The Big Apple is still grappling with 9/11’s aftermath. And a year after one of America’s worst natural catastrophes struck the Gulf Coast, New Orleans struggles to remedy numerous problems, like their devastated neighborhoods and displaced public housing residents. Wanting to experience the Post-Katrina Big Easy first hand, I ventured down there this past July to gut houses. The first home I worked on was situated in the Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans’ most decimated area, and the neighborhood with the largest African-American population.
As I passed a white A-frame, one of the ravaged neighborhood’s few “intact” homes, I spotted a telling image. Spray-painted in red graffiti on the house was the word “Baghdad.” I haven’t visited Iraq, but those seven letters summed up how the Lower Ninth—and I assume Iraq—must look. And since our government spends an estimated $250 million on the war every day, and nothing comparable to rebuild New Orleans, the graffitied message hit home. My home. The United States of America.
While gutting, I wore a cerulean Tyvek suit, respirator, goggles and work gloves. From the outside, the home that I would work on looked habitable. But once I entered, I encountered the disaster’s devastation: toppled furniture and waterlogged objects. Soon after, I also experienced a trademark gutting phenomenon: the smell of dead bodies.
On the living room floor, I spotted a book covered in filth. I wiped it off. Splayed, so both yellow and black-bordered covers were facing up, was Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth. What more apropos title to discover here, in New Orleans, where both the government and nature had neglected and abused African-Americans.
Although I was gutting private homes, I became keenly interested in the Crescent City’s public housing situation. In the 1980s, New Orleans had 14,000 public housing units. Pre-Katrina there were 6,000—5,100 occupied. A year after Katrina, less than 1,000 units are inhabited. Still, New Orleans’ public housing projects have an illustrious history. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's WPA (Works Progress Administration) completed Lafitte in 1941, and the St. Bernard complex’s oldest section in 1937. Being one of the United States’ oldest public housing complexes, St. Bernard and Lafitte could, and should, get landmark status, which would make a proposed demolition virtually impossible.
St. Bernard is noteworthy for other reasons, too. “Everybody heads here when a storm comes,” displaced St. Bernard resident Edward Sears says. “It saves thousands of lives. It was built to withstand a category-5 hurricane. And if it wasn’t for this project all the people from the Ninth Ward that lived up on these second and third floors through the high water that couldn’t swim, would be dead.”
Race and class figure significantly in New Orleans, pre-and post-Katrina. Nearly all displaced, public housing residents are lower-class African-Americans. And many, like grassroots activist Malcolm Sobor, believe that, although Mayor Ray Nagin presides over a mostly African-American metropolis, “He’s just a convenient tool of affluent real estate developers like Pres Kabacoff and Joseph Canizaro.”
These powerbrokers have expressed an interest in both privatizing and redeveloping public housing projects. And on June 14, HUD—which oversees the beleaguered Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO)—announced that, within three years, it would demolish four public housing projects: B.W. Cooper, CJ Peete, St. Bernard and Lafitte.
Earlier this spring, HANO spent hundreds of thousands, and gave “Vacant Property Security” a no-bid contract to build fences and place steel plates on doors, in order to shutter the aforementioned housing projects. But they didn’t invest any money to clean the barracks-style low-rises. And they’ve stated that one reason they must keep the projects closed is because soil and other environmental tests must be undertaken to ensure safety. But why do these “safety” tests only apply to public housing residences and not other areas of the city? Marty Rowland, a civil engineer with Lockheed Martin, surveyed some St. Bernard units and found little damage above the first floor.
“They don’t have fences around other neighborhoods. But they have brought in the National Guard for protection,” says Sobor. “The same way they detect people stealing from private homes, they can do that with public housing.”
Interestingly, the city and HUD/HANO did little to secure public housing prior to building the fences. “Security came twice a day: 6:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m.,” recalls Sears. “This was when there was no fence.”
