MOMENTUM

Every nail driven has a tempo. It is the back beat of rebuilding, the rhythm of momentum. Before, there was devastation, utter and complete. Now, there is hope for people like Edwina Colton and her family  who became first-time homeowners thanks in part to a grant from the Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative.

Edwina Colton and her husband, Robert, are in their seventies, but the excitement they feel about being first-time home owners makes them feel like they are much younger. “I just love that it has a hall,” said  Edwina of their new home on Sixth Street. “I don’t have to walk through the bedroom to get to the kitchen. And I love having a dishwasher. I’ve never had a dishwasher.” Their daughter Kim is excited about having her own private room. Mrs. Colton adds, “The Jericho Home folks were wonderful to  work with. In addition to the grant, they made the whole closing process easy for us.”

The Coltons represent the new face of home ownership in New Orleans. They are the kind of hard working, middle class people who are bringing back the neighborhoods of our city damaged by Hurricane Katrina and years of misguided public housing policy.

Helping to make this kind of rebuilding momentum happen are GNOF-supported groups like the Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative. According to Holly Heine, Director of Operations and Communications for Jericho Road, “There are two pillars to our approach – affordable home construction and neighborhood redevelopment. If we can accomplish those two goals, we will prevent the destruction of the neighborhoods and the cultural makeup of the region.”

Jericho Road focuses their efforts in three mid city neighborhoods – Faubourg Delassize, Faubourg Livaudais and Faubourg Lafayette – in an area bound by St. Charles and Louisiana Avenues and by La Salle and Calliope Streets. To date, they have cleared title on 69 lots and have 20 homes built or under construction, 16 of which are sold.

“We work with the community to plant trees and gardens and to reclaim public areas for parks. We helped to organize a neighborhood group that meets once a month and sponsors picnics, parties, trick-or-treat events and the like,” added Heine.

According to Chris Ross, Director of Housing Programs for Jericho Road, the homes sell in the $145,000 to $155,000 range. Unlike typical public housing, the Jericho homes reflect the character of the area and feature desirable amenities such as mahogany front doors, tall ceilings, 9-inch baseboards, working transoms, black iron porch railings, central air and heat, hardwood floors, energy efficient appliances, floor-to-ceiling windows, alarm systems and  fenced backyards.

The homes are raised and handicapped ready, featuring universal design elements such as wide doorways  and halls, levered door handles and are ramp capable. They also utilize “Green” elements such as  blown-in insulation, low VOC paints and recycled brick steps.

“Houses are the face of the community,” Mr. Ross adds, “and the face of the community has to be smiling.”

The important  work being done by groups like the Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative are made possible by the continuing generosity of our donors. As these groups succeed, so will our city and region. Let’s keep moving forward.

The sign above the blackboard at Benjamin E. Mays charter school reads, “The College of William & Mary Class of 2025.” Rising from the devastation of Carter High School in storm plagued New Orleans East are the seeds of a new generation of hope.

New Orleans is in the forefront of a revolution. A revolution in education. The new charter schools that have emerged since Hurricane Katrina point the way to a bright new future for education in our city. Thanks to the generosity of our donors, The Greater New Orleans Foundation has been able to help move this important resurgence to the head of the class.

By supporting groups like New Schools for New Orleans, GNOF has been able to fund critical improvements in the way our children are prepared for the future.

Sarah Usdin, Founder and CEO of New Schools For New Orleans, describes the charter schools as “the muscles responsible for doing the heavy lifting in our educational renaissance.” She defines groups like NSNO as the cartilage and tendons that connect the schools they sponsor to key resources such as teacher training and recruitment.

A promising example of this new type of school is Benjamin E. Mays Preparatory School. Headed by CEO, Duke Bradley. The energetic Mr. Bradley is a graduate of Morehouse College, was a fellow at Brown University and a graduate of the John Marshall Law School. According to Bradley, “The core values that drive  everything we do at Mays Preparatory are hard work and excellence. We believe our students will be as good as they can be based on how hard they work. If we can instill that quality in our students, it will not only serve them well now, but throughout their lives.”

Mr. Bradley points to longer school weeks and longer school years as key examples of the kind of expectations they set for their students. “We extract best practices from high-performing charter schools around the country.”

The school’s motto is “Every Student College Bound,” and each classroom is dedicated to one of the nation’s top universities. The thinking is that students will rise to the expectations that are set for them.

142 students are enrolled and the school is an open enrollment school. 98% of their students plan to return next year.

When asked about how the school attracts quality teachers, Bradley said, “New Orleans is a laboratory for the future of elementary education. This alone attracts great teachers. We also give our teachers better training through resources like TeachNOLA that New Schools for New Orleans sponsors. The city is primed to be a model of what urban education reform can look like in this country. We can be a beacon on a hill.”

Looking toward the future, Bradley commented, “Parents need choice. That is what will ultimately hold schools accountable. When education improves, the city wins. When education improves, the workforce improves and commerce improves. Education will be the catalyst for change in this city.”

The Greater New Orleans Foundation is proud to support groups like New Schools For New Orleans and the Benjamin E. Mays Preparatory School. They and other like groups have shown much progress in the past five years, but we cannot afford to stop. We hold the future in our hands. The momentum must continue.

