Director Bob Brown joined with New Orleans City Council members Jackie Clarkson, Stacy Head and Shelley Midura in going to Baton Rouge over a week-long period with personal appeals to legislators to defeat this legislation. They were joined in the effort by Henry Charlot and Kurt Weigle from the downtown Development District, Jaci Coles and Eric Strachan from Councilwoman Clarkson’s office, Leslie Alley, Bill Robinson and Yolanda Rodriguez from the City Planning Commission, Ruthie Frierson from Citizen’s for 1 Greater New Orleans, Meg Lousteau from the Vieux Carre Property Owners Association, Michelle Kimball from the Preservation Resource Center, Letitia Clark George of the New Orleans Metropolitan Association of Realtors and, local attorney Bill Borah. Each of them had a direct hand in rallying the support of House members. Also playing key roles in engaging legislators were veteran Governmental Affairs professionals C. J. Blache, Derrell Cohoon, C.B. Forgotston, Deborah Harkins and Byron Stewart.

Senator Murray and his supporters argued that his bill would give the voters the final say over planning decisions in their neighborhoods. The more insidious effect, however, would have been to push the city back to the old-school, politicized and dysfunctional planning process that has crippled development in New Orleans for decades. The defeat of Senate Bill 75 represents a triumph of smart and progressive decision-making over the failed policies of the past.

It is now up to us to make certain - not just that this hearing is comprehensive and legitimate - but also that the City Planning Commission and its staff meet their obligation and responsibility to the public as the city’s department of planning experts. A public forum alone does not guarantee the reasonable, independent analysis of the competing hospital plans we need to ensure that officials are making the best possible choice for the best possible outcome for residents and taxpayers.

This is what we should expect our City Planning Commission to accomplish:

1. Include both the FHL/RMJM and LSU/VA site proposals in the Master Plan planning process in order to determine the impact the projects will have on Mid-City, the Central Business District, and the City of New Orleans.

2. Use the testimony presented and the materials submitted at this public hearing to produce a recommendation to City Council concerning which of the hospital proposals is in the best interest of Mid-City, the CBD, and the City of New Orleans.

3. Request the City Council to hold a public hearing on the recommendations presented to them by the Commission in order that the Council will be in a position to adopt a resolution expressing its opinion on which hospital proposal is in the best interest of Mid-City, the CBD, and the City of New Orleans.

Please attend this pivotal civic event.

At a press conference on Wednesday, March 25th, 2009, The Urban Conservancy joined with more than forty-five local, regional and national organizations to call on Louisiana Governor Jindal to order an independent, third-party comprehensive cost-benefit analysis of the two leading plans — LSU’s proposed new construction in Lower Mid-City and the alternative proposal to gut Charity Hospital and rebuild a new 21st century hospital inside the shell. The groups argue that a rigorous, side-by-side financial analysis will both clear up contradictory claims about construction costs of the two plans and will also measure the impact of different timelines on job creation, related economic development and health care delivery to the community.

The proposed medical centers represent the single largest facilities project that will be undertaken in New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. They will involve massive federal spending, a major appropriation of state funding and should be a critical component to the rebirth of New Orleans. With so many different entities involved and so much at stake, it falls to the Governor to step in and bring impartial evaluation and clarity to the process.

ADD YOUR VOICE TO OURS - TAKE ACTION TODAY! Urge Governor Jindal to step in and order an independent cost-benefit analysis of the competing plans by filling out and sending a message to the Governor today at this link.

In his official statement issued February 17, 2009, City Council Vice President Arnie Fielkow, urged “citizens to express their outrage at the Administration’s decision to effectively remove their voice from the awarding of professional service contracts.” Take action now.

Official Statement of City Council Vice President Arnie Fielkow:

“On February 5, the New Orleans City Council unanimously approved an ordinance creating enhanced openness and transparency in both the executive and legislative branches of local government relating to the awarding of professional service contracts. This ordinance, which was supported by a broad cross-section of the community and passed 7-0 by the council, was vetoed by Mayor Nagin on February 12, 2009. In the mayor’s public statements on the issue, he himself justified his veto by saying he wanted openness and transparency in city government.