Some activists insist HUD built the fences for one reason. “The fences are to keep residents out of their own property because for months there were none. It wasn’t until people started to return and ask about getting to their property that the housing authority contracted out for fences and boarding up windows,” says housing advocate and Loyola Legal Professor Bill Quigley. “They laid-off their maintenance, and contracted out for security. The supposed concern for the residents isn’t real. They have a plan to rid the city of the poor. And this attempt to destroy public housing has been in the works; it was just accelerated by Katrina. The hurricane was an excuse.”
Still, some displaced tenants believe the fences serve a multi-purpose. “I think the fence is there to keep us out, yeah.” Sears says. “But it’s also there to keep people who weren’t residents from breaking in and vandalizing.”
In HANO’s four “closed” projects, water reached no higher than the first floor; in Lafitte there was only one foot of water. “Lafitte is immaculate,” Sobor says. “These two- and three-story brick buildings look like there is absolutely no damage.”
According to some, CJ Peete is considered the most neglected development, yet there’s no damage above the first floor. Quigley acknowledges the mold problem: “Almost every piece of property in New Orleans has had mold. And that’s a health problem, but that’s not a reason to tear public housing down. Besides, the projects are made from concrete. It isn’t sheet rock.”
Regarding the mold, some public housing residents state the obvious. “Of course if it’s locked up and not cleaned for 10 months it will be moldy,” says Gloria Irvine, or Mama Glo as she’s known around her neighborhood. She’s a wheelchair-bound, displaced, 70-year-old and a resident of the St. Bernard complex. It’s just a way to keep us out. Why we can’t go back in our houses?”
Local housing advocates think the lockout has little to do with safety. “This is how it’s going to go: a lot of residents from low-income places, living in or out of the projects, are going to wind up homeless. Right now, there are people sleeping in cars and abandoned homes. I’ve been sleeping in a church,” Sears admits. “But I’d rather sleep in a place without power, than on the street. I went in there [to St. Bernard] and they had running water, but no gas or no electricity.”
With New Orleans experiencing a significant housing shortage, it makes no sense that undamaged, habitable apartments are not being fully utilized. Some public-housing advocates are holding fast to the belief that there is a plan—by both developers and government officials—to shift the city’s demographics by decimating affordable housing, and eliminating the renter class.
“This is a long-term struggle,” Quigley acknowledges. “These 6,000 units of affordable housing are the only guaranteed form of rent-controlled living that could be open. But they’re closed and the reason is because of the powers that be, above all else, the Bush administration.” Quigley’s talking about the same Bush who, last September, in New Orleans’ Jackson Square, said, “We will do whatever it takes.”
Some displaced residents believe that Bush, and other government officials, utter empty promises. “People died on account of the President. He lives in government housing, why not put him out?” Mama Glo wonders. “We put Nagin back in office, but he’s going against us. Housing is lying: HUD—especially HUD—and that [Housing Secretary] Alphonso Jackson. Lord knows, I would like to see him face-to-face. I want to ask him, ‘Do he have a mother?’ Y’all can’t be. The way y’all treating senior citizens... Y’all don’t have no feelings for nobody.’” Pursuant to both our Constitution’s Fifth amendment, and the United Nation’s Principle for Internally Displaced People, which allows the right of return, the treatment of New Orleans’ public housing residents should be deemed both unconstitutional and illegal. Yet, a year following the disaster, and four months after HUD finished erecting fences, public housing residents are still locked out.
This public housing lockout poses even more problems, in terms of government justification, because these residents have valid leases. “In March, we were by the project talking about going in and cleaning up,” remembers Mama Glo. “The next day they started putting up the fence.” This action echoes how public housing residents were told to return and then, without explanation, told not to.
For some public housing residents, the raised fences have made a difficult situation almost unbearable. Mama Glo underwent a double bypass right before Katrina. Trapped in Houston for the past 10 months, Mama Glo has endured repeated injustices. “In Texas there are no good doctors,” says Mama Glo. “I have to fight with the doctor’s secretary all the time. I’m on my second doctor. Sometimes I go to crying because they doing us wrong. What have we done to them?”
