Catalyzing Entrepreneurship Assets, Gaps, and Interventions for Areas Beyond the New Orleans Renaissance A Forward Cities Report by the New Orleans Research Advisory Council, researched and written by Richard Campanella, with special thanks to Summer Suleiman, Allen Square, Aaron Miscenich, Glen Armantrout, Matt Wisdom, Louis David, and Forward Cities co-founders Denise Byrne and Christopher Gergen. New Orleans, Louisiana, 2015.

CONTENTS

Executive Summary ...... 2 Introduction and Goals ...... 2 Definitions and Process ...... 4 Geography and History of Study Area ...... 6 Baseline Socio-Economic Data ...... 7 Assets and Gaps in the Current State of Entrepreneurism in Study Area ...... 9 Asset/Gap: Existing Businesses, Missing Businesses ...... 9 Asset/Gap: Social Capital, Fiscal Capital ...... 9 Asset/Gap: Nonbasic and Basic Sectors ...... 10 Asset/Gap: Inclusive Entrepreneurship and Disadvantaged Business Enterprises ...... 10 Asset/Gap: Transportation Arteries, Reliable Public Transit ...... 11 Asset/Gap: Historicity and Proximity to Historic Core ...... 11 Asset/Gap: Affordability, Rising Costs of Living ...... 12 Asset/Gap: Flood Zones and Urban Risk ...... 12 Asset/Gap: Dillard University as Anchor Institution ...... 13 Asset/Gap: Creole Culinary Heritage, Culinary Offerings ...... 14 Asset/Gap: Vocational Education and the Skilled Trades Heritage ...... 14 Potential Interventions for Fostering Entrepreneurship in the Study Area ...... 16 Co-Location of “Food, Food, Food” ...... 16 Cluster Strategy: Creation of a Visitable Destination ...... 16 New Orleans Master Crafts Guild ...... 17 Cluster Strategy for Light Industry, Artisan Product Manufacturing, and B2B Businesses ...... 18 Overlay Districts ...... 18 Live/Work Zoning ...... 20 Short-Term Rentals, AirBnB, and the Sharing Economy ...... 20 Unbundled Procurement for Neighborhood DBEs ...... 21 Entrepreneurial Ombudsman ...... 22 Restrained Regulatory Environments and One-Stop Licensing ...... 22 Conclusions ...... 23 Appendix: Organizational Inventory ...... 24

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1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY disconnected communities.” With support from national donors such as the Case Foundation and Aspen Institute, This Forward Cities report explores and recommends specific Forward Cities operates by organizing consortia of leaders, interventions toward fostering entrepreneurial activity while entrepreneurs, and citizens in four comparable American avoiding gentrification in a selected neighborhood in New cities and, using a consistent set of goals and investigative Orleans. Working with a wide array of community advocates rubrics, guiding them to explore and improve their and entrepreneurs, members of the Forward Cities New entrepreneurial ecosystems through cross-city learning. To Orleans Research Advisory Council selected in early 2015 a this end, Forward Cities’ two key tactics are the formation of study area that boasted sufficient potential and momentum, local advisory councils “to ensure local input and ownership yet that lay outside the current or soon-to-be “renaissance by the key stakeholders and donors in that city's ecosystem,” spaces” of the post-Katrina city. In the ensuing months, we and the launching of a mapping and research component, 2 explored, researched, mapped, and analyzed socio-economic which this report represents. data in the 2.5-mile area, and interviewed stakeholders in its The cities include Cleveland, Ohio; Durham, North Carolina; commercial, civic, nonprofit, academic, and government Detroit, Michigan and New Orleans, Louisiana, all of which sectors. Analyses aimed to identify assets and opportunities have historically experienced economic booms followed by conducive to a successful entrepreneurial ecosystem, as well declines and, more recently, sporadic revival as well as as gaps and deficiencies, and proceeded to propose ten upheaval. New Orleans offers an extreme case within this potential interventions. After debates and discussions with cross-city collaboration, given the massive trauma of the stakeholders at year’s end, council members decided to 2005 Hurricane Katrina deluge and the unevenness of the recommend pursuing and implementing the following ensuing recovery. Financial contributions made specifically interventions in the next phase of the Forward Cities effort: for the New Orleans work come from Entergy, Greater New (1) Formalizing the Informal Economy, through techniques Orleans Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Blue Cross-Blue such as the easing of permitting processes, simplifying Shield, and the Foundation for the Mid South. paperwork, providing tax advice, greenlighting use of The goals of this investigation may be captured in the residencies as workplaces, streamlining of bureaucracy for following guiding question, complete with its four conditional