Blight definition russian11/21/2023 ![]() ![]() “Many organizations extended their efforts as a response to their dissatisfaction with municipal, state, and federal responses-particularly municipal-in the immediate post-Katrina period,” says Scarlett Andrews Martin, a community organizer who researched municipal and nonprofit efforts to reduce blight at Tulane University’s City, Culture, and Community Ph.D. In the aftermath of the storm, many residents and communities felt that they couldn’t wait for the city to figure out how to approach the tens of thousands of vacant homes, both new and old, that would need to be rehabbed so residents could move back, or be sold and redeveloped so that new owners could take over. And blight remediation is a slow slog, one that some say was just starting to get attention before Katrina. New Orleans isn’t a city that’s exactly known for its speedy or efficient processes. By 2010, the number of blighted properties had risen to more than 43,000-more than one-quarter of New Orleans’s housing stock. Each of these homes are individually-owned, and you have to track down the owner in order to be able to purchase them, and then you're not able to go and secure a loan product for redeveloping 10, 15 of these at a time.” “You're not talking about being able to buy in bulk. That means developers must sort out title and ownership issues of lots of individual properties one by one, Heyman says. Most rental housing in New Orleans is made up of single-family homes, not large multi-family complexes. And the city’s issues with succession and titles can make buying and financing such rehabilitations difficult. Some homeowners with property that was destroyed decided to cut their losses and disappear, others were unable to get the amount of money they needed to repair the damage. Katrina, of course, exacerbated these issues. “A lot of those properties are languishing because there is no real mechanism by which we can transfer ownership to be able to rehab them.” As the number of people dwindled, the number of vacant properties falling into disrepair grew. “We have a lot of properties that have been passed down through generations from family member to family member without opening proper succession or legal proceedings to pass title,” says Nicole Heyman, the director of Louisiana initiatives at the Center for Community Progress. At the crux of the problem are legacy or succession issues. ![]() In fact by 2004-before the storm-population had dipped to around 445,000, a decrease of nearly 30 percent from the peak of about 627,000 residents in 1960.Īs the number of people dwindled, the number of vacant properties falling into disrepair grew, reaching more than 26,000 well before the catastrophic hurricane. For decades, New Orleans has faced the same challenges as many Midwestern and southern cities: a lackluster local economy, limited opportunities, and population decline. The city’s blight problem is man- (and policy-) made. And the storm certainly made things worse-leaving behind water that submerged entire homes in some places, and covering hundreds of thousands of structures with rot and mold-making them uninhabitable. But this particular problem existed long before the storm, and the raging waters that followed, swept through the city. It’s easy to believe that this is Katrina’s fault. The most ominous look as if they’re being reclaimed by the land, with tall grass and unpruned shrubs shrouding them, weeds and vines growing through every crack. They pepper the landscape becoming more and more frequent as you drive from ritzier neighborhoods to poorer ones. NEW ORLEANS-New Orleans’s abandoned houses, their entrances sealed with graffiti-covered plywood, are common. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |