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Every Single County in America Is Facing an Affordable Housing Crisis-CityLab

When people overreact about airbnb, I think I’ll bring this story up. Affordable housing has been in a crisis for some time, long before that site was created.
The lack of affordable housing issue comes from the same old greed that has allowed this crisis to happen in every place in the US (not all of which are airbnb-heavy counties): owners cashing in on the highest rates they can get for their property, whether the culprit are developers or homeowners. If you want to charge at the high end of market rates (whether through airbnb or Craigslist/classifieds or using brokers or any other system), then you are going to get a revolving door of tenants and those tenants are not going to care about the area or the neighbors. If you want to have responsible tenants, then map out something that works for both parties whether using airbnb, a handshake or Craiglist/classifieds or using brokers or any other system. As for those who use airbnb to decimate their neighborhoods: those folks have been around since the first days of the Industrial Age, using any means necessary to populate their slums. The way to counteract those slumlords is for a city government to take affordable housing seriously, and begin to address that issue without penalizing those homeowners (and yes renters) that use their property properly to offer good places to long-term neighbors and to the type of visitors interested in participating in community when they travel, and for short-term and newly arriving residents.
I find it ironic that those who are crying the loudest against airbnb are not now (and have never been noted for) demanding rent controls or incentives to increase long term affordable housing. (Interestingly, after Katrina, the vitriol against public housing was shocking and directed almost entirely at those trapped in the cycle of poverty for generations as their neighbors and neighborhood associations applauded the shuttering of well-built, brick townhouse and had no issue with the crap now being slowly built in its place with much of it reserved for market rate apartments.) I have been lucky for almost my entire renting life to have caring and responsible homeowners that I have rented from (including presently, stand up and wave to the people, E and D) and they always repay my loyalty with their own, but too many of my friends are being priced out of the city because of this type of rampant market-rate greed that started IMMEDIATELY after Katrina (long before airbnb) and so lets call it what it is. I have long advocated for the city to offer tax credits for rent-controlled listings or at least for those who offer rates on the low end or middle. I think the DDD should offer incentives to the owners of Canal Street businesses to develop their upper floors for the service industry to be able to be in walking distance of their workplaces, and the same with the Quarter (as a resident, I can show you how many floors over storefronts are completely vacant; it would boggle your mind).
Airbnb done badly is just a symptom of that greed and outlawing it will not stop slumlords but will reduce the number of caring residents who use it responsibly to make the mortgage or to keep their apartment if they need to be away for a month or two. Airbnb offered the data in 2013 that 89% of their listing were single listings of primary residences. (If you suspect that data is 100% accurate, I will say that i have some skepticism just as I do about hotel data, but I can tell you that in my 20+ airbnb trips, all but 2 of them have been primary residences and those 2 were well-managed European hostel-style with strict rules about behavior.) As a constant traveler, I appreciate the ability to stay in a neighborhood and get to know residents, and to be able to walk to the store and to the metro or bus. I cannot tell you how many times before airbnb that I was in a hotel “zone” with no place to walk to get food and little access to public transportation, no one to talk to about what or where it was safe for a woman alone, adding up to what was often a stressful experience.
Check out these sensible recommendations for short-term housing (including different rates for primary residence airbnbs and a cap on the number of short-term rentals in any one area):

http://www.theselc.org/draft_short_term_rental_recommendati…, but let’s recognize that the boogeyman has been among us for some time and cannot be solved by outlawing a sharing site.

Affordable Housing Crisis

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Angeline-1032 Chartres Street

Opening soon at the old Stella space at Hotel Provincial is Angeline, opened by well-regarded chef Alex Harrell, last found at Sylvain, which earned 3 Beans in the T-P review (and here is my “review” too). We certainly needed another mid-priced restaurant with a creative menu and an ambitious chef for locals and for savvy visitors. I’ll look forward to making a reservation and will report back here of course.

The Angeline menu will include butter bean tortellini with redeye gravy; sherry-glazed shrimp with fried Meyer lemons and shaved radishes; and fried quail over hoecakes with local honey and hot sauce. The average price of the entrees will be $20

“I don’t want to price out the neighborhood and local business,” he said. “I want it to be a place where people feel comfortable coming in multiple times a week, maybe grab a starter and a glass of wine after work.”

Angeline is the middle name of Harrell’s mother. He wants his restaurant to reflect her personality.

“When I thought what I want the restaurant to be,” he said, “I want it to have that Southern charm. I want it to be friendly and inviting. Those are things that I associate with my mother.”

UPDATE

Went last week with writer pals Nancy and Bill and we had a grand time, excellent service and lovely food. We were originally seated in the lovely main dining room, but one of us wanted to sit in the front room (not me!) and we were immediately seated there. Unfortunately, that front room is low on personality and is a little like sitting in an waiting room, although having access to viewing the street is a plus. (Maybe they can knock down the wall that separates it from the bar and make that all one area, which I think would work very well. If they can’t knock it down completely, then even cutting a “window” between it and the bar would help.)