Regrettably, city officials learned today that the Administration placed an official notice in the back pages of Monday’s Times Picayune Sports section outlining a proposed new executive order governing the city’s professional service contracting process. The proposed new executive order would replace the current system of having a selection review panel comprised of mayoral aides and outside appointees reviewing professional service contracts, a process which according to the Louisiana Attorney General, needs to be in compliance with the Louisiana Open Meeting laws. The mayor’s current process does not comply with the Louisiana Open Meeting law and was the basis for the council’s ordinance on February 5.

Under the proposed new executive order … in an effort to avoid the Louisiana Open Meetings laws, the mayor, instead of embracing enhanced openness and transparency, has taken several steps backwards. The mayor has returned the city’s professional service contracting process to an era of closed-door decision-making. Indeed, if the proposed new executive order goes into effect, the only individuals reviewing and consulting on the proposals will be employees appointed directly by the mayor, namely the chief administrative officer, the city attorney and/or the Office of Recovery and Development Administration director. Their evaluation of contracts and input to the mayor may be either verbal or written, thus ensuring that the public, including the inspector general, will now be totally excluded from the selection process.

The City Council’s actions two weeks ago ensured that the contracting process would be open and transparent and that the public could be informed and engaged as to how their dollars are being used. Meetings would have been publicly noticed, citizens would have been able to view and participate and minutes of all meetings would have been kept. Sadly, despite the mayor’s stated intentions to achieve openness and transparency, his current actions contradict his words and negatively affect a citizen base which desperately seeks to have its city government operate in the sunshine.

Who loses in this?

The public.

Who loses the most?

Those in our community who have historically been shut out of the decision making process in this city, who have not shared in economic opportunities and who have historically competed on an uneven playing field.

This is what the council’s February 5 ordinance was designed to combat.
I am confident that my council colleagues will join me to override the mayor’s veto of ordinance Cal. No. 23,388 this Thursday. The ordinance passed by the unanimous council at the February 5 City Council meeting is still relevant, even with the mayor’s newly proposed executive order.

I further urge citizens to express their outrage at the Administration’s decision to effectively remove their voice from the awarding of professional service contracts.
In the words of President Barack Obama, spoken at his inauguration only a few weeks ago:

“(T)hose of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account, to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day, because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.”

Lower Mid-City Residents and Business Owners, The National Trust for Historic Preservation and their partner the Foundation for Historical Louisiana view this decision as a serious error, as alternatives exist for these medical centers that would provide the same benefits while saving the neighborhood and reusing Charity Hospital (PDF). The new hospitals would destroy 70 acres of the neighborhood, including 145 historic buildings where residents have been rebuilding and restoring their community since Hurricane Katrina. The VA hospital has agreed to fund the relocation of approximately 20 single-story homes of “historic significance.”

According to an alert released by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the VA and LSU have chosen “the most time-consuming, difficult, expensive and destructive route” to deliver health care to the region’s veterans and a medical teaching facility to the community. With this decision, the bulldozing of homes and businesses could start as soon as the day after Christmas.

Alternatives include building the VA hospital on the site currently proposed for the new LSU hospital with LSU occupying a renovated, rehabbed Charity as the new Academic Medical Center. Another alternative would co-locate the new VA and LSU hospitals on the site currently slated for a new LSU hospital.

A third alternative is the commercial site containing the vacant Lindy Boggs Medical Center. “No homes or other historic buildings occupy this site, it has fewer parcels of land to assemble and the land would be available immediately from a willing seller,” the National Trust said in its press release.

Despite the announcement of Lower Mid-City as the selected site, many pieces have yet to fall into place— most notably, $1.2 billion in funding for the LSU hospital— and many questions remain unanswered. Of grave concern is the City’s agreement to deliver construction-ready land to the VA before funding for the project is assured.

