Renaissance Woman

Not a ton has changed since my last update, but I did acquire a new project today that should be pretty exciting. There was a competition within NHS for marketing stories (tales of success, basically illustrating why NHS is awesome), but now the stories need to be edited to go on their website and potentially into other marketing-related publications. At the last staff meeting, there was talk about finding an intern to do this. But then David, who I am constantly asking "What now?" after I finish something he's given me, suggested that this intern might not be too difficult to find.

I get to copy edit! It's like yearbook! Except when I need quotes, I can't just turn to Lauren or Avjit or Vikki and be like, say something about this event, and quote them as an anonymous attendant (we did that a lot, which was only slightly less underhanded than when I just quoted myself!). It will be nice to talk to people to see how they feel about their interactions with NHS. And then since editing can be done remotely, they might ask me to continue doing so once I'm back at school (except then I'll be compensated). Not too shabby.

Tonight I ended up staying at the office until almost 10 because I babysat during a training for a Community Conferencing program that CBI is starting at a local high school. The kids were pretty adorable, but also fairly rambunctious--thankfully, they hired a second (professional!) sitter as well. We tried to calm them down with a movie (Air Bud!), but they seemed much more interested in playing with the projector than watching the movie. One girl stayed occupied for a good 5-10 minutes (if only it had been longer!) just playing with my hair. She said it was weird, and I guess she was right--another one of those moments where even my mom teasing me about having my dad's pasty skin doesn't really cover the contrast when I am the only white person in the room.

Delicious Purple Hull Pea Recipe

At the farmers market, I saw these funny looking green and purple peas and thought, wonder what those taste like. So I bought some--some internet investigation identifies them as purple hull peas, kind of like black-eyed peas (to me they taste kind of like lentils). I also found this amazing recipe that I just made for dinner. Tastes great (and oh so southern) with cornbread!

PurpleHull Peas with Pancetta and Onions

4 slices pancetta or bacon (I used bacon)
2 sweet onions, thinly sliced
2 large cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 14-oz. can chicken stock
2 cups fresh shelled purplehull peas (a little over 1 lb. unshelled)
3 sprigs fresh thyme
Freshly ground pepper and salt to taste

Saute strips of pancetta or bacon in a saute pan. (If using bacon, fry until crisp.) Remove pancetta or bacon and pour off rendered fat, leaving 1 tablespoon in pan. Slowly saute onions in the pan, stirring frequently, until they are well browned and caramelized. Remove
onions and set aside. Next, saute garlic in pan (adding rendered fat or oil if necessary) just until it sizzles. Deglaze pan with chicken stock. (Pour chicken stock into pan, scraping up brown bits that cling to the bottom and stirring them into stock.) Add peas and thyme sprigs. Broth should just cover peas. If not, add additional broth or water to cover. Cover pan and simmer gently until peas are tender, 15 to 20 minutes. Crumble or dice bacon or pancetta and add to peas just before serving, along with caramelized onions and generous grinding of black pepper. Add salt to taste. Makes 4 servings.

Update on the 7th Ward and my work so far

So due to a lack of funding, nothing has been built yet in the 7th Ward and the lots there that NHS owns have not been kept in repair. As I've written before, the Neighborhood Center there is very young in terms of its presence in the community, and NHS's other services are virtually nonexistent.

I just came from a planning meeting for the in 7th Ward in particular, attended by people from both the Community Building Initiative (running the property campaign and neighborhood centers) and the Design/Build folks (who actually design houses and run the construction management services), so the strategy is fresh in my mind. To inform 7th Ward folk about NHS services provided through the main office, there's going to be a letter campaign just to introduce NHS services to the community (no threats of code enforcement this time), followed up by door-to-door surveying of need. I have already written drafts of both the letter and the survey. This will hopefully identify neighbors who will be good candidates for city funding for home repair that NHS hopefully will receive soon (*crosses fingers*).

Additionally, Design/Build people are going to attend the next couple monthly community meetings in the 7th ward to talk about services and ask for input on designs--hopefully construction can start soon. At the very least, once they sell a house they've built (supposed to close at the end of the month) they'll be able to pay for regular lawn maintenance at the vacant lots they own. There's going to be a few civic action campaigns in the near future, too, one of which is scheduled to start next month--a campaign to re-open the Circle Food grocery store, since there otherwise is no grocery store in the neighborhood. There are so many ideas floating around, I'm excited to see them hit the ground.

