Many areas marked for green space after …
Published: Monday, August 23, 2010, 9:00 PM Updated: Monday, August 23, 2010, 9:42 PM still stuck in Baytown, Texas, five months after Hurricane Katrina, Elaine Tobias stared at her computer screen, studying an image of New Orleans destined to become a touchstone of the emotionally pitched battle over how her flood-ravaged hometown should be rebuilt. “When I seen that map on the Internet, I said, ‘Mama, they plan on putting a greenway on your house,’” she recalled recently. From another room, Doris Tobias, who turned 80 this month, responded with confusion and a bit of alarm: “What do you mean, greenway?” Sure enough, a green dot — one of six stamped across the digital citywide map — covered the location of the family’s one-story brick home near Morrison and Bundy roads in eastern New Orleans. The colorful nodes indicated areas, all hard-hit by the flood, that could become park space. But while urban planners who drew up the map meant the dots merely as examples of where parks might be created — after the approval of a government buy-out program and the conclusion of a citizen-driven planning process — opposition erupted almost as soon as then-Mayor Ray Nagin’s Bring New Orleans Back Commission unveiled it in early 2006. Amid the panic and fury of residents whose neighborhoods had been overlaid with green circles, the map quickly met its demise. along with it went a suggestion that City Hall temporarily quit issuing building permits across a broader swath of town while residents cemented their rebuilding plans. Nearly five years later, some sections of the green zones fulfill the prophecies of urban planners who warned that letting property owners rebuild everywhere — rather than incentivizing migration to higher ground — would produce a gap-toothed effect of remodeled homes amid a sea of blight. meanwhile, other parts of the targeted areas have recovered strongly. In short, there’s no evidence that the dreaded green dot was much of an impediment to rebuilding. A review of addresses receiving postal service in June, for instance shows most areas pinpointed for green space had rebounded to at least 60 percent of their pre-Katrina population. That’s more than the swamped Lakeview area, none of which was designated for parkland on the controversial map. Only in the mostly commercial slice of the two green zones in eastern New Orleans and in the Lower 9th Ward north of Claiborne Avenue did populations still hover below 50 percent, according to the study by the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center. Nevertheless, references to the map still come up during public meetings, indicating just how significant and emotional the concept became in post-Katrina planning. As recently as last month, Mayor Mitch Landrieu raised the issue before an audience of urban planners, architects, bankers and community leaders. “there was a lack of awareness of a simple notion that planning somehow could be untethered from people,” said Landrieu, who grew up in Broadmoor, part of which was covered by a green dot. “People thought, ‘Someone’s trying to put a green dot on my neighborhood. They didn’t really think about me.’” Indeed, the placement of the green dots on various sections of town, however conceptual, in many cases produced the opposite result of what professional planners had in mind. Reggie Lawson first learned of the map in much the same way as Elaine and Doris Tobais — sitting in front of a computer screen at his cousin’s home in Prairieville, just east of Baton Rouge. “I saw that my neighborhood was to be cleared as green space, and I said, ‘Oh, hell, no,” Lawson recalled. “my cousin said, ‘You’re welcome to stay here. And if they’re going to tear it down, just make sure you get a fair price.’” “that wasn’t an option,” said Lawson, now a coordinator with the Faubourg St. Roch Improvement Association. “For me, there was no fair price because this was my home, and I had no intention of moving, nor could I fathom a reason why I should move.” Figuring officials would have a harder time converting his block to a park if he’d already refurbished his home of 12 years, Lawson sped up renovations, though he’d already determined he would live outdoors on his property before he’d consent to be driven off his land. The map’s introduction into the public debate, Lawson said, “was my reason for coming home immediately.” A similar zeal took hold on a larger scale in Broadmoor, a residential enclave where Landrieu’s parents, Verna and former Mayor Moon Landrieu, still live. Soon after the Nagin commission unveiled its map, residents began packing meetings of their already well-organized neighborhood association and erecting lawn signs that declared, “Broadmoor Lives!” To celebrate their rebuilding progress, neighbors in early 2008 hosted a party, complete with a green-dot cake. The civic group still meticulously tracks repopulation and blight, and it aggressively solicits grant money to build affordable homes. For residents of some low-lying areas, the green dots sent an unnerving signal that they might not be safe if they moved back.