The American urbanscape of the 20th and 21st centuries is littered with good intentions and bull-dozed tracts of land where neighborhoods once stood— tracts that never materialized into the promised engines of economic development. The time to consider less disruptive options is before the wrecking balls swing.

The Urban Conservancy urges you to take action now while Lower Mid-City is still intact. Strongly encourage the VA and the State of Louisiana to reconsider other less harmful alternative sites. And encourage your elected officials to champion their constituents’ rights to fair mitigation. We’ve made it easy with the links to sample letters below.

TAKE ACTION: With Less Than 30 Days Left, Please:

Email Governor Bobby Jindal and Louisiana Secretary of Health and Hospitals Alan Levine, and The Honorable James B. Peake, Secretary of Veterans Affairs.

Email Councilmembers with special attention to Stacy Head, Arnie Fielkow and Jackie Clarkson.

MORE ABOUT THIS ISSUE:

Learn about Charity Hospital and why NTHP listed it as one of the 11 Most Endangered Places this year;

View NTHP’s slideshow What’s At Stake in Mid-City;

Read National Trust’s Five Unanswered Questions for Federal, State, and Local Officials regarding this issue.

Peruse a collection of related news articles dating back to December of 2007 at The Urban Conservancy’s News Roundup.

• Direct consultation on high impact energy efficiency options based on a detailed inspection of the energy issues in your home or business.

• Financing for efficiency improvements paid directly out of the energy savings, which requires no upfront money.

• A list of qualified contractors and an independent quality assurance inspection once the work is done.

The program is supported in two ways. A system benefit charge of 1 mil / kWh (one tenth of a cent) is paid by all utility customers, which provides for the creation and administration of the program, consultations and quality assurance, contractor training and certification, and low income services. For the average residential customer, the cost works out to be about $1 / month (equal to the savings from replacing one frequently used incandescent light with a compact fluorescent bulb). The energy efficiency home improvements use private capital financing paid directly out of the energy savings. The program is designed to improve 2,800 homes each year with individual expected energy savings between 20-30%.

The substantial savings for improved homes is further enhanced by the city-wide savings from reducing use of high price energy during times of peak demand. All customers in the city benefit from lower peak energy prices when total consumption drops. Instead of throwing our money down a hole, with the utility company reaping the benefits, we should be lowering our utility bills while investing in the value of our homes.

Please show your support for the Energy Smart program on Wednesday, June 25th at 1pm in the City Council Chambers.

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By Forest Bradley-Wright, Sustainable Rebuild Director, Alliance for Affordable Energy

The Alliance for Affordable Energy is a 22 year old non-profit grassroots organization dedicated to creating fair, affordable, environmentally responsible, community-based energy policies for Louisiana and the nation.

1001 S. Broad Street, Room 119 - New Orleans 70125 - (504) 208-9761 - www.all4energy.org

For this highly-significant contract to have both an immediate and enduring impact, the New Orleans Home Rule Charter must be amended so that (1) the Master Plan, when completed, will have the force of law — that is, all public officials as well as private citizens will be required to follow it; (2) land use regulations - including the Zoning ordinance - as well as all capital expenditures will have to be consistent with it; and (3) all citizens will be legally structured into the planning process.

Why Should You Support the Charter Amendments?

1. New Orleans needs a Master Plan to responsibly direct its growth and development,

2. New Orleans needs a Master Plan that both private citizens and public officials know will be followed and adhered to as required by law.

3. New Orleans needs a Master Plan in which all of the regulations required to implement the plan will be consistent with the Plan.

4. New Orleans needs a Master Plan and a planning process that is transparent and predictable to attract quality economic development to the city.

5. New Orleans needs a Master Plan that will give the Mayor and the City Council the authority to direct the growth of the city, but relieves them of the day-to-day land use decisions that take up so much of their time.

6. New Orleans needs a Master Plan that can be developed, revised, and amended in a transparent planning process easily understood by all citizens.

7.In order to maintain its distinctive urban character, New Orleans needs a Master Plan to protect its historic buildings and strengthen its unique neighborhoods.

