A success story — for a change — from the city's snake-bitten program to preserve houses from the bio-medical center footprint by trucking them to different neighborhoods.
It took six years for Kimberly James to get Road Home money to rehab her Upper 9th Ward home. This summer, she thought she was months away from inhabiting it. But in July, she learned that the city had demolished the house, concluding that not enough progress had been made in rehabbing it. She says no one told her the house had been targeted for demolition.
The proposed remedy, fake grass, was as unwelcome as the original offense. The Zoning Board of Adjustment required that the owner jackhammer the cement parking pad.
Peter Gardner says he wasn't notified that the property had been targeted for demolition.
The group said it expected the Sewerage & Water board to rescind its lease offer due to neighborhood opposition.
Three years ago, the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority created a program called Near Miss, which opened the door for non-residential property owners to buy Road Home lots. So far, 59 properties have been acquired. But the City Council never approved the program, and most of those properties have not been zoned for commercial use.
Illegally paved yards, short-term rentals and demolition by neglect draw One Stop Shop scrutiny; Spotted Cat gets go-ahead.
The city's focus on blight means no hearings have been held to deal with code violations such as illegal short-term rentals and front-yard paving.
Neighborhood leader says the parking that would come with the courts would destroy the bayou's beauty.
Volunteers envision their work as “an opportunity for children to participate in the process of improving their own communities and receive art instruction in the process.”
