Housing Sub-Committee:
Co Chairs: Mtumishi St. Julien
Lauren Anderson
Kathy Laborde
The Housing Sub-Committee is still seeking to add committee members in order to match the breadth of New Orleans demographics and communities.
Its first meeting this past Friday attracted close to 200 people.
The Committee used the meeting to entertain both venting and to expose the key concerns/ideas floating around at this time. Many of the comments were documented on flip charts which will be included in meeting minutes.
The Sub-committee has been coordinating with the Urban Land Institute Senior Fellow John McIlwain.
The meeting was important in that we gave a clear message that the Housing Committee is inclusive and transparent. We hope that we built a lot of goodwill that will make the work of the smaller committee more acceptable to our large and dispersed constituency.
Historic Preservation Sub-Committee:
Co-Chairs: Edgar Chase
Peter Trapolin
Coordination:
The committee would like to meet with each survey group -- City, FEMA, USCOE, etc. -- to assure that historic structures and districts are protected wherever possible. This would allow the committee to review the different forms and standards being used to assess properties.
The committee would like to ensure that someone with a historic preservation background is on the Culture and Economic Development Committees of the Commission, as historic preservation is an important economic development tool.
Resources Needed:
The committee would like to have a survey of buildings considered compromised or declared unfit for habitation by the City, FEMA, or USCOE.
Preliminary Ideas:
The Commission should push for limits on demolition of historic properties by requiring proper review of the Historic Districts Landmark Commission and through Section 106 review (prior to using federal funds).
As many of the citys vacant and blighted properties are in areas that had minimum or no flooding, these properties could be restored and put in commerce quickly as affordable housing. The PRCs Operation Comeback program could be considered a model for what could be done. The committee suggests that efforts should be focused on specific areas at one time to guarantee services and security. The committee also encourages the Legislature to make the process easier to expropriate blighted properties. Something must be done to accelerate the citys ability to handle the program, possibly including utilizing a non-profit organization.
Develop a trade school for the Master Craftsmen to build on our citys history of high quality tradesmen renowned for skills and the need for high paying jobs.
Future planning and zoning needs to recognize the scale and nature of each historic district, with contextural design, stepped building heights, and denser development along urban corridors in scale with existing historic neighborhoods.
Co-Chairs: Greg Rigamer
Bob Tannen
The Infrastructure Sub-Committee has been formed to coordinate with the Commissions Infrastructure Committee and with the other City Planning Sub-Committees. The group agreed upon its role in the Committee on City Planning as follows:
Identify the physical and institutional infrastructure necessary to improve, support, and sustain a viable City.
To this end, we will:
1. Immediately secure funding from Congress to provide adequate flood control and storm protection
for the City and region.
2. Expedite the identification and implementation of the measures needed to insure the environmental
health and wellbeing of the City.
3. Insure that all investments made for the recovery, remediation, and development of our community be
consistent with the vision and objective of the Master Plan.
4. Insure that city, regional, and state plans and initiatives are consistent and coordinated to facilitate
implementation.
5. Encourage FEMA to promptly establish elevation standards for new development.
Co-Chairs: Pam Dashiell
Doug Meffert
The committee recognizes that it will have to address issues that deal with both issues of objective sustainability based on scientific knowledge as well as the subjective issues of safety, security, and therefore, sustainability, of the community. In terms of how the subcommittee interacts with others within the larger committee, we see that sustainability is the how regarding outcomes of the other committees (land use, urban design, infrastructure, historic preservation, etc.). In other words, anything this committee should recommend should be either deemed sustainable or disposable.
The Sub-committee will seek to provide recommendations on the following three primary categories and subcategories:
I. Ecosystem Sustainability (i.e., coastal wetland restoration) which provides:
1. Hurricane Protection for the City of New Orleans
2. Economic Values including Fisheries, recreation, oil & gas, and waterborne commerce
II. Urban Sustainability
1. Levee protection and other engineering recommendations in coastal Louisiana to protect the city of New
Orleans from storm surge
2. Levee Protection surrounding Orleans parish for flood protection
3. Protection and construction of structures that can withstand the catastrophic conditions related to
hurricane and flooding disasters
4. Smart Growth issues focusing on strategic redevelopment on a city-wide level
5. Green Architecture recommendations that focus on sustainable and environmentally friendly architecture
III. Social Sustainability
1. Neighborhood Resilience and initiatives on establishing trust and confidence that lead to safety and
security
2. Racial and economic equity in this process
Outputs suggested, so far, can include:
Legislative Agendas relating to issues above
Economic Feasibility
As part of process the sub-committee will seek additional expertise (which may be within our own commission) that was not present at our first meeting:
Ÿ Expertise and processes on demystifying urban myths related to risks related to sustainability and equity
Ÿ Expertise on flood mitigation methodologies as they relate to architecture
Co-Chairs: Larry Schmidt
Walter Brooks
Urban Design:
Co-Chairs: Ray Manning
Reed Krolof