microbusinesses, microfinancing, and ombudsmen support; statements: How may we foster local entrepreneurial activity (2) Empowering the Dillard University Film Program to aid which (1) produces sustainable fiscal, human, and/or social film-based enterprise development by students of this HBCU, capital in (2) spaces at the margins of New Orleans post- in an era when Louisiana ranks among the most popular Katrina-recovery renaissance, (3) among peoples not states for film production and digital media; proportionally represented in the archetypal renaissance (3) “Food, Food, Food,” an effort to promote food-based scene, (4) without precipitating gentrification, displacement, enterprises in a neighborhood that is—or should be—world and neighborhood upheaval? famous for its Creole culinary heritage. These opportunities Parsing the above directive, readers will note that condition may include eateries, retail, wholesale, at-home preparation, #4 makes all prior ones that much more challenging, but also catering, food processing, stall markets, destination food more pressing. Many cities over the past twenty years have courts, and traditional restaurants and luncheons. discovered the “creative class”3 and striven to attract young educated knowledge workers through the tax-incentivized INTRODUCTION AND GOALS housing development, “up-zoning” of inner-city residential areas to make space for the new units, and municipal This investigation seeks to understand and improve the marketing aimed at real estate renovation and reinvestment entrepreneurial ecosystem of a neighborhood which lies at in areas that previously experienced divestment. What has the heart of New Orleans society—but at the margins of the resulted is a remarkable rediscovery of the inner city, city’s post-Katrina “renaissance.” It does so by studying the particularly by younger generations reared in the suburbs and area’s history, geography, culture, and economy; by spatially exurbs by parents and grandparents who had fled urban analyzing its assets and gaps through detailed maps, field areas decades prior. Their skill sets have attracted employers surveys, and interviews; and by proposing specific interventions toward a broader, more inclusive, and less disruptive brand of revitalization. 1 Christopher Gergen and Denise M. Byrne, “Welcome to Forward Cities,” http://www.forwardcities.org/features/welcometoforwardcities.aspx , This work is supported by Forward Cities, a national learning visited June 29, 2015. collaborative launched in 2014 endeavoring to help “local 2 Internal document titled FORWARD CITIES: A National Learning innovators connect with one another as they take on the Collaborative Among Cities of Innovation, 2014. 3 Richard Florida, The Rise of the Creative Class, and How It’s Transforming challenge of increasing entrepreneurial activity…in Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life. New York: Perseus Book Group, 2002. 2

and capital, and their creativity and verve have turned downtown economies. “We have this incredible economic deteriorating arteries and crumbling buildings into growth that’s happening,” said one informant on St. Claude entrepreneurial hotspots and fashionable addresses. Avenue, “but we are also sacrificing the things that make it beautiful.”6 Indeed, the very divestment that afflicted these We now know how to do this brand to revitalization quite areas in the 1960s-1990s came to be viewed as a bargain in well, and its fruits may be found in all four Forward Cities the 2000s-2010s, and their affordability became drivers for sites as well as most American metropolises. In post-Katrina New Orleans, well-educated newcomers have established their transformation. In one 2015 study by SmartAsset.com, for instance, analysts ranked the nation’s “Top Ten Cities for themselves in and near the urban core, in both their Creatives” by calculating the per-capita number of people in residential and work locations, and have injected new rigor 28 creative professions, including designers, artists, and and excitement in this downtown area. While their numbers are relatively small, their impact on the city (and the architects, and weighted it by that city’s affordability, in which “any city with a cost of living that is 85% of the national perception of the Katrina recovery) has been outsized. Quite average or lower scored a perfect 100 for affordability…”7 In often, flattering national media representations of New Orleans’ unexpected postdiluvial renaissance focuses on this other words, the lower cost of living on which lower-middle- group, and hard data—in the form of national business class locals depend becomes a driver in gauging an area’s rankings and economic statistics—seem to back up the attractiveness as a transformation target. narrative that certain portions of New Orleans, and certain “The rate of change in the neighborhood has been New Orleanians, are doing quite well. To wit, the