Labor Council opposes New Orleans demolitions

The following resolution was unanimously adopted on Dec. 10.

Whereas, the Housing Authority of New Orleans announced at its Nov. 29, 2007, public meeting that the authority and the federal Department of Housing & Urban Development had scheduled the demolition of four public housing projects in New Orleans, beginning as soon as Dec. 15, 2007. They are the St. Bernard, Lafitte, C.J. Peete, and B.W. Cooper housing projects, in addition to the Fischer development already scheduled for demolition. According to the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper (Nov. 29, 2007), approximately $30 million in contracts have been approved for demolition of the five developments; and

Whereas, housing advocates in New Orleans say the plan to destroy public housing is a means of discouraging poor residents, who had been displaced after Hurricane Katrina, from moving back to their homes and neighborhoods in New Orleans—despite the fact that an inspection by MIT engineers found the public housing buildings structurally sound and easily renovated; and

Whereas, a disproportionately high percentage of the displaced people are African Americans; New Orleans housing advocates point out that big real-estate interests and private developers have been eager to tear down and redevelop the poor neighborhoods to make way for profitable business development; and

Whereas, the New Orleans-based Coalition to Stop Demolition issued this statement: “What is at stake with the demolition of public housing in New Orleans is more than just the loss of housing units—it destroys any possibility for affordable housing in New Orleans for the foreseeable future. Without access to affordable housing, thousands of working-class people in New Orleans will be denied their human right to return. Although this situation is unique and urgent in the city of New Orleans, it does not occur in isolation. The plans for redevelopment here are part of a national assault on public housing, in which tens of thousands of homes have been demolished in the past decade”; therefore be it

Resolved, that the San Francisco Labor Council send a letter to the New Orleans housing authorities and the Department of Housing & Urban Development, protesting the planned demolition of five public housing developments—with bulldozing set to begin as early as Dec. 15, 2007, and calling for the tens of millions of dollars earmarked for the demolition to be spent instead to increase the number of low-income, affordable housing units in New Orleans.

Copies of the letter to be sent to labor organizations in New Orleans including the Greater New Orleans Central Labor Council.