The dance performed by Houma Indians, Evan Solet and Trent Dardar, evokes a happier time. A time before coastal erosion, pollution and a shrinking fishing industry caused them to scatter inland, threatening their very existence as a people. An Environmental Fund grant is helping them adapt their architecture and make changes to enhance their resilience and sustainability.

The plight of the United Houma Nations (UHN) is indeed a story ripped from the headlines of today’s newspapers. After centuries of being forced  ever  southward away from rich farmlands by European settlers, they are now being pushed in the opposite direction by an  unrelenting combination of failed environmental policy and a fishing industry threatened by pollution from one of the nation’s worst offshore oil spills.

“We still could make a living here,” says tribal elder Antoine “Whitney” Dardar, 74. “But now, with the oil coming, I don’t know.”

Tommy Verdin, is a fisherman and Houma tribe member. He was just recovering from losses sustained during Hurricane Katrina when the oil spill occurred. Now his 60-foot trawler lays idle due to the suspension of fishing. “It’s a tragedy what they have done here. They have made a mess of my heritage.”

The people of the United Houma Nations face nothing less than the extinction of their culture and traditional way of life. At this point, there are only 17,000 tribal citizens remaining. Such traditional centers of Houma life as Chauvin, Dulac, Pointe-aux-Chenes and Isle de Jean Charles are severely threatened by rising sea levels due to coastal erosion at a truly alarming rate. As a result, many tribal members have been forced to flee inland and scatter.

“The tribe is at a crossroads,” says Kirk Cheramie, program director for a Houma radio station who also acts as spokesman for the tribe. “We are tied to the land, the resources, the fish, the crab and shrimp… Not only that, but it’s where our families are buried. It’s our identity.”

Thanks to the generosity of our donors, the GNOF has awarded a grant from its Environmental Fund to assist the United Houma Nations in providing the survival tools their people need to sustain their way of life. This grant will provide a blueprint for those who are committed to staying for the creation of smarter and safer structures more suited to the environment. It will also assist in the creation of an inland refuge for those who feel they must move away from the coast they have grown to love.

The grant will cover the production and dissemination of a technical assistance manual covering such critical subjects as architectural models better suited to the changing environment, evolving building codes and flood insurance policies, information on climate and coastal erosion projections – information essential to the creation of a more sustainable way of life.

In the process, the UHN plans to provide a wide range of print, web-based and audiovisual materials to policymakers and philanthropic groups, as well as to their own people. It is their hope that their efforts will become a planning model for threatened coastal communities around the world.

It is said that the longest journey begins with a single step. The members of the United Houma Nations have taken that bold first step. They cannot, however, complete their journey without help along the way. We must take the next step with them on the road to a better future.

Social change is never easy. But the formula is simple: Take an empty room and add people. Anna Frachou, heads up LatiNOLA, an offshoot of Puentes. Her mission is to build bridges. Her group of mostly volunteers endeavors to promote a better understanding of Hispanic culture and values in the larger community.

There has been a large surge in the Latino population in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina. It has quickly become the fastest growing segment in our region. This has created certain tensions within the various ethnic communities that make up this area’s unique cultural gumbo. Puentes and LatiNOLA work within this complex matrix to build bridges, and create trust among these groups.

One mission of Puentes is to create access for the Latino community of the Greater New Orleans area. They aspire to create an integrated New Orleans region in which the Latino community is a vital, vibrant and active participant that enjoys access to good jobs, quality education, safe streets, affordable housing and economic opportunities.

LatiNola is the group’s civic engagement arm. According to LatiNOLA Director, Anna Frachou, one of the most challenging tasks is getting the Latino community to speak as one. “Latinos are very diverse. They come from many countries and speak many languages and have great pride in their home countries. This makes it difficult to create a unified voice speaking on behalf of all Latinos. This is what we attempt to do.”

2010 is a Census year. This posed a significant opportunity and an equally challenging problem for LatiNOLA and Puentes.  ”We conducted a large drive in support of the U.S. Census,” said Ms. Frachou.

“It is very important that we can accurately ascertain the size of the Latino community, in order to better serve their needs through community services and governmental representation. There is an element of mistrust that must be overcome in this regard.”

Puentes endeavors to build trust and erase stereotypes within the community. The group has created an outreach program with the New Orleans Police Department. According to Frachou, “Thanks to our Public Safety Initiative, which is a joint effort with the Hispanic Apostolate of Catholic Charities, we have been able to add four hours of cultural sensitivity training at the Police Academy specific to the Hispanic culture.”

Additionally, the Black Brown Forum, attempts to create a better more open atmosphere of cooperation between the African American and Hispanic communities. The Vietnamese community has also joined forces in support of the group’s efforts. Ms. Frachou added, “The Black Brown Forum breaks down all of the barriers, and all of the myths that have been put on these groups. We have held the first of several planned trust building workshops to help create more openness between our various communities.”

Puentes and LatiNOLA sponsor non-partisan voter registration drives, as well as a wide assortment of Hispanic related community events, such as Experience LatiNola, a yearly festival celebrating Latin culture in the New Orleans area.

What began in an empty room in 2007, has been steadily building momentum since then. With the generous support of our donors, this momentum can and must continue.