Behind The Lens episode 163: ‘Rodent harborage’

A new superintendent for NOLA Public Schools. And new problems found with Make It Right Foundation properties.

On this week’s episode, The Orleans Parish School Board unanimously selected Avis Williams as the NOLA Public School District’s next superintendent at a special board meeting this week. 

And actor Brad Pitt established the Make It Right Foundation in 2007 with a mission to build new, affordable homes in the Lower 9th Ward, which was devastated by flooding from the levee failures that followed Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Fifteen years later, Make It Right is fighting a class-action lawsuit from homebuyers over the construction and design of the houses. And, The Lens has learned, the group has stopped maintaining or paying taxes on the properties it still owns.

Our guests this week are reporters Marta Jewson and Michael Isaac Stein.

You can listen to Behind The Lens on Apple PodcastsSpotify and other services.

Carolyne Heldman

Carolyne Heldman has been in media for 35 years, most recently as Executive Director at an NPR member station in Colorado where she was responsible for new multi-platform content initiatives, strategic planning, research, branding, and non-traditional revenue generation. During her tenure she also created and launched four weekly news, public affairs and cultural affairs programs and monthly live Town Hall broadcasts. Heldman moved to New Orleans last summer with her husband and canine companion and they live happily in The Marigny.