The city has paid the private company managing the bulk of New Orleans’ recovery projects more than $3 million for work actually done by city employees, according to an internal memo written by the ousted city capital projects director just weeks before he left City Hall.
Bill Chrisman wrote in the Feb. 20 memo that the [...]

Controversial contractor MWH Global, which serves as the project manager for most major city recovery projects, is billing the city at a higher rate than allowed for in federally subsidized projects, according to an internal city memo obtained by The Lens.
“…MWH has grossly exceed [sic] the 8% cap max fee allowable for project billing,” wrote [...]

More than two weeks after filing a public records request, The Lens has gotten its hands on the proposals that competed with Zulu for a share of the city’s Urban Development Action Grant fund.In addition to the winning $800,000 Zulu proposal, the city considered a plan for a nightclub and multimedia production center on St. [...]

Accepting a recent $800,000 award from City Hall could further jeopardize Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club’s tax exempt status.
That’s because its unusual IRS status requires that it get at least 65 percent of its gross income from membership dues. Its latest tax filing, for 2007, shows that it apparently violated that provision, with [...]

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No good deed goes unpunished.
That was how real estate developer Pres Kabacoff ended an e-mail sent recently to New Orleans City Councilwoman Cynthia Hedge-Morrell. The good deed in question was Kabacoff loaning space for a temporary 5th District police headquarters.  The punishment,  the real [...]

By Ariella Cohen, staff writer – A year and a half after the city of New Orleans received a half-million-dollar donation to foster citizen involvement in the recovery, none of the programs has been fully implemented and neighborhood activists complain that the main beneficiary so far is City Hall.
“This grant was supposed to build capacity [...]

The Housing Authority of New Orleans is “overly dependent” on private contractors,  resulting in higher costs for taxpayers and a loss of efficiency, said a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development report on the local housing agency released Thursday.
“If the consultants were to cease providing services, activities within [HANO] departments would essentially come to [...]

A federal judge gave final approval Friday to two agreements for broad reform at the New Orleans juvenile detention center.
Judge Ivan L.R. Lemelle’s approval of the consent decrees legally obligates the city and Orleans Parish School Board to improve conditions and increase educational resources at the jail-like facility, a holding center for juvenile offenders euphemistically [...]

If you build it, they will pay. Or so the architects thought.
Government is fondly seen by architects as a source of sizable and reliable, if often unglamorous, work. In a recession, a contract for a public school, library or community center could sustain a small firm for months – or so said industry lore.
In post-Katrina [...]

More than two years after New Orleans was given permission to begin drawing down federal recovery grants, the city has spent less than 5 percent of the $300 million in grant money appropriated in the city’s operating budget, the city’s chief technology officer Harrison Boyd told the City Council today.
The amount totals $11 million, a [...]