Thanks to Darnola's Blog for this post.

Coffeehouse culture is alive and well in Brown Zero. I sit in the newest; Coffea in the Bywater, full of red touches, funky paintings; clearly, the owners living room was transported here. Starting at a Sunday opening time of 9:10 am (yes, actual opening time on the sign on the door; New Orleans is an understanding late riser), a mix of characters come for lattes, crepes and Mr. Henry’s doughnuts.
Conversation swirls around; ongoing renovations of one’s flooded or burned house (fire is the biggest concern presently in a city full of empty houses with new wiring, newer wood and being held hostage by the worst drought in over a century), last night’s music and literary shows, and today’s event at the newly renovated library up the street. It’s in these moments that the city seems more itself than at any other time. Conversation over a cup of coffee and neighbors spending the day together, culture flows through casual relationships and unlikely formal matchings.

Unlike other American places where families equal one to three small people and one or two tall people that look alike driving in a van or SUV, families in urban enviros are often a group of friends sharing all of their spare time together, vacationing together, evacuating together in the teeth of an approaching storm.

Boy, summer. watching many folks leaving for the summer (or longer), 95, 96 degree heat every day starting at around 11 am, the worst drought in the city in 111 years, tough news almost every day. The latest: The city and federal gubments have decided to tear down some of the public housing complexes. Loaded subject here, but I am going to try to give my (and other) feelings here ...

New Orleans public housing has a checkered history like so many other cities; high crime, less oversight all the time, etc. It is a common conversation in many circles to hear how "they should all be torn down."
Here's what I am thinking:

No other community exists for the low-income resident near the main service jobs (French Quarter, Garden District and CBD). No other community will be built for the low-income resident of these complexes where they can continue to live and work near bus routes — since at the same time, RTA has informed the public that most bus lines will stop running in the next month — no money.

"Mixed income developments" as they have proposed for the areas have not added homes, just subtracted them for lower income people here in New Orleans (St, Thomas 2004).

The almost 8,000 people that resided in public housing before the breaks are totally out of luck. No entity is working for them. How do they arrive at tearing down good housing before they decide where these institutionalized poor (institutionalized by the same body of decisonmakers) people have another place to go?

“Did you see that people in New Orleans are already rebuilding some of those neighborhoods that got flooded?”

“Yeah, they want the rest of the country to bail them out and they shouldn’t even be living there!”

Have you heard or been part of this exchange?
It’s a valid exchange. I say valid in the sense that the media and the government would have you believe we are helpless and out of touch with reality down here and are making decisions based on emotion, not logic. I will try to answer with logic to make our case, but will also ask that you understand that emotion does (and should) play a part in this.

As most know, New Orleans’ founding predates the founding of our country. The French settlers, Bienville and Iberville, put the city here deliberately for two reasons: to have an advantageous location to create commerce and to protect France’s investment along the Mississippi.

The exact spot that the city was founded on was chosen because it was high land (an actual ridge) in an otherwise swamp-filled area.

In other words, the settlers who built our cities throughout the North American continent in the 1700s did it precisely because of the proximity to water; New York City, San Francisco, Seattle, Charleston are other examples of that. Here at the mouth of the Mississippi, Bienville realized France could control all of the natural resources of this middle country just by controlling the shipping channel. When the Louisiana Purchase happened in 1803, Jefferson saw that too, and paid good money for this swamp because he knew.

What's wrong with this picture?

Or maybe I should ask what is missing. Okay, I’ll let you in on the secret: no “X” on the front. No indication that this neighborhood was checked for people or animals during the dark days of early September.

The city is full of the marks, including uptown and downtown houses outside the flood zone, and even businesses large enough to have a corporate office in Minnesota. The most interesting business I have seen marked is a national drug store chain on St. Charles, which is a bit mystifying. Did they expect to find a family of three in there? Or a senior citizen who spends the nights living in the back of a shiny store?

Many areas with a foot of water or less, areas with streets high enough to get out on, had folks pounding on doors and shining flashlights in windows; why not us?

My street is smack in the middle of the flooded area. Five feet of water on our street.

I have been reading some George Orwell, and a few passages seem appropriate to write down:

"Is it wicked to take a pleasure in spring and other seasonal changes? To put it more precisely, is it politically reprehensible, while we are all groaning, or at any rate ought to be groaning, under the shackles of the capitalist system, to point out that it is frequently more worth living because of a blackbird's song, a yellow elm tree in October, or some other natural phenomenon which does not cost money and does not have what the editors of left wing newspapers call a class angle?'

Thanks, George, for that.

I was sitting in front of my moldy and brown home yesterday, feeling the warmth of the sun and drinking a High Life from the bar down the street and enjoying all of it. Then, I felt guilty. Then, I felt confused. Today, I read that and felt better and also read this and felt better still:

In between running farmers markets, looking for a place to live after Mardi Gras day and keeping up with far-flung (and I do mean flung) friends and family, I am working on a new thing for New Orleans: our first green map.

Green maps are snapshots of sustainability in a city. They focus on those positive things that bring creative culturals to an area to buy an old shattered house, adopt a local dive and call themselves locals after a time. Green spaces, bike lanes and cultural authenticity can make or break an area when it comes to keeping these mavens in your town. Green maps can be used (and are) in many different ways, from presenting a rosy picture of today to seeing the holes to fill tomorrow. The organization Green Map System is set up to help interested city activists with the dos and don'ts and technical assistance to make their own maps. Wendy Brawer, the head of Green Map, produced the first one, back in 1992, for New York City. And true to her belief that "sustainable" means "local," she uses her success to help others map their city.