Gulf Coast Housing Partnership Breaks Ground on Central City Development, The Muses

Nearly five acres of vacant land at Felicity and Carondelet Streets in New Orleans’ Central City neighborhood was known as the focus of a bitter land use struggle that took place in the years before Katrina. Today it is better known as the Muses, the newest housing development in Central City. The Gulf Coast Housing Partnership (GCHP ) is working to replace this contested past with a brighter future. Formed by former community banker Kathy Laborde and the national Housing Partnership Network in January 2006, the GCHP combined a $1 million Community Revitalization grant with other funding sources to purchase “the old Albertson’s site.”

The Muses which will be a mixed-income, mixed use housing development containing 263 apartments, 28 market-rate condos, and 4,000 square feet of ground floor commercial space. “We are very excited about this project because it offers people who want to reside in the inner-city quality living in a mixed-income development designed for the market rate tenant and managed to market rate standards,” said Kathy Laborde.

“The Muses project is one of several development projects shaping the revitalization of Central City. For us, it reflects many of the principles of the Community Revitalization Fund. The project also demonstrates a great partnership between the public, private, philanthropic, and non-profit sectors,” said Ellen Lee, senior vice president of programs at GNOF.