The main room looked great and two of us eyed it wistfully when we left! I guarantee we’ll sit there next time.

as for food:

I had two of the “starters” of southern fried quail made with local honey, their own hot sauce on a hoe cake and the crispy cauliflower (olivade aioli, sheep’s milk cheese); both were very good. One of us enjoyed the fish entree which had a goodly amount of fish (at first glance, it seemed small but was not). The last had two other starters and loved them as well-one was the chicken livers and arugula (with pickled blue berries, shaved red onion, Angeline buttermilk) and I think the other was the squash blossoms, but I was too busy with my quail. We all shared a nice brothy black eyed pea and collard green soup which was made with bourbon, bacon, smoky pork broth.

Drinks were good-one had asked for sherry and had the good luck of catching the general manager (I think?) on his way out who then stayed for a lively 20 minutes at our table discussing sherry, sent out a flight of choices for tasting and their own copy of the sherry bible to peruse as well as invitations to meet their sherry contacts in Spain for the two of us often there (not me!)

I had a gin drink which was tasty, well presented and a healthy size; the good size is so unusual for a restaurant these days (I’m getting tired of 10.00 cocktails that don’t match their description or are hastily or lightly poured- that is not the case at Angeline, I can assure you.)

Long story short- good menu with robust flavors using many locally sourced ingredients. Staff lovely and pleasant. Ambience good, but stick to main dining room.

yes will be back- after all, it is one of my neighborhood restaurants.

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ESCAPE MY ROOM

Many thanks to Abita Springs activist/artist John Preble for linking to this site today. Fascinating.

An escape room is a live-action puzzle where five to six people work together in a locked room to find clues that will eventually unlock the door. This is the first New Orleans version:

ESCAPE MY ROOM.

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Royal Street dig is underway

I talked for a few seconds to the very approachable team member who informed me that they were focusing on colonial artifacts and will gently place the later ones aside for others to peruse. This team is also doing two other digs presently, one in Treme.

Royal dig2

Their excellent website is found here

The owners of the site, information found on the website:

808-810 Royal St., Square 47, Lot 18525

  • From: Francois Picard To: Francois Balthzar Languille, Jan. 19, 1801 To: Francois Balthzar Languille, Jan. 1, 1808
  • From: Francois Balthzar Languille To: Pierre Maspero, Azelia Maspero, Zuline Maspero, Pierre Maspero, & Pliny L. Maspero; Jan. 3, 1828
  • From: Azelia Maspero & Zuline Maspero To: Pierre Maspero, Nov. 23, 1883
  • From: Pierre Maspero To: Emile B. Angaud, Jan. 2, 1884
  • From: Emile B. Angaud To: Henry Parlongue, Apr. 22, 1897
  • From: Henry Parlongue To: Eliza Redacher Camors Parlongue & Solidelle Lemelle Parlongue, Nov.26, 1907
  • From: Solidelle Lemelle To: Eliza Redacher Camors Parlongue, Dec. 7, 1907
  • From: Eliza Redacher To: Paul Camors, Emma Camors Musso, & Bertha Camors Angaud, Jul. 23, 1917
  • From: Emma Camors, Paul Camors, & Bertha Camors To: Joseph Petrie, Oct. 2, 1917
  • From: Joseph Petrie To: Petrie Realty Company, Inc., Jul. 12, 1927
  • From: Petrie Realty Company, Inc. To: Joseph Petrie, Dec. 2, 1935
  • From: Dorothea Reiser To: Rosa E. Petrie, Myrtle Ruth Petrie, Earl Joseph Petrie, Warren Petrie, Elaine Doris Petrie, & Joseph Petrie; Jul. 20, 1944
  • From: Joseph Petrie To: Rosa E. Petrie, Myrtle Ruth Petrie, Earl Joseph Petrie, Warren Adolph Petrie, Elaine Doris Petrie, Apr. 27, 1953
  • From: Myrtle Ruth Petrie To: Earl Joseph Petrie, Warren Adolph Petrie, Elaine Doris Petrie, & Benito Estalotte Johnson, Aug. 1, 1956
  • From: Rosa E. Petrie To: Benito E. Johnson, Aug. 8, 1956
  • From: Benito E. Johnson To: Edna Johnson Kenney, Oct. 1, 1981
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June 1

My friend John is currently searching for a natural indicator to mark  the end of summer in order to bookmark the termites swarming at the beginning. If I know him, he’d be pleased if it could be another pest.