But there are no lack of heart-wrenching public housing stories like Mama Glo’s. “I lost my fiancé in the storm because he was trying to help his mom,” an Iberville resident, who wishes to remain anonymous, remembers. “And when I was away, my job told me to be back in June, but I can’t work because of my housing situation. I’ve had to leave my stuff in storage because landlords are charging big money for places that cost nothing before.”
Post-Katrina, rents have skyrocketed. Apartments that went for $300 a month, pre-Katrina, are now sometimes going for as high as $800 a month.
As well the inequities of price-gouging, some public housing advocates think HUD, and the city’s elite, have used crime in the developments to keep some residents locked out. A common belief among many “non-project” residents—but also held by some public housing tenants—is that the projects were breeding grounds for illegal, violent activity. Yet crime has returned.
“Drugs and violence is no reason to put people out,” Mama Glo insists. “Killing’s going on now. Do you see anybody in the housing authority?” Interestingly, according to the 2000 census, public housing crime and poverty had decreased pre-Katrina. And 60 percent of St. Bernard residents worked, while the city’s average was 73 percent.
“We live in a capitalist society, so you can’t go to the store with buttons. That’s why crime is starting again,” says Sears. “They got to sell drugs. I been there. I know what it means to take the gun and go get something. When you got kids, their nose is snotty, or you about to get put out. You got to have money or you can expect more killing, and drug dealing, until you alleviate this. And it would make me feel terrible if the projects open back up and they start that killing again,” Sears admits. “I’d feel like I was fighting for a bad cause.”
Drug use takes place all over New Orleans, but many drug-related crimes happen in economically depressed areas. “You don’t have drug dealing in the French Quarter or Uptown,” Sobor insists. “You know why? Because cops won’t allow it.” Just like the urban myth of all these Ninth Ward, and housing project, African-Americans being 24/7 soap opera watchers and thugs, another misconception exists that everyone living in the housing projects is a ne’er do well. “As a single mother, I worked hard as a nurse’s assistant and raised my two boys right. They’ve never been in trouble with the law,” the anonymous Iberville resident says. “Not everybody in the projects are bad.”
“Public housing has a screening process. Anyone in a family arrested for drugs or crime, the whole family can be evicted,” Quigley says. “The reason there has been more crime in housing developments is due to demolition by neglect. Some developments have hundreds of vacancies. And so criminals use it as a hideout. But it’s not the people in the developments who are likely to be criminals. It’s people from outside.”
Some nearby store owners hold a different opinion of crime and public-housing. “My brother was shot to death in the projects,” store owner Muhammad remembers. “I am happy for the fences because the violence was happening, sometimes on a daily basis.” Housing advocate, and former St. Bernard resident, Endesha Juekali, wants to confront, and resolve, these internal contradictions, but he sees no need for the barricades.
Crime might frighten non-residents from entering public housing, but some marooned tenants fear returning to their homes because their belongings have been mysteriously ransacked and looted. “They stole our stuff before the fences were put up,” says Mama Glo.
The anonymous Iberville resident observes: “They didn’t clean buildings up; they cleaned them out by robbing people. I saw Spanish workers, who had been hired to clean, stealing things. One guy told me he had three TVs in a shed.”
This public housing lockout, and its attendant problems, is further complicated by FEMA’s actions. Under the Stafford Act, FEMA is legally obligated to provide meaningful housing assistance to disaster victims. FEMA promised displaced Katrina victims that they would have their housing taken care of. Initially, FEMA paid rent through their short-term lodging program (403), which has no mandatory caps, or time limits. They told evacuees that the 403 program would last twelve months, which encouraged displaced individuals to sign year-long leases. But on November 15, FEMA did an about face. They decided to discontinue the 403 program and switch evacuees to their temporary housing program (408), which requires recertification every three months, has fewer guarantees, a $26,200/18-month cap, doesn’t pay utilities and has numerous “small print” stipulations.
