Environment
OVERVIEW
“Either we are witnessing the death of something truly great in America or the start of something even better, something new and blessedly permanent.”
— Mike Tidwell, Bayou Farewell
The most serious challenges to the Greater New Orleans region include issues of coastal land loss and growing vulnerability to storms. These challenges confront the very existence of one of America’s most culturally vibrant and ecologically important areas.
We recognize that our response to our unique environmental challenges will determine every aspect of our region’s future, from the shape of our communities to the strength of our economy. The Foundation partners with environmental experts and community leaders to set goals and chart effective strategies, in order to purposefully support work that is critical to the health and resiliency of our region.
We believe the best solutions can simultaneously increase environmental sustainability and foster new economic opportunity for the region.
OUR WORK
We support innovation in this arena through:
Coastal 5+1 Initiative
Our program addressing the most pressing challenges shared by our region’s five coastal parishes — St. Bernard, Plaquemines, lower Jefferson, Terrebonne and Lafourche — and the coastal-dependent Orleans Parish. Read More >>
Environmental Fund
The Environmental Fund was established in 1994 using the settlement money from a legal dispute involving a chemical spill in the Mississippi River. This endowed fund encourages ecological, economic, and cultural vitality, resilience, and sustainability through environmentally focused policies, programs, and projects. Read More >>
Gulf Coast Oil Spill Fund
We continue to monitor the effects of the 2010 oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and make strategic grants from our Oil Spill Fund to programs assisting the people and communities dealing with its aftermath. Read More >>
Metropolitan Opportunities
An initiative of the Ford Foundation, this program enables us to help grantees build capacity and strengthen communities throughout the greater New Orleans region. Specifically the goals of this initiative are to connect people to opportunities for safe, affordable housing, efficient and effective transit, and to promote economic and workforce development in a holistic regional way. Read More >>
SNAPSHOTS
Funding Water Solutions CEO of The Idea Village, Tim Williamson
Living in New Orleans means living with water, and The Idea Village sees this as an opportunity. The Idea Village, in partnership with the Greater New Orleans Foundation, is launching a Water Venture Development Fund to support entrepreneurial solutions that address our water challenges.
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“The Water Fund will create innovative solutions to living with water,” says Tim Williamson, CEO of The Idea Village. “We are looking to be the catalyst, with the Greater New Orleans Foundation, to encourage New Orleanians to create solutions to end such problems as street and coastal flooding.”
“This is just the kind of grant we like to make,” says Marco Cocito-Monoc, director of regional initiatives at the Greater New Orleans Foundation. “We are going to take one of our greatest liabilities—excess water—and turn it into an asset. Water management is big business. One only has to look at Holland as an example. We’re addressing one of our greatest environmental challenges while creating jobs at the same time.”
The $110,000 program will encourage entrepreneurs to develop and start high-growth ventures in the water industry in the New Orleans region. Through a competitive process, The Idea Village will select up to three Water Fund winners during its Entrepreneur Week in March.
“The Greater New Orleans Foundation is displaying leadership in identifying that entrepreneurs can create sustainable change while also creating jobs and industry,” says Williamson. “We can solve the challenges our community is facing, and then New Orleans can become an expert and a leader on this subject and a model for other communities.”
Friends of the Lafitte Corridor
The Friends of Lafitte Corridor are working on an exciting project in the heart of New Orleans to connect historic neighborhoods with a three-mile long strip of land that was formerly a railroad path.
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