My role in all of this has been... everywhere! As I said, I have written drafts of the aforementioned letter and door-to-door survey, as well as a few fliers and other surveys (MS Word, Publisher and Excell are becoming my best friends!). I've also been working to update a new online database system they have to keep track of contacts and properties (SalesForce), which will hopefully be really useful in the future but at the present is pretty confusing--a mix of Excell spreadsheets and handwritten notes, some of which are uploaded, some are not....ugh! And I sent a bunch of invitations to the Circle Food Store Campaign Kick-off event next month that I'm excited to attend myself.

Separate from the 7th Ward stuff, I'm starting to work on a way to advertise houses that are for sale in the Freret/Milan communities--ultimately we want to hang a bulletin board in the Freret Neighborhood Center with listings, since they get a decent amount of traffic, but first we need descriptions of the homes and contact info for the owners. I've also been trying to keep up on reading about all these issues--the history of community developing corporations, gentrification, etc. etc. There's so much to think about!!!

Books + Coffee + Sun = Love

There is a really cute bookstore, Maple Street Book Shop, a few blocks from me that I visited this afternoon. It's very small--a converted shotgun whose entire frame leans to the left a little bit--but they've crammed a surprising number of books in there. I bought American Gods by Neil Gaiman and 1 Dead in Attic: After Katrina by Chris Rose, a collection of short stories about life after the hurricane. The free bookmark now tucked after the first few chapters of American Gods (which have been quite good) says "Fight the Stupids!"

I took my new books to the Starbucks outdoor patio across the street, drank iced coffee and read for a few hours--the temperature and lighting were perfect, I was quite content. The rain we've gotten lately seems to have cooled things off a bit. Walking back just as the sun was starting to go, it was making me squint but I was just... in a great mood. It was a moment of clarity, I think, although I'm not really sure what it was that felt clearer. Maybe a moment of peace, because anything unclear wasn't really bothering me. Regardless of what it was, it was unexpected. *ponders* Ok I'll stop now :)

All in all, though, this weekend went pretty well. Friday I was boring and stayed in to do laundry. But Saturday I exchanged my bike for a new one with hand brakes and speeds and everything--the brakes stopped working properly on my way home from the 7th Ward Thursday. I almost got hit by a bus, it was a great time! Hopefully this new bike will not try to kill me.

Later Saturday I went to Bourbon Street for a little while and tried a hand grenade (rum, gin, vodka, grain alcohol, and melon liquor served over crushed ice and in a silly looking plastic cup), which was extremely potent and probably responsible for the headache I had this morning. It didn't taste that spectacular either, but I'm told hurricanes are better so I'll have to try that next time. I'll also have to bring a camera to capture all the crowds and drunk people falling off the curbs! My night ended back at Bruno's, one of the bars a few blocks from my house. A nice ending to the day, I'd say.

The Unpackable Knapsack

I was thinking a lot today about a reading I did for class last quarter, White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Peggy McIntosh, and I think I'm seeing a situation in which that white knapsack really cannot be "unpacked" without some serious changes in the entire makeup of society.

Out for coffee with Erica and Sarah, the VISTA/AmeriCorps volunteer at the 7th Ward, I realized what a frustrating and practically impossible situation Sarah find herself in terms of reaching out to the 7th ward community. She has been screamed at in meetings, called a tramp, told to go back where she came from, and generally mistrusted, in ways that are not only insulting and discouraging to her personally, but also are counterproductive to the entire campaign. Why? Because she, as a young, white female (through no fault of her own) manages to embody everything that is wrong with American society--whiteness as seen through the most negative, and yet shamefully accurate, lens possible. Whites are the gentrifying invaders, the fakers and the phonies who will take advantage of you, the arrogant outsiders who want to tell you what to do, the oppressors. And there is absolutely no way to deny any of these accusations, first of all because they are sometimes true. And second of all, because NHS in the 7th ward has not yet managed to build much trustworthy evidence to the contrary.

Of course Sarah herself has the best of intentions. She is not racist and she really is doing everything right from what I can tell. But what she represents is a problem that she cannot overcome alone, especially when the actions of others continue to reinforce the negative image she cannot help but represent. There was a meeting held by a developer who wanted to build yet another bar in the 7th Ward--Sarah attended this meeting having already heard a lot of community opposition to the bar, so she was expecting to hear more of the same. But then the first person to stand up and voice the opposition was a newer resident in the community--young, white, and gay. He stated that he did not want the bar because it was only going to bring more of those Second Line parades that always end in shootings.