Evacuees and advocates have had numerous problems with FEMA. The agency declared some displaced individuals ineligible because they’d shared the same household before, but not after the disaster. Evacuees have been deemed ineligible because their pre-disaster housing was “habitable.” (Meanwhile, the city of Houston investigated this and found that 70 percent of homes FEMA deemed livable were not.) Evacuees have also accused FEMA of not providing fair market rents. Sometimes FEMA declared an evacuee ineligible, then days later found them eligible, or vice versa. In short, some advocates and evacuees see FEMA as inept, lacking clear standards, arbitrary and inconsistent.
A year after the disaster, 100,000 displaced New Orleans residents still live in Houston; 60,000 live in Atlanta; and 1,000 in New York. And many of them depend on FEMA.
“When Katrina happened we told these cities do whatever you have to do to get people into apartments. Sign a 12-month lease we will worry about it later,” recalls FEMA public affairs officer, Don Jacks. “But around the first of the year it was determined that we were going to end 403 at the end of March.”
FEMA’s actually mandated to be an immediate responder, and to help individuals for no more than 18 months. “FEMA is not designed as a social service agency. The 403 program typically lasts a few weeks. In 408, you’re getting back on your feet. You’re able to pay your utilities and take some responsibility for your recovery,” says Jacks. “And regarding our eligibility requirements, we err on the side of compassion. We took a list of people who appeared to be ineligible and went through it again. From the end of May until July we went from 15,000 to 4,000 ineligible families.”
FEMA continues to address its perceived negligence. “We keep asking ourselves how long is long enough? We’ve now extended the 403 program another 30 days, until August 31. But recovery is not a spectator sport. You need a housing plan. You need to move on and not depend on FEMA,” Jacks warns. “Even still, we have volunteer liaisons who’ve identified the 4,000 ineligible families and we’ve alerted social service agencies, so once we’re done maybe these agencies can help these people.”
In the face of these claims, some housing advocates still think FEMA’s actions are insufficient. “Initially, FEMA made a clear pronouncement of eighteen months, as did the President. That would have taken us through February 2007. I’m not sure that that’s enough time,” Quigley insists. “But certainly the constant throwing people out of hotels, changing the rules and repeatedly changing the programs is unfair.”
Since FEMA’s initial about-face, other problems have also arisen. “They broke it off at the end of May and then they voluntarily extended it twice. But the people who are being subjected to this incredible amount of start and go, it’s taking a toll on them, says Quigley. “I know people living on the edge who’ve given up and become homeless because they can’t take the stress of constant recertification, wondering if FEMA’s going to evict them next week. It’s a cruel way of operating.”
Initially, FEMA did provide many displaced individuals with $2,300 for rent and $10,000 to replace lost items. Sears received the initial outlay, but still expresses misgivings. “Ten Gees [$10,000] to replace everything you’ve ever owned? To relocate, get clothes for your kids, food and furniture? That’s not much.”
The combination of FEMA, and the city’s, behavior spells disaster for some displaced residents. “FEMA’s not providing money for housing for some,” Mama Glo asserts. “And the city is not letting us return. It’s wrong.”
To some, HUD’s practices indicate that other plans are afoot, which will not benefit poor/displaced residents. “Demolition money might already be in place for the destruction of Iberville,” Quigley believes. This statement is disturbing because there is a public/private/Clinton-era federal program, Hope VI, which, pre-Katrina, helped demolish a New Orleans Housing Project—St. Thomas—and convert it into the mixed-income residence, “River Gardens.”
I perused the pre-fab, ‘reformed’ River Gardens; it resembles Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood. And some public housing advocates insist that of the 1,500 River Gardens’ units only 40 are occupied by former St. Thomas/low-income residents. “Hope VI is a complicated and controversial program,” River Gardens developer, and HRI properties, CEO Pres Kabacoff admits. “But we brought back 35 percent of St. Thomas residents during River Gardens’ first phase. And I would be glad to discuss revitalizing other housing developments.”
“I know why some of the other residents haven’t been let back, but I can’t say because I would get in trouble,” a former St. Thomas resident, who wishes to remain anonymous, admits. “I don’t like what they did to some of my neighbors. But the violence is a lot less than it was in the projects.”
