Developer John Cummings had plans for an eastern New Orleans neighborhood that involved building better levees. For the nearby residents, that was fine – they just wanted them built with someone else’s dirt. The residents prevailed Tuesday with the city’s Planning Commission, which denied Cummings a permit for a borrow pit, where clay would have […]
Author Archives: The Editors
Posted inGovernment & Politics
GOP locks keys in the car; Louisiana Dems lose keys
Healthcare overhaul had been iffy in the polls throughout the past year’s arduous negotiations on Capitol Hill. But now that it has passed, Democrats are banking that as the public learns what is actually in the law and what gets implemented in the first year of the law, the public quickly will warm to it. […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
Healthcare wins!
Great news, everybody! After delighting in last night’s historic vote to extend healthcare coverage to nearly all Americans while simultaneously lowering the long-term deficit, I put my Democratic voter registration card under my pillow and went to bed. Lo and behold, I woke up this morning to find that my acne had cleared, my seasonal […]
Posted inLand Use
'Just' compensation difficult to define in Detroit
The push to “shrink the footprint” in New Orleans — to slowly shut down badly blighted or hurricane damaged neighborhoods by banning development and rolling back public services — fell apart under howls of resident protest against the 2005-2006 Bring New Orleans Back plan. In the New York Times, Harvard Economics Professor Edward Glaeser described […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
Zulu VP facing foreclosure on property near krewe HQ
It’s been a rough few weeks for the vice president of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club. First, Naaman Stewart was the public face of the group as it struggled to explain how and why it got an award of $800,000 in taxpayer money from the city. Now the sheriff is auctioning off his […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
More anti-abortion Catholics back healthcare bill
U.S. Rep. Ahn “Joseph” Cao, who represents most of New Orleans, still has not decided whether he will vote for or against President Obama’s historic healthcare reform bill. As, I wrote yesterday, his objections to the bill pivot on his belief that the Senate version of the healthcare reform bill has loopholes that permit the […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
Congressman Cao still a ‘no,’ vote hinges on abortion flap
In November, U.S. Rep. Ahn “Joseph” Cao, who represents most of New Orleans, bucked his party and was the lone Republican vote for the House of Representatives version of the healthcare bill, after aligning himself with anti-abortion Democrats. Negotiated by Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., the “Stupak amendment” was restrictive enough to allay the concerns of […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
“Balance this city”
Oh! Another day, another shameful story of institutional and individual police terror and racism in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Sunday, The Times-Picayune added new details to the mysterious death of Henry Glover, whose remains were founded in a burned car last seen being driven by New Orleans police officers. Meanwhile, The Advocate in Baton […]
Posted inLand Use
Senate action helps chances for New Orleans housing
Just a couple weeks ago, affordable-housing proponents had little hope that developments to replace the public-housing complexes torn down after the levee failures would materialize. A damning federal assessment of the Housing Authority of New Orleans stated that, “Two of HANO’s Big Four the former Lafitte and B.W. Cooper projects mixed-income deals are in jeopardy. […]
Posted inGovernment & Politics
Comments underscore sad reality of broken NOPD
It probably didn’t shock Mayor-elect Mitch Landrieu Thursday night when the residents of New Orleans told him and his transition task force on the NOPD that they want a police superintendent who has such rare qualities as “integrity,” “a background in diversity,” and “a successful track record.” It was likewise probably not too surprising when […]