rate of helpful. You have lots of wealthy young folks individuals in greater New Orleans starting their own coming in [and] spending money. [But] I have mixed businesses has more than doubled during 2004-2011, from feelings about it… [Incoming entrepreneurs] should consider the social, political and economic impact of 218 per 100,000 adults to around 500, and has remained well what they’re doing. They should think about the above the national average of 280 to 300.4 Idea Village co- broader picture when they’re deciding on suppliers, founder Tim Williamson described the new New Orleans as location, where they’re taking money from and who “the Third Coast for entrepreneurship”—a riff on the fact that they’re hiring. It’s really, really difficult; we have the vast majority of venture capital gets invested on the other devalued social impact and only valued monetary two coasts—and cited evidence that the New Orleans impact.” renaissance is no myth: —entrepreneur on St. Claude Avenue interviewed by New Orleans is 56 percent above the national Summer Suleiman, July 2015 average in the number of startups-per-capita (The Trends like this have made “gentrification” among the most Data Center). We've been called America's No. 1 disputatious words in the discourse of urban affairs, Biggest Brain Magnet (Forbes), the No. 2 Best City for Women in Technology (SmartAsset.com), one especially in postdiluvian New Orleans, and it draws attention of the 20 Hottest Startup Hubs in America (The to the fact that the New Orleans renaissance has been Kauffman Foundation), No. 7 on the Most Inspiring socially and spatially circumscribed. The rest of the city, City in the World list (GOOD Magazine) and the flooded or otherwise, struggles with near-national-highs of "Coolest Startup City in America" (Inc.com). In May, Steve Case, Co-founder of AOL said, "I think everything from poverty rates to crime rates. (Incidentally, New Orleans is poised to reemerge as one of the the #1 City for Creatives, according to the aforementioned great startup cities in the country, maybe even the study with its affordability-based methodology, was New 5 world." Orleans—and by a substantial margin.) Injecting outside human and fiscal capital into areas of Thus, while we know well how to do creative-class-style divestment, in sum, has proven to be highly effective in revitalization, we are less adept at broadening the catalyzing urban revivals. But it comes at a cost, as it is participation in this American success story. That broadening capable of traumatizing the working-class denizens of those would need to include underrepresented groups and areas, who oftentimes find themselves priced out of their minimize the deleterious effects upon working-class own neighborhoods, displaced from their social spaces, populations that occur when affordability is viewed as “slum appropriated of their neighborhood culture and language opportunity,” as the late geographer Neil Smith put it.8 Per- (revitalization is often accompanied by changes in capita numbers of minority business enterprises (MBEs) fall neighborhood names), and excluded from the new

6 Interview, anonymous St. Claude Avenue entrepreneur, by Summer Suleiman, July 31, 2015. 4 Drawn from graph in report by Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine 7 Nick Wallace, “The Top Ten Cities for Creatives,” July 7, 2015, Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, “Expanding Opportunity for Minority- https://smartasset.com/mortgage/the-top-ten-cities-for-creatives , visited Owned Businesses in Metro New Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 23, 2015. July 2015. 8 Neil Smith, The New Urban Frontier: Gentrification and the Revanchist City. 5 Tim Williamson, “Let's Make New Orleans the Hub for Entrepreneurship by London: 2018,” NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune, July 17, 2015. Routledge Press, 1996. 3

well below minorities’ share of the total population: in 2007, DEFINITIONS AND PROCESS minorities comprised 43 percent of the population of the greater New Orleans metro area but 27 percent of its Definitions businesses—and a scant 1.9 percent of total receipts, implying that the vast majority of MBEs were Forward Cities defines “entrepreneur” as “a person who microenterprises. “[P]articipation parity for MBEs in the organizes and manages any enterprise that translates an idea robust entrepreneurship ecosystem of New Orleans,” or invention into a good or service which creates value or for concluded the authors of a recent study, “has not changed which customers will pay.” “Enterprise,” meanwhile, is significantly from pre- to post-Katrina.”9 understood as “an individual effort, a nonprofit organization, or for‐profit business;” thus for this study, someone running a Entrepreneurship is challenging for any one individual, and sustainable nonprofit promulgating a valuable idea would it’s nearly as difficult