I always think the summer season is hard to decipher in New Orleans. Used to be that once JazzFest was over, people began to shut up their apartments and stores and head to other cooler places for a month or two, coming and going throughout August. With the arrival of the casino downtown, that changed. Or maybe it changed with  the addition of thousands of hotel rooms downtown through the 1980s and 1990s or maybe it just changed. In any case, visitors come year round now and festivals like Tales of the Cocktail and Essence are big draws in July and there are things in August too that I cannot remember at this moment, but I know I am always surprised when they come-oh yes, just remembered one: Satchmo Summerfest.

Maybe summer is really here when the figs ripen and drop and draw flies and make walking in alleys a distinctly squishy experience, except that fig trees are largely gone from the Quarter, courtesy of part-time residents and non-Sicilians who tore them out at the beginning of their renovations.

Or maybe it’s when the children finish their school year at McDonogh 15 and St. Louis Cathedral School, except that Cathedral is no more; soon to be condos I am sure.

Probably many locals would identify the start of summer with the official beginning of hurricane season, which is today, June 1. That’s as good of a choice as any, since summer is a largely hostile time here, unlike the land of my childhood, the shores of Lake Erie. There it is a glorious and kind season with lightning bugs in jars, sailboats always on the water and cool walks in the dark before bedtime.

Tonight in my adopted hometown, I went for a bike ride around the neighborhood with my hard cider in a koozie cup as I do many evenings before heading in for the night. The Quarter seemed different, slower and more neighborly than I have seen  in many recent evenings. Lots of people on stoops with the front door open, dogs pausing on their walks with their people attached (when did huge dogs become a thing in the Quarter? and why usually 2 of them?) The Square is quieter, but will have more overnighters than the spring does. Lack of air conditioning at home will drive many to catch any night breeze they can out there and hopefully pick up a buck or two or make some friends.

The chalkboards in front of restaurants and bars praise their fruity drinks and their cold air conditioning and hope for a few big groups to come in and spend and tip well.

Seeing the row of smokers in chairs in front of Cosimo’s Dauphine Street windows was lovely even though I know they don’t think so, in these new days of no smoking inside.  Of course, sitting out there may also just be a leftover experience from their crawfish boil season. In any case, a great bar with the best well drink in the Quarter in my estimation.

The  tourists in town this Monday are quiet and mellow. Few whoohooers or Hand Grenaders  seen (or heard). These kind of folks are always welcome as they proudly take a photo near architectural details rather than of the silver guy or the drunk passed out woman.

On Royal, I counted 4 tours and 2 more on Saint Ann this evening. I remember once a friend of mine hissed at me as we passed a ghost tour, “You know they make it all up” and I laughed out loud and said, “really? you mean they don’t just stick to the truth about our ghosts?”

Let’s hope the entire summer is as quiet and as sublime as this first June early evening was.

Here is a list of nola.com’s “favorite” summer festivals.

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Home-grown Fruits and Vegetables Uncommon in Early New Orleans

As someone deeply involved in regional food systems, I am always searching for detailed descriptions of earlier food systems wherever I work. Here in my own region of the Gulf Coast, I often find a common misperception that the level of truck farming found in and around the city in the late 19th century and early 20th centuries (due to the large number of Sicilian and German immigrants) was representative of the agricultural system of the earlier colonial eras. However, most accounts I have read indicate that the port was the entry point for much of the food and drink that the region used and plantations were mostly used for growing and exporting commodity crops from the earliest days until the present day, with market crops quite limited.  Therefore, I was gratified to find this passage in Public Spaces, Private Gardens : A History of Designed Landscapes in New Orleans by Lake Douglas:

“The French botanist and explorer Charles-César Robin (ca. 1750–?) discussed his travels in Louisiana, West Florida, and the West Indies between 1802 and 1806 in his three-volume Voyages dans l’intérieur de la Louisiane … (Paris, 1807):

‘The high cost of labor is reflected in the high price of vegetables in the markets, where fish, game and meat are very cheap, these not being the product of much labor. Vegetables are so rare that sometimes they are lacking altogether. In the spring there are no first fruits, although the cold spells are so transient that with a few precautions one would hardly notice the winter. No one knows anything about seed beds, greenhouses or shelter, nor anything at all about the art of vegetable gardening. In the dry periods of summer there are no lettuces or other leafy vegetables, because no one waters or protects the young plants. Notwithstanding the fact that a person near the city can make six, seven, eight, nine, ten piastres a day from the sale of vegetables, not even these exorbitant prices have stimulated anyone to perfect this branch of agriculture. I have examined several of the large vegetable gardens. They are shameful, not to the slaves who cultivate them; they don’t know any better, but to their masters who hardly bother to oversee work outside of the fields. The expense of slave labor on the one hand prevents the introduction of new products, and, on the other, stunts the ingenuity and industry of the masters themselves’  These observations are obviously those of someone well acquainted with horticulture, cultivation techniques, and agricultural economy. They suggest that, well into the nineteenth century, the community itself was not self-sufficient in growing fruits and vegetables and was still dependent upon external supplies for these needs” (italics added).