indeed, as late as October 2006, Nagin continued to warn against rebuilding in the Lower 9th Ward and two sections of eastern New Orleans, though he refused repeatedly to specifically define them. Vera Triplett, who along with several others founded the Gentilly Civic Improvement Association in November 2005, said she was inclined to trust the advice of experts as she weighed whether to rebuild in her home in Milneburg. that area, swamped by water pouring through breaches in the London Avenue Canal, also bore a green dot. “But my husband and I felt very strongly that unless they could prove to us unequivocally that we were placing ourselves and our children in danger — and they couldn’t — that we were not going to allow anyone to unilaterally dictate where we couldn’t live,” she said. Since then, Milneburg’s population has bounced back to more than 60 percent of its pre-Katrina tally, with adjacent neighborhoods showing an even stronger rebound, postal records show. moreover, the 161-year-old Holy Cross School selected the area as its new home, and a new public high school is under construction nearby. Still, the area lacks the ample restaurants, groceries and other stores that existed before the flood, and some public assets have yet to be revived. Triplett knows Gentilly’s green dot discouraged some of her neighbors from returning, though the label was not their main motivation. “They had been disenchanted with the city pre-Katrina, so it just gave them an excuse,” she said. “They were contemplating leaving already.” The Nagin commission’s map also had an effect on older residents, she said. “some elderly people were just not up for the battle. I think seeing that map made some people think, ‘I’m not fighting that fight,’” Triplett said. With much of the flood zone still struggling to recover, some residents suspect the Nagin administration adopted a policy of “green dot by neglect.” They point to city facilities in “wet areas” that remain in disrepair, such as the 5th District Police Station in St. Roch and the Andrew “Pete” Sanchez Multi-Service Center in the Lower 9th Ward. Again, though, the same could be said for other parts of town. Intended or not, the previous administration’s mismanagement of the city’s $1.5 billion recovery program means some projects have been scaled back or shelved. the inertia has led some rebuilders to feel like they’re in a sort of purgatory: with no one to stop them, they came back and rebuilt, but they don’t always feel they’ve been rewarded. Maurice Boykin, a Greyhound Bus Line driver and Vietnam veteran, played the odds when he decided to rebuild his home along Dwyer Road. “When I first called the insurance company, they said, ‘you can’t come back. That’s going to be green space,’” he said. Now that repairs to the quaint ranch house are nearly complete, Boykin said he wants City Hall to make good on the myriad promises made in Katrina’s wake, including restoring nearby Kerry Curley Playground and enticing Walmart to reopen the doors of its eastern outpost. When Elaine Tobias finally made her way to City Hall in August 2006 to secure a permit to rebuild her mother’s house, the green-dot map was on her mind. “does it make sense for us to get a permit if you are going to tear it down?” she recalled asking an official at the permitting office. The bureaucrat said simply he could issue a permit for the address, Tobias said.she took it. “I didn’t have nowhere to stay,” Doris Tobias said. But the elder Tobias sometimes wonders about her choice. she bemoans the lack of doctors in her area, as well as full-service grocery store and clothiers, though she was heartened by the city’s purchase of the shuttered Methodist Hospital, which is slated to be reopened it as a public medical center. And though nearby subdivisions, including Spring Lake and Lake Forest Estates, boast manicured lawns and beautifully rebuilt homes, her own neighborhood offers a bleaker view, with scant greenery and burned-out buildings pocking several blocks. “if I’d have known that things was going to be like this, I would have stayed in Texas,” Doris Tobias said. “I would have taken the little money that I had an invested it there. I wouldn’t have invested here because I’m not getting things fixed up like I want.” After considering that option for a moment, however, the new octogenarian quickly reassessed her return to a home once hidden under a green dot. “But I love New Orleans,” she said. “I was born here. This is my home.” Michelle Krupa can be reached at mkrupa@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3312. Many areas marked for green space after Hurricane Katrina have rebounded
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