for local societies to create optimal qualify as an entrepreneur, regardless of revenue generation. conditions for entrepreneurship to flourish. Hardest of all, More commonly, however, the typical entrepreneur perhaps, is for societies and local government to catalyze envisioned here would take the form of a person or persons entrepreneurship without also triggering gentrification. It launching and managing a small business. may even seem paradoxical: said one frustrated entrepreneur on St. Claude Avenue, where he is experiencing both success The word “innovation” occurs frequently in the lexicon of and criticism, “[it’s] damned if you do, damned if you urban revival and community development, as well as in don’t.” 10 But American cities abound with examples of Forward Cities’ founding documents, which define it as “an neighborhoods which “gentrified in place,” through the idea that involves deliberate application of information, gradual economic rise of the local population rather than the imagination and initiative in deriving greater or different importation of empowered outsiders. The raw material values from resources to satisfy a specific need in a way that already exists: as the authors of the previously cited study is replicable at an economical cost.” By extension, “social pointed out, “metro New Orleans is currently number one in innovation” is “an innovation focused on addressing a social the nation in the rate of self-employment among African- problem.” Innovation and innovative entrepreneurism may Americans, at 17.4 percent.” More so, nearly 90 percent of well be the engine room behind technological progress and the DBE respondents to the study’s survey questionnaires wealth-creation. But they are also relatively rare, and usually indicated “they became entrepreneurs because they saw require larger numbers of deeper reserves of capital (fiscal business opportunities,” not because of “discouragement by capital, human capital, etc.), and draw from larger population low wages and/or institutional resistance to hiring people of pools more likely to yield specialized talents. Prioritization for color.” 11 The city in general and this neighborhood in innovative entrepreneurism thus tends to involve tactics particular are also known for having a substantial informal designed to attract outsiders with outside resources, which in economy (known as “the hustle” in the local vernacular) turn are more likely to trigger upheaval in local which includes everything from food preparation to neighborhoods. For this reason, the standard of success for landscaping, to auto-repair and music-making to vending at this investigation is simply the launching and sustaining of second-line parades. Many of these microenterprises have for-profit or nonprofit enterprises which bring beneficial the potential to come out of the shadows and become services, products, jobs, and/or capital to neighborhoods, legitimate if permitting and other barriers were adjusted regardless of its size or whether its offerings are pioneering, appropriately. brilliant, or innovative. (One could argue any entrepreneurial effort that survives in an environment with an 80-percent “Metro New Orleans is currently number one in failure rate is necessarily innovative.) A new roofing business the nation in the rate of self-employment among employing local workers, or a new mom-and-pop corner African-Americans, at 17.4 percent.” grocery serving local needs, would quality in this study as --McCline et al, “Expanding Opportunity for Minority- “success stories,” as much as a new digital media firm or Owned Businesses in Metro New Orleans” artisanal industry. On the “Intelligent Evolution” of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems Advocates for entrepreneurship borrow a concept from the biosciences—a healthy ecosystem—to herald the importance 9 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New of habitat and resources in both economics and ecology. Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. Economist Daniel Isenberg, who pioneered the concept of 10 Interview, anonymous St. Claude Avenue entrepreneur, by Summer entrepreneurial ecosystems in the early 2010s, argues that six Suleiman, August 3, 2015. broad domains drive rigorous entrepreneurship within a 11 Drawn from graph in report by Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, “Expanding Opportunity for Minority- specific space: Owned Businesses in Metro New Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. 4