You do not have to be psychic to accurately predict the outrage that followed his comment--community members who previously were wary of having yet another bar in the neighborhood (causing traffic congestion and bringing in outsiders who would not contribute anything to the residents) suddenly found themselves vehemently supporting it. Did they actually think it was best for the community? Probably not. But did they feel themselves dutifully bound to defend their culture and identities against the blatantly racist characterization of this ignorant outsider? Absolutely. In opposition to one man's ignorance, the bar came to represent everything that was important to the people of the 7th Ward... even though it wasn't.

These are the attitudes that the 7th Ward Neighborhood Center needs to address--attitudes based on centuries of oppression and mistrust. The Center has been there for a year and a half now, but still does not have the trust of the community. One way to do this might be to partner with local churches, the most obvious social organization already existing there. But can a white girl walk into a black church, introduce herself and say hey, how can we help you? The unfortunate answer is probably no. She would not face the same outrage Mr. Second Line Shootings did because she would not say something so ignorant, but I don't know how much people would trust her.

There are, of course, ways to address this. The 7th Ward has already gained enough trust from a handful of residents to at least have a working relationship with them, but the scale isn't big enough. I have only been here for a few weeks, so I do not know the entire story behind the problem of scale--I am not trying to be critical and really believe that NHS has beautiful intentions and is working very hard--but it looks like it's a struggle. Most problematic seems to be the fact that they do not yet have the same resources in the 7th Ward that the center in Freret is able to provide: a free computer lab open to all residents (although one is coming!), home buyer training classes, summer camp for local kids, free yoga classes. They have not yet reached out to the churches. And they have not yet begun building on the 20+ vacant lots NHS owns in the neighborhood. As a result, there are little visible, tangible, meaningful places for residents to look to see the product of NHS's work. For a few, the center provides some meaningful resources. But the sad truth is that for most, it is more of a mystery that doesn't really fit in.

There are, however, plenty of opportunities for growth on the horizon. The Circle Food Store campaign kick-off next month will hopefully bring together a variety of residents who may want to become involved in the future. The property campaign is beginning (I'm going to start drafting a mailing tomorrow!), which will hopefully result in the renovation of existing homes in the neighborhood, creating a tangible impact and also making the neighborhood more attractive to those who might buy the houses that NHS eventually hopes to build. Similarly, NHS might be getting money from the city to finance smaller home repair, having a quick and tangible impact. And there is even talk within DesignBuild about having a community meeting in the 7th Ward to get feedback on designs--if done correctly, this will hopefully avoid the problem they've run into in Central City where brand new and affordable homes have sat on the market for quite some time because nobody wants to buy into their modern geometric design, as well as show that NHS does value resident input.

So there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel for sure--yay!

Her SHOE flew OFF!

So in order to properly read the title of this post, watch this fantastic Dane Cook skit, particularly at 1:26. Ok.

Today I was biking to work as usual, trying my best to avoid potholes but sometimes failing as usual, when all of a sudden the pedals were spinning out of control and I was missing a shoe. The faulty pedals were easy enough to explain--the chain had slipped off--but I really can't figure out how my shoe ended up in the middle of the street instead of on my foot.

The best part about this was that my lovely bicycle does not have hand brakes, so with no chain to backpedal, I could not stop. I couldn't drag my feet because I was missing a shoe and didn't think one foot would be sufficient. So I coasted.... eventually came to a stop a little over a block later... and then had to walk back barefoot to retrieve my shoe. Thankfully neither it nor I was run over by a car.

Last summer when I was doing research for ASP, the brake line in the car I was driving snapped--the repair garage happened to be at the bottom of a large hill, so I passed it right by and had to turn around on flatter ground and drive back. I think maybe I just have bad luck with brakes.

UPDATE 7/16/09: Very bad luck. Today riding home from the 7th Ward, I almost got hit by a bus. Why? Because the moment I needed to stop behind a parked car to let a bus pass was the moment my brakes decided that they are only going to work 50% of the time. I was sandwiched between the bus and a car so tightly that the bus almost scraped my elbow. Tomorrow I will be heading to a repair shop to see how much it would cost to buy and install a hand brake. If it's more than $30, then I'll be heading back to Walmart to exchange the bike from hell for a new one that hopefully will not try to kill me.

UPDATE 7/18/09: Today I exchanged my bike--the new one is a rather noxious shade of purple, but it has hand breaks! It was also newly on sale, so it ended up being cheaper than the one I originally bought. I will put the savings towards buying a cushy new seat, because the one that it came with is extremely uncomfortable.

Miss Dorris's White Gloves

On Saturday I went to the 7th Ward for a community meeting, followed by another meeting about starting a Neighborhood Watch program. The turnout for both meetings left something to be desired--3 community members for the first and 5 for the second. But I've been told that turnout is usually better when there is something specific to do, whereas these meetings were more informative than action-oriented. They did talk about an upcoming action, though--an ongoing campaign to get the Circle Food Store back into the neighborhood. Mondo Bizarro, who did the I-Witness Central City project, hopes to interview people about their memories of the store, to play in the background at an event in the former store's parking lot where people will meet and sign petitions (I highly recommend looking at that link, it's a pretty awesome collection--the woman pictured at the top is Stephanie, one of the 7th Ward Organizers).

In between the 2 meetings, I got to talking to a Miss Dorris from the community. She is 76 and has lived in the 7th Ward all her life, and nothing could make her leave or break her dignified, well-spoken calm--not even a hurricane that sent water up to her second step. She was content with all her stores of canned food and dry goods, candles, and her radio. She was not afraid to sit in her closet as the wind sent her awning tumbling down the street because the radio announcer himself took a break when he, too, was moved to a closet. After the terrible winds had stopped, she got a phonecall from someone asking if she had any water on her block. What water? Just as she looked out the window to see the water beginning to rise on the street, her phone went dead.

But she was just fine in her little house! Her only regret is that her nephew. David, living a few blocks away also stayed behind because he did not want to leave her (she felt very guilty about this, so that for Hurricane Gustav, she did evacuate with the rest of her family--as she said this, David's eyes widened and he shook his head, probably thinking his aunt was crazy!). With the contents of the broken levee stagnant in the streets, her nephew came by boat to get her, having to walk the last block or so to her house through knee-deep water because while the water was certainly too deep to belong on the street, it was too shallow for the boat. She was extremely lucky--no water got into her house, while areas nearby were over five feet under. They and some others spent several days on an overpass with little by way of food or water or facilities--she said they passed one porta-potty on their way, but it was full. Just the one!

Miss Dorris also had a lot to share about the history of the neighborhood and how times have changed. She used to work for an insurance company on Canal Street, and she described the higher standards they had back then for how people dressed. At a wedding reception she went to recently, she was horrified to see someone wearing shorts. For church and for weddings, they used to wear stockings and hats and white dress gloves. Even to go shopping on Canal Street, which used to be much nicer, they would put on hats and white gloves!

She and David also talked about the deterioration of the 7th Ward. People don't watch over the neighborhood as much, minding other people's kids in the street if parents aren't looking. Parents are not present the way they used to be. And people don't look out for eachother anymore--there isn't the neighborhood carpenter there to fix your porch for free when you can't afford to pay someone. Miss Dorris remembers helping her father paint the house--she said she used to do all kinds of manual labor, in a way implying that people nowadays don't seem to work as hard.

They also gave a lot of credit to the demolition of the projects, putting people together who just couldn't mix. Gang violence increased among groups from different project developments--even though these newcomers had the shared experience of being from the projects, they were divided by which specific project they had come from, which didn't make much sense in their opinions (While I question the mindset that different people are incapable of mixing, the violence between people formerly from different projects doesn't make too much sense to me, either). Miss Dorris also couldn't understand why they demolished the projects in the first place--they were well constructed and had hot and cold running water, making residents better off than many others in the neighborhood who did work and pay for their own housing. They were so well-constructed, she said, that they were extremely difficult to demolish--why didn't they just let them be?

There was also the city's decision to build an overpass over what used to be a beautiful neutral ground--a tree-lined boulevard with dozens of businesses. Miss Dorris remembered how the shoe repairman used to work all night on the weekend to get kids' shoes ready for school on Monday, something you never see anymore. People didn't used to drive so much either, but now the automobile has kind of taken over. Despite understanding the need for bigger roads for all the cars, she thinks the city probably regrets building the overpass because of what it did to the vitality of the neighborhood.

I was sad to have to end this conversation when the second meeting started. I still have this beautiful image of Miss Dorris with her perfect posture and curled white hair walking down Canal Street in stockings, hat and gloves, shopping for a new dress or ribbons for her hat.

The cop who came to talk about Neighborhood Watch program was, to be polite, a bit clueless about what he was doing. He tried to make up for his very heavy accent (Vietnamese?) by talking extremely loudly, but he was still pretty difficult to understand sometimes. And there was no disguising the fact that he was talking down to everyone present, putting most of the blame for unsolved crime on the fact that it often goes unreported (aka it's the neighborhood's fault for not calling the cops). But people don't call the cops because they are afraid of retaliation--this he did address by explaining how to make a confidential report. But people don't call the cops because the cops are corrupt and people do not trust them--this he did not address at all. He also held up the Neighborhood Watch sign that they can hang in the neighborhood and proclaimed, "This is the gansta sign! We cops are gangstas too!" while everyone present looked either horrified or disgusted. Fail. Still, he did provide good information, so hopefully the program really does get off the ground and running.

Research Alert!: Gentrification

Symposium: When Gentrification Comes Knocking-Navigating Social Dynamics in Changing Neighborhoods, NeighborWorks Training Institute Minneapolis, MN 20 April 05

Definition of Gentrification: influx of wealthier people into a community, which leads to increases in rent/property values and changes in the community's character and culture. Has both pros and cons. What remains fairly unstudied are the social stresses that come with gentrification. It appears that success comes from creating strong social ties between old and new neighbors before the negative effects of gentrification become unmanageable.

Characteristics of Gentrification (Freeman)
--decreased residental mobility (disputed by Van Meter?)
--increased housing costs
--low-income families less likely to move in, which is just as important as displacement
--some positive side-effects (more amenities, services)
--cynicism from asking questions such as, why do we need the "gentry" to move in to get better amenties? Reinforces the idea that poor communities of color are undervalued by society
--tension over behavioral norms also leads to resentment

(From my own observation: "bad" gentrification might be represented by new businesses such as the bar on Freret "The Cure" (bad 80's rock band? Let's call it "The Disease" instead! :) that serves drinks no one in the community can afford and would not let us hang a flier about summer camp on the phone pole out front (not community-oriented). There is also the "community" garden in the 7th ward that built a fence around the lot to keep out those untrustworthy neighors and sells plots mainly to people outside the community. "Good" gentrificiation might be Beaucop Nola snowball shop on Freret that rewards kids with free snowballs if they bring a book to read in the shop.)

Causes of Gentrification
Baby boomers' renewed interest in urban space (vs. suburban)
For-profit development/"booming" economy unevenly distributed (City Life/Vida Urbana--although it might be interesting to see how this has changed now that the economyis not so booming)

Social Stresses involved in gentrification, from quotes from Freeman and others
--"Us vs. Them" mentalities, cultural differences and misunderstandings, social inequalities become more obvious as cultures/races mix, tension over norms
--White people legitimize an increase in property values --> resentment. Some of the people Freeman interviewed expressed much less resentment towards black gentrifiers because they seemed to mix in more easily
--White people moving around in the neighborhood (jogging, walking dogs, etc.), but almost never standing around street corners, adds to the perception of "taking over" (again, behavioral norms are challenged)

Example of conflicting perception: KNO member new to the community saw a lack of action/development and said that what the community needed was "people who aren't tired." But is burn-out/tiredness the real root of the problem? Need a dialogue.

According to Bob Van Meter's "CDCs in Gentrifying Neighborhoods" (Shelterforce Jan/Feb 04), gentrification can lead to a loss of social capital (ex: Little League coaches, church goers) because new residents are often younger and not prepared for long term commitment. They are more transitional and will move away again to the suburbs when they want to start a family. Lance Freeman's research, however, suggests that gentrification is associated with a decrease in residential mobility. How to reconcile...? Maybe loss of social capital occurs, but not because of mobility--new people may just be less interested in getting involved?

How should CDCs approach issues of gentrification?
Don't just build houses

"If you want to be a developer, then call yourself a developer. If you call yourself a CDC then you have to be more than a housing developer... You need to be about community development, which includes community service programs, which includes commercial programs. Developing housing isn't everything--because community doesn't develop based on houses." --Mechanicsville Community Leader

Give neighbors opportunities to meet and engage in conflict resolution (Gonzalez)
--Positional vs. Interest Bargaining--do not take a position or start by assuming a solution, but look for ways to first form productive relationships and address everyones interests.
--Moderators should use "negotiator aikido," or rechannel attacks on himself or others present in the discussion into an attack on a problem and a way to bring consensus
--As the Jamaica Plain Neighbors Against Gentrification discovered, this may involve very racially charged conversations. These conversations need to be had--provide a safe environment for them to occur (set rules, use "I" statements, avoid personal attacks, etc.)

Be open to learning, discovering, and getting everyones opinions

"We are exposed to many ideas, theories, and improvement strategies, yet few of them stick because few make deep intuitive sense. But occasionally we are introduced to something that leads to a deep sense of recognition--a kind of rediscovery rather than learning something entirely new. It is important to live with this sort of rediscovery over time, to continute to apply and test it, to see whether it makes deeper and deeper sense. If such ideas stand the test of time, the result is an ongoing process of ever-expanding insight rather than a continued effort to remember what were were supposed to have learned."
--Peter Senge, Leadership the Fifth Discipline

"We probably could have guessed what people would say were the biggest housing problems... But the process of asking people their opinions led them to get involved in the planning of the campaign as a way of finding solutiosn to the issues they were raising."
--Joe Valley, Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corporation

Act creatively before gentrification has really hurt the community
In Boston, City Life/Vida Urbana created Anti-displacement zones (ADZs) and organized tenants into unions, building power among tenants at risk for displacement, before they became displaced. This way there were more options and more chances for success.

Freeman's research suggests that the stock of low-income housing shrinks fairly slowly as gentrification begins--CDCs can step in to preserve affordability before it is lost. For example, in Jamaica Plains, they campainged to convert a historic church not only into a historical landmark, but also into affordable housing units.

Run-ins in the 7th Ward

Today was interesting for 2 reasons: first, bike riding today was cursed. I arrived at the 7th ward center "on time" only to then see I had a text saying I should come an hour later. I really should have checked my phone before I left! Then my 5.7 mile ride home turned into something like 8.7 miles because I managed to lose track of the street I was on...? That sounds ridiculous, I know, but the pedestrian walkway that David said might be on Broad Street was actually a highway-like bridge with cars merging on and off rather quickly, so I tried to go around it. Tried... and failed.

Now the second reason that today was interesting was the random people I saw and talked to while walking around the 7th ward with Sarah to pass out several different fliers (about 2 community meetings on Saturday, a free legal advice clinic, and the Crescent City Farmers Market).

First, there was a man walking down the street with a can of beer in one hand and a large machete tucked under his other arm. Interesting.

Then a younger guy (early 20s?) on crutches might have said he got shot in the leg yesterday. But then Sarah thought he also could have said he fell. There was nothing wrong with his voice, so I'm not sure how we got two very different interpretations of what he said... but he (like many of his neighbors) did sound pretty enthusiastic about coming to the community meetings, so that was encouraging.

There was one woman, though, who didn't want anything to do with us and our fucking fliers, because us organizations just get grants and don't do anything with them. That was difficult to respond to--we really couldn't do much besides remove our fliers from her mailbox. As Sarah said, it's a legitimate concern that NGOs don't necessarily use their resources to make an immediately visible impact in the community. That isn't to say they're irresponsible or wasteful or even really doing anything wrong, but I guess that isn't the same thing as doing everything right. It's impossible to address every need--just like one person can't do everything, one organization can't do everything either--but it's not so easy to accept that if some of your basic needs aren't being met despite the presence of an NGO in the community. And NGOs do fail--maybe she had a particularly bad experience in mind. Hopefully events like Saturday's community meeting will help keep NHS and the community on the same page.

And last (but certainly not least!) there was Mr. Black. Well actually his name was not Mr. Black, he was just playing with us. He and his friend, both (like pretty much the entire community) African American, were sitting on their front porch drinking Miller High Life (Champagne of Beers!) and he certainly loved to chat. His friend read the flier about free legal advice (specifically for those with a criminal background) and went into a little rant about how so many people in the neighborhood don't work and join gangs and that's why they really need this kind of thing (he did not need it, he goes to work every day).

Then "Mr. Black" (I can't remember his real name now) pretty much took over the conversation. He recalled a conversation he'd had with a guy who claimed to be white: he'd held a piece of paper up to the "white" guy to show him that he was not, in fact, the same color as white paper, and therefor not white. Same with "black" people--are they really the same color as your shoes? No, no I suppose not. One time he'd seen a woman who actually was white--you could see all her veins--but otherwise he's never seen a person who was actually white. I feel like there was some kind of deeper wisdom there, but I'm not quite sure I grasped it.

He also told us about how he starting picking potatoes and other crops when he was 8. About another job that only paid $25/week, and another that paid $75/week and made him think he was rich. He told us he'd been to 26 states in the United States, and all over Europe, and Guatemala (in the army). In Guatemala they had $0.25 girls--for $0.50 they'd spend the whole night!

He asked us if we were married, and if we were going to get married (several times he asked that, actually, it was very important to him somehow). He was happy to hear we were not and told us that we never should. (His friend was sort of nodding in the background). "Mr. Black" had been married twice and claimed to have something like 18 children, all between the ages of 9 months and 23. That's not nearly as many as his father had (like 30!), but nowadays they have everything (everything and I mean everything!) and it's harder to get pregnant. Something about a cup--I think he might have been talking about diaphrams?

That was kind of our cue to leave: when the old man starts talking about sex. But as we were walking away, he reminded us not to get married! :p

Research Project Ideas

Today I spent most of the day helping to set up the Freret Neighborhood Center for summer camp. I got to paint a box to be their "treasure chest" full of prizes for good behavior--I put a giant mosquito on one side because Kate told me to use their field trip to the swamp for inspiration :)

But in the afternoon I took a break from that to talk to David about a potential research project--let me type up my notes before I forget what they mean.

Potential Questions to answer:

--Broadly, what can residents do when they have a lot of vacant properties in their neighborhood? (what works, what doesn't, etc.)
--How successful is NHS's CBI initiative? Aspects to concentrate on include the physical (are homes being renovated?), the social (are residents involved/engaged?) and the property owners (what are their intentions? how well does the campaign address their needs?)
--Speaking of property owners--what are their intentions in more detail? What do these intentions say about the neighborhood, this type of approach? (this could do more than just evaluate NHS)
--What are some "best practices" for neighborhood organizations? David seemed to like the idea of looking at what other cities/organizations are doing--even just page long case studies. Possible cases include organizations in Flint MI, Detroit, Chicago ("Troubled Building"/CIC) and Broadmoor NOLA.

Data available:

--Results of the Freret property campaign (survey June 2008, letters Feb 2009) --Incoming results of the Milan campaign (survey March 2008, letters June 2009)
--Anticipated results of the 7th Ward campaign (survey June 2008, letters TBA)
--The beginnings of a "data set" of who volunteers/does what, using Sales Force (to track community involvement)
--Anything I do myself?

We also talked about how NHS is hoping to administer a grant from the city to rehab houses, which led to a discussion on soft-second loans. Basically it's a loan that covers part of your mortgage (only part--the "second" part that you're not getting from the bank because you don't qualify for it/can't afford it). It is different from a typical mortgage in that it might not have to be repaid if it's the kind that can be forgiven, or if you have to pay it back, you don't owe any interest. Either one helps you build equity in your home for less than it would cost if you went through the traditional mortgage process. It's confusing and I still don't fully understand the entire process, but David drew a pretty chart. Charts make me happy.

Touring the City: 7th Ward , 9th Ward, New Orleans East

Last week on Thursday I went to the 7th Ward Neighborhood Center for the first time. Their office is small, but they have a large backyard that they share with a community arts program called "The Porch," which made me rather nostalgic for ASP's porch (ASP's is bigger! :). I added a whole bunch of names and emails from sign-in sheets for various events to Constant Contact, an online service that lets you keep track of emails and send mass emails. That was boring. But then Sarah drove me around for a tour of the 7th Ward.

The 7th Ward has a higher vacancy rate (about 40%!) than Freret/Milan and is more racially homogeneous (re: black). I would guess it also has a higher poverty rate. The lots looked smaller--more dense--but many homes were indeed falling apart or demolished. Sarah gave me some of the history of the ward. It used to be home to large numbers of creoles (freed blacks from before Louisiana was purchased by the US and before slavery was abolished) and was an intellectual and cultural hub for creole culture in particular. But several factors contributed to the 7th Ward's decline: first, when slavery was abolished, creoles lost their distinctive class and suffered under Jim Crow laws along with more recently freed slaves. Then the city decided (in the 70's I believe) that the beautiful boulevard/shopping center/meeting place/center of town wasn't all that important and build a highway on it... good job. To put the bitter icing on the cake: Hurricane Katrina... yeah.

Then yesterday I again went to the 7th Ward (except this time I biked--almost 12 miles round trip! Thankfully it was a bit cooler for once). We drove around in the 9th Ward and New Orleans East--two dramatically different parts of town! The 9th ward was all over the news when the hurricane hit--it experienced some of the worst damage. The wealthier part of town is already more rebuilt, which Johnathon explained were generally the homes of black doctors, lawyers, etc. But it's apparently been a huge hassle finding the owners of many of the now vacant lots on the other side of town--many have died/moved away/no one knows who owns it to even look for them.

You might also have seen the Brad Pitt "green" houses that have been built there--they are kind of funky looking, with solar panels and lots of weird geometric shapes, which has been kind of controversial given how much New Orleans tends to value it's traditional architecture. There were about 7-8 of them built, surrounded by several blocks of empty lots on all sides, which was kind of eerie. I remember when I was looking for an internship, Susan's contact down here in New Orleans suggested that I NOT work for that organization--"I dunno -what- they're doing over there!" he said. We also drove by Musician's Village, built by Habitat--they looked like typical Habitat houses, which is closer to the typical home design down here (yay Habitat!). I'd like to volunteer to build there on the weekends, but unfortunately it's hard to get there without a car.

New Orleans East is part of Orleans Parish, but much more suburban. It's interesting in that on one side of town, there is a bunch of smallish, run down Section 8 housing ("the hood" as Johnathan called it) and then on the other side are these gorgeous homes like I'd see in some of the wealthier suburbs back home (except with palm trees!). The population there is more mixed--black and Vietnamese. Apparently those Asians really love their fireworks on the 4th of July, I was told. Johnathan ended up giving us a sort of geographical tour of his life--he's now living in New Orleans East, and we also saw the home where he grew up, still standing on the nicer side of 9th Ward.

I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the make-up of the city--I'm getting there, but it's a lot to take in.

Snowballs and Ludacris

Friday I went to get a snowball at Beaucoup Nola on my way home from shopping/picking up my bike from work (I left it there Thursday and took the bus because it was pouring). This was a very good idea for two reasons. First, my snowball was free because a volunteer church group was there ahead of me and paid for mine because I had to wait (for like... 5 minutes...). That was super nice of them, though. Ah, fond memories of getting ice cream almost every day after work with ASP! And second, I found out that the guy who I believe owns the place is offering to give kids free snowballs if they sit there and read for a while. How awesome is that? The shops focus on being involved in the community shines in contrast to the bar with $12 drinks down the street, whose owner told Kate and I not to "waste our time" hanging up a flier on the pole out front because he was just going to take it down. As Kate put it, if gentrification were a decor, that bar would have it. Smelly.

Yesterday completely unrelated to my internship I got to work one of the doors to a fundraiser party for the Chris Paul and Ludacris foundations, sponsored by Grey Goose Vodka. And by work one of the doors, I mean sit with Erica and our laminated "staff" lanyards at the back door that was no longer being used as an entrance and tell people to go around to the front. They had a red carpet rolled out and everything, classic VIP-entrance style, so people tended to be confused by this, but apparently the night before too many people kept sneaking in the VIP section so they wanted both entrances on the same side to keep track of people. But really, there wasn't much excitement on our end--sitting there from around 10pm to 4am got to be pretty boring.

I apparently saw Ludacris and Chris Paul walk by into the party, but they were walking so quickly with a group of other guys (security probably) that I didn't even recognize them until the cop sitting next to me was like... That was Ludacris. I didn't believe him at first... fail. But I did see them inside the VIP section when I went to go get some water from the bar. Ludacris was wearing sunglasses inside a dimly lit tent--why? Unfortunately having access to the VIP section didn't mean too much when nobody was dancing--as Erica said, if I had paid $20 or $40 to attend this party and got inside to see that no one was dancing, I would have been pissed!

I saw a lot of classy people, one of whom turned out to be Beyonce's sister Solange (she said "hi" to us while awkwardly waiting for her backup singer to show up--she looked famous but I had no idea who she was until Erica told me later...). Then there were the people who thought they were classy because they were somehow connected to famous people (security managers, groupies, etc.) but really weren't that special. I also saw a lot of distinctly not-so-classy people. As Stephanie, the NHS organizer who brought us to this party in the first place put it, some outfits should just not be allowed to exist! Panty-lines and neon colors and leapord prints and way too much shiny...

My one regret is that I didn't bring my camera--it would have been awkward and probably really rude to take pictures of party-goers, but at the end of the night, I kind of wanted a photo of myself in front of the brightly lit Grey Goose sign set up expressly for photo taking. I may not recognize famous people, but I definitely know my vodka :)