This St. Thomas woman benefited from moving into River Gardens, but she looks to be an exception. “What they did to St. Thomas is what they want to do to these four projects,” Quigley insists. “There were 1,600 units in St. Thomas. Under Hope VI, maybe 60 former St. Thomas residents returned. Most would’ve liked to come back. But it was economic purging, pure and simple.
“You had privileged developers make money off the development of private houses using public money. There’s not a successful HOPE VI program in the country that has brought back 30 percent of previous residents. The national model may be 15 percent. In New Orleans there’s almost nobody who lived in St.Thomas that was able to come back,” says Quigley. “The plan for HOPE VI is to turn land that was for poor people into land that generates tax revenue. So it’s meant to gentrify and exclude poor people. It’s not a housing program; it’s a ‘housing exclusional’ program. And if we let them demolish St. Bernard, Cooper, CJ Peete and Lafitte—less than 5 percent of the original residents would ever set foot on the new property. The only people that benefit from HOPE VI are land speculators and developers. Isn’t Kabacoff a multi-millionaire? Canizaro used it [HOPE VI] to develop river front property, and to move poor people out of his way. And these guys want to use Katrina’s misery to steal land from the poor. But we’ll stop them.”
For developers and city officials, Katrina might have been the perfect storm to help them acquire prime real estate—where public housing complexes sit—they’ve coveted for decades. Lafitte is situated seconds from the Central business district and Iberville is moments from the tony French Quarter.
“There’s a plan. Katrina has opened up the opportunity for land speculators and developers to get some of the most valuable land in New Orleans. The only problem was they had built public housing on it and they need to get rid of the people,” Juekali insists. “[St. Bernard] is the Gentilly area. You’re five minutes from City Park by car; you’re three minutes from Downtown; seven minutes from the lake front—the city’s most exclusive neighborhood. The bayou front lands are five minutes away. And here they done built acres of land that got poor people just sitting on it. But if they get rid of the poor, the land would be theirs, and the property value would go through the roof.” It’s clear that when the WPA erected public housing the business community couldn’t envision the land’s strategic and economic value.
Public housing residents have held rallies and marches to protest all that they’ve been subjected to. On July 4th exiled tenants, some traveling from Houston, circled the off-limits St. Bernard complex—which now has a Survivor’s Village outside it—demanding their right of return.
As with public housing, other areas of Crescent City life have proved challenging, too. The public school system, businesses and public hospitals are functioning as a shadow of their former selves. “They said you can’t come back to the projects unless you’re willing to work,” Sear recalls. “Yet they’re shutting down one of the major avenues where people in the projects work—Charity Hospital.” Governor Blanco has pillaged the public Charity Hospital system, decimating vital services. And 15 of New Orleans’ 22 city hospitals are now closed.
In the ’30s, former governor Huey Long started Charity to provide healthcare for the uninsured. Today, Charity holds a special place for numerous working-class African Americans. “I was born there. My son was born, and died, there,” Mama Glo recalls. “I fought to keep it open. But they closed it.”
The public school system is experiencing similar setbacks. This past academic year, less than 20 percent of the public schools were opened. And the state government destroyed the teachers’ union.
As former residents commemorate Katrina’s woeful, first anniversary, New Orleans has issued an ordinance that if houses have not been gutted, mold remediated and boarded up by August 29th, a municipal task force may inspect homes for compliance. If homeowners have not complied, the city will send crews to perform the job and place a lien on the property for the work’s value. Disaster waters flooded around 80 percent of New Orleans’ dwellings, approximately 250,000 homes. Most of these residences haven’t been gutted. Thankfully, the Lower Ninth Ward has been exempted from this ordinance. But the city hasn’t absolved either New Orleans East or many other apartment dwellings.
Despite mayor Nagin’s recent off hand “hole in the ground” statement on “60 Minutes” (a reference to the still unfinished site at Ground Zero), the widespread devastation of New Orleans remains an ongoing crisis. Will it take as long, or longer, for the Crescent City to both rebuild and address its housing inequities? For the 200,000 displaced, and 11,000 residents—still missing a year later—this stark question looms large.