a conducive culture, enabling policies and geography of old public markets—and all of them leadership, availability of appropriate finance, today, to greater and lesser extents, can be quality human capital, venture-friendly markets for products, and a range of institutional and described as entrepreneurial ecosystems. 12 infrastructural supports. Isenberg ponders whether entrepreneurial ecosystems are Isenberg maps these six domains amid a larger framework of products of nature or nurture. That is, do they arise key elements and drivers in the graphic Domains of organically courtesy individual creativity amid free-market Entrepreneurial Ecosystem. forces, or are they products of specific decisions and policies? The case of the old municipal markets shows that both the Historic New Orleans abounded with bustling industry public and private sectors played key roles, with local districts, and while no one called them entrepreneurial government providing space, centrality, a legal and ecosystems, they formed enlivened spaces of economic administrative framework, and infrastructure (water, opportunities (at least for the empowered segment of the sanitation, etc.), while private entrepreneurs, including the population) whose whole was greater than the sum of its farmers, fishermen, and hunters who supplied the stall parts. A banking district, for example, formed around the owners, did everything else. To the question of whether intersection of Royal and Conti streets in the French Quarter; entrepreneurial ecosystems “evolve naturally, or can we cotton merchants clustered around Carondelet and Gravier in intelligently design them,?” Isenberg responds: what is now the Central Business District; wholesale grocers operated on Tchoupitoulas at Poydras in what we now call They are usually the result of intelligent evolution, the Warehouse District; sugar and rice traders dominated the a process that blends the invisible hand of markets and deliberate helping hand of public leadership upper French Quarter riverfront; theaters concentrated that is enlightened enough to know when and how around Canal and Baronne; and anything involving the to lead as well as let go the grip in order to 14 printed word could be found on Newspaper Row on 300 cultivate and ensure (relative) self-sustainability. Camp Street, New Orleans’ original media district.13 More to Process the goals of our project, the French Market and most other municipal marketplaces—the system had 34 units at its peak This study gathers baseline data through two main channels: (1) via mapping and interpreting comprehensive economic in 1911, the largest per-capita in the nation—formed amazing and demographic data from city and federal sources, and (2) examples of diverse entrepreneurial ecosystems, where men via interviews, field surveys, research, observations, and and women (most of whom were immigrants and/or people interactions with key actors. Both require that a specific study of color) found low-capital, easy-entry opportunities to own area be selected. their own businesses in the form of a stall inside an open-air pavilion. So robust were these hotspots of commerce that On February 25, 2015, members of the New Orleans Research other entrepreneurs opened businesses adjacently to take Advisory Council convened to discuss, debate and select a advantage of the foot traffic, among them restaurants and study area. We agreed we wanted to target an area with eateries, to serve hot food to customers and vendors; sufficient potential and momentum, yet that lay outside the retailers and service businesses such as cobblers and tailors, current or soon-to-be “renaissance spaces.” Given this and local banks, where venders deposited their daily criteria, we considered but declined places such as Freret earnings—or obtained financing for their entrepreneurial Street (already booming), South Claiborne Avenue (lots of ventures. While the markets are long gone, these century-old new businesses recently), North Claiborne (Tremé is already businesses clusters remain in the cityscape today in the form grappling with gentrification, and the status of the I-10 of commercial land-use zones, which were delineated and overpass is uncertain), North Rampart/St. Claude (already codified by planners in the 1920s. booming), Broad Street (about to boom), Galvez Street around the Canal intersection, Canal Street lakeside of Modern-day business clusters along Magazine Claiborne Avenue, and Tulane Avenue (all of which will Street, in Mid-City, in Tremé, and even in our study benefit from the new University Medical Center), and St. area around the recently restored St. Roch Market, Claude Avenue in the Lower Ninth Ward (already the subject can all be explained by the historic economic of immense amounts of ongoing research.) We narrowed down the nominees to St. Bernard Avenue, Franklin Avenue, 12 Daniel Isenberg, “Introducing the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem: Four Elysian Fields at Gentilly Boulevard and Gentilly in front of Defining Characteristics,” Forbes, May 25, 2011, http://www.forbes.com/sites/danisenberg/2011/05/25/introducing-the- Dillard, LaSalle/Simon Bolivar, New Orleans East, and Algiers- entrepreneurship-ecosystem-four-defining-characteristics/ , visited July 11, 2015 13 Richard Campanella, “Remembering Newspaper Row,” Preservation in 14 Danieal Isenberg, “Introducing the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem: Four Print Magazine, September 2012. For more on this phenomenon, see the Defining Characteristics,” Forbes, May 25, 2011, author’s Time and Place in New Orleans: Past Geographies in the Present Day http://www.forbes.com/sites/danisenberg/2011/05/25/introducing-the- (Gretna, Louisiana: Pelican Publishing Company, 2002) and Bourbon Street: A entrepreneurship-ecosystem-four-defining-characteristics/ , visited July 11, History (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2014). 2015 5