8. New Orleans needs a Master Plan and a planning process that will insure that all citizens will be structured into the process and have the ability to shape it.

9.New Orleans needs a Master Plan that citizens will support and take an ownership interest in because they were involved in creating the plan and the plan that they created must be followed.

10. With more historic resources than any city in America, and increasing numbers of visitors coming every year, New Orleans needs a Master Plan that will insure the continued expansion of its tourist industry.

Jackie Clarkson will introduce Charter amendments at the Thursday, June 5th City Council meeting that will incorporate these three vital concepts: force of law, consistency, and citizen involvement.

Ms. Clarkson’s Charter amendments were prepared by Smart Growth for Louisiana, an organization dedicated to reforming the state and city’s land use planning processes. In preparing the amendments, the nonprofit relied heavily on the expertise of top land use lawyers and urban planners from around the country.

The Smart Growth Charter amendments are supported by increasing numbers of citizens and community organizations, including the Unified New Orleans Plan (UNOP) District One Steering Committee — a coalition of individuals and organizations from the Central Business District, French Quarter, Lafayette Square, Picayune Place, and the Warehouse District.

How Can You Show Your Support?

First, distribute this information widely to your friends and colleagues.

Second, send a brief email to the addresses below by Thursday, May 29 (or as soon as you can) indicating your support of the amendments and urging all members of the Council, the Mayor and Dr. Blakely to join Ms. Clarkson in this ground-breaking effort.

With the Council’s approval of these amendments, New Orleans will have an unprecedented opportunity to move beyond the dysfunctional, special-interest-driven planning process that has plagued the city for decades, and to create a visionary one that all our citizens can be proud of.

E-Mail List:

Jacquelyn Clarkson, Council Member at Large, JBClarkson@cityofno.com
Arnie Fielkow, Council Member at Large, AFielkow@cityofno.com
Shelley Midura, Council Member, District “A,” SMidura@cityofno.com
Stacy Head, Council Member, District “B,” SHead@cityofno.com
James Carter, Council Member, District “C,” JCarter@cityofno.com
Cynthia Hedge-Morrell, Council Member, District “D,” CHMorrell@cityofno.com
Cynthia Willard-Lewis, Council Member, District “E,” CWLewis@cityofno.com
psmith@mayorofno.com
Dr. Edward Blakely ejblakely@cityofno.com
Betsy Stout, betsy61900@aol.com

Read the most recent recommended charter amendments. This is not the final version, but a work in progress.

They might not have a champion in City Hall, but an Emmy Award-winning journalist is working to shine a light on their situation with his documentary film-in-progress, Independent America: Rising from the Ruins The final feature-length documentary is scheduled to be ready for national broadcast by early fall.

Hanson Hosein and his assistants have been touring the city with their cameras to find out how a wide variety of mom-and-pop businesses are faring in post-Katrina New Orleans.

The clip includes comments from Edward Blakely of the city’s Office of Recovery Development and Administration as he bicycles with Hosein through a Katrina-damaged neighborhood.

Blakely tells Hosein that “the pressure from the ordinary citizens” is to bring more big-box stores. Blakely concedes that big boxes may “put these … little guys out of business,” but he insists that citizens he is hearing from say they’re focused on their own rebuilding efforts and “can’t think about that guy’s business.”

Granted, Dr. Blakely’s sound bite was extracted from a larger conversation, but it is fair to ask whether his characterization is accurate. Are New Orleanians really clamoring for chain retailers per se, or simply for a robust local economy? It is a mistake to conflate the two.

Locally owned businesses have been critical in our city’s recovery. Many reopened within days of the storm while corporate chains nervously kept their distance.

Now that federal recovery money is trickling in, big retailers are courting local politicians and scoring the sort of tax incentives our local businesses can only dream about.

Ironically, independent business owners will subsidize with their tax dollars those projects that threaten their very livelihood.

We believe that, in fact, most New Orleanians do understand the link between community well-being and their neighborhood businesses. For this very reason many residents of Orleans Parish resent the drive out to neighboring parishes to shop at the big boxes; they’d rather spend their dollars closer to home.

