Category
News
Timely coverage of the people, policies, and events shaping New Orleans and Louisiana. This category delivers clear, factual reporting that keeps readers informed about local government, community issues, and stories that matter most to everyday residents.
Judge temporarily blocks construction of Phase III jail facility
A hearing on Wednesday will look into whether the Cantrell administration violated the city’s charter by allocating capital money to jail without City Council approval
District: New Orleans school-closure announcements delayed
The planned Nov. 14 announcements hinged on a Nov. 1 release of state A through F letter grades, which have not yet been issued, NOLA Public Schools officials said.
Jackson Parish holding pre-trial youth in unlicensed juvenile jail
Despite lacking a required DCFS license, Jackson’s detention center is housing kids awaiting adjudication — and collecting roughly $200 a day per kid from surrounding parishes
Threats facing fragile lower Mississippi river delta to be addressed – and possibly mitigated – by five-year, $22 million research consortium
Tulane University and Louisiana State University will lead the Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative – working with researchers from the National Academies’ Gulf Research Program, six HBCUs, four Southern universities and two Louisiana marine-focused nonprofits – to ‘navigate the challenges of sea-level rise, erosion and shifting river dynamics’
Historic drought at root of ‘superfog’ and massive I-55 wreck
The combination of fog and thick smoke may return this weekend, as a peat fire in remote New Orleans East swamp burns underground. Unlike the fire in Lafitte, which is actively being battled by firefighting crews, the Orleans blaze is largely unchecked. But it's now watered by two pumps from the Sewerage & Water Board pouring the equivalent of two Olympic-size pools a day into the marsh.
‘Another step backwards’: $9.5 million private security contract for Louisiana youth prisons raises eyebrows
OJJ pays $75 per hour to staffing company for guards. Critics say that contractor seems to be “enriching themselves on the backs of Louisiana's teenagers and taxpayers’
Louisiana’s inland, non-tidal wetlands are most at risk to lose protections from weakened Clean Water Act
As the Clean Water Act turns 51 today, environmental advocates scramble to understand a new judicial interpretation that leaves more than half of the country’s 118 million acres of wetlands unprotected, including the swamps of Acadiana and key waterfowl habitat.
‘No Phase III’ still a battlecry
Even as construction begins, the fight continues. Within the jail, monitors find, conditions are worse, due to the same old chronic issues: short staffing, violence, and shoddy mental-healthcare.
Federal review finds grain terminal would harm historic sites in climate-vulnerable St. John Parish
Several historic sites would suffer “adverse effects” from construction of gigantic Greenfield Grain Terminal, says review of rural St. John the Baptist Parish – which was recently placed at the top spot of a nationwide list of places vulnerable to climate risks.