“If I’m going to spend my dollars at Target,” the reasoning goes, “I’d rather spend them at a Target in Orleans Parish.”

However, there are long-term costs in cozying up to corporate chains: Inevitably, profits are siphoned off from the host community and invested elsewhere.

Meanwhile, the citizen-owned businesses that have invested and re-invested in New Orleans — and that collectively contribute hundreds of millions of dollars and many thousands of jobs to the local economy — are ignored by the architects of public policy.

Not only is this unfair, but it is ultimately self-destructive, undermining local decision-making, wealth creation and retention, environmental sustainability and competition.

Hanson Hosein has documented the difficulties of independent small businesses around our country. His current film project exemplifies his belief — and ours — that New Orleans can be smarter, more diverse and more local than hundreds of less lucky American communities with derelict main streets and nowhere to go but the shiny big box on the edge of town.

… … .
This guest editorial originally appeared in the Times-Picayune on April 23, 2008.

Dana Eness of New Orleans is executive director of the Urban Conservancy. She can be reached at dana@staylocal.org.

One of the best ways to counter a surprise is to let your government representatives know that you know. One of the most effectiveways to declare your position on the surprise development is to write a polite letter or email to the appropriate individuals.

So whether your neighborhood becomes the site of a haunted bed & breakfast, a high-rise condo, or something else that does not fit the Unified New Orleans Plan, the Master Plan, or your idea of rational, sustainable development, focus your efforts on writing letters. They usually receive some sort of response and provide documentation that will provide clarity and direction as the process and dialogue move forward.

One of the most important aspects of a good letter to a city official and news outlets is to write a polite, fact-based letter devoid of angry rhetoric. As an example, below is a letter that Karen Gadbois wrote on behalf of her neighborhood association.

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Dear Ms. Wright,

It is my understanding that a preliminary plan for the Carrollton Shopping Center area has been put forward internally, including double left hand turn lanes on Palmetto and the relocation of a Bus Stop at the Palmetto Canal.

While I understand that this plan has not been adopted or formally reviewed the fact that the Developer is going forward with financing strategies utilizing tax credits it would seem that the public should be engaged.

I attended the meeting last year {May 2007} where the developer set out vague and non-specific ideas for the property with no mention of the impact on the area or the wishes of the residents in terms of traffic and scale. While we were asked what kind of stores we would like we were never asked what kinds of traffic and transportation issues there were nor what mitigating factors may come into play. In fact at that very meeting the developer needed to be reminded of his obligation to mow the grass. Which may give some indication of his familiarity with the site and surrounding areas.

If you are familiar with the area, you would understand that this intersection not only causes great issues with the on and off ramps of 110, but that the underpass is impassable in a heavy rain fall. The issues that have plagued that area Pre K have not been relived by the lack of retail there. It is as bad as it ever was.

http://blog.nola.com/times-picayune/2007/05/storms_sweep_through_region.html

We in the community have spent endless hours visioning and planning as we were ordered to in order for funds to be released by the State. It seems that the plans we made with UNOP and Lambert are not being considered.

Could you please inform us of a meeting timeline for this project, if there is one. If not would you please inform Mr. Fiel of the need to engage the community.

As you stated, “As noted in this email chain to you, no updated conceptual designs for the footprint of the shopping center itself have been presented to ORDA by the property owners.”

Our concern is not just with the design of the shopping center, but with the configuration of the area surrounding it. We do not want to find ourselves in a position of arguing about poorly designed intersections which do not take into account the knowledge of people who use it on a daily basis.

Thank you,

Karen Gadbois

Northwest Carrollton Civic Association

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This letter was cc’d to many of the decision makers in our city. Karen received a response from a sampling of the contacted, including a response from Dr. Edward J. Blakely and Lavon Wright, community Development Specialist for the Office of Recovery Management. At the very least this begins a dialogue, and lets the relevant folks understand that your neighborhood is not one that likes surprises. (Full disclosure: Karen is a member of the Urban Conservancy board).