Meyers-DeGaulle on the West Bank. After much discussion, organize balloting. Today, New Orleanians vote by ward and we decided to forego New Orleans East as a second study precinct, and although their council members are elected area in favor of a single larger contiguous study area which within decennially adjusted council districts, wards retain integrated a series of interconnecting commercial clusters: cultural significance as spatial references and neighborhood the commercial and industrial zones of the central Seventh monikers. This is very much the case in our study area. and Eighth wards, from Franklin Avenue to Gentilly Boulevard Throughout the 19th century, the study area occupied the to St. Bernard Avenue to North Claiborne Avenue, plus margins of the city—the “back of town,” a phrase still heard business clusters therein. The fact that this study area today—and their inhabitants tended to be at the margins of contains an institution of higher learning (Dillard) made it all local society: poorer, more likely to be of African ancestry, the more appealing. more likely to be immigrant, and less likely to speak English. Black and white francophones with roots in the colonial era (generally known as Creoles), Irish and German immigrants GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY OF STUDY AREA who arrived in the 1820s-1850s, African-American emancipated peoples who migrated to the city after the Civil Our study area straddles an imperceptible but hydrologically War, and more recent immigrants from Sicily, Croatia, and significant topographic bowl, with the highest lands on the throughout the Mediterranean and Caribbean basins, plus river-side (south) along St. Claude Avenue, roughly 2-3 above smaller numbers of Anglo-American anglophones, constituted sea level; the second-highest lands along Gentilly Boulevard local society. Many of black Creoles were descendants of the to the north (1-2 feet above sea level); and lower lands to the gens de colouer libre (free people of color) and worked as west and especially the east (downriver), where terrain drops skilled tradesmen specializing in the building crafts. to -4 and -5 feet below sea level. While this elevation range might seem slight, in a deltaic city like New Orleans it is highly The drainage system installed at the turn of the 20th century consequential, because it meant that, prior to the installation allowed new subdivisions to be built throughout the study of the modern municipal drainage system in the 1890s-1900s, area and across Gentilly Boulevard into modern-day Gentilly most of this basin comprised backswamp undevelopable and to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain. But by draining the since the founding of the city. backswamp and removing storm water, the system also lowered the water table, dried out the soils, and allowed Established in 1718 by the French, governed by the Spanish them to drop below sea level, making them prone to after 1769, and reacquired by the French and sold to the flooding. Most of Gentilly, as well as the study area, subsided United States in 1803, New Orleans saw its population double below sea level. Because Gentilly was developed with roughly every fifteen years throughout the antebellum age, modern auto-friendly subdivisions, it became a fashionable 1803-1861. The city’s footprint expanded accordingly, but residence for the upwardly mobile white middle class, who because of the swampy environment, it was restricted almost departed the older neighborhoods in the heart of the study exclusively to the higher, drier terrain closer to the area and settled into houses with explicitly racist deed Mississippi River and its distributary ridges. One by one, covenants preventing sale or rental to black families. Our plantations of sugar cane and rice immediately outside the study area, on the other hand, remained fairly well integrated original city of New Orleans (today’s French Quarter) were in the early to mid-20th century, with whites predominating converted from agrarian to residential and commercial land closer to the river and African Americans further inland. Most use. residents, despite their differences, shared a common Our study area underwent this conversion starting in 1805, working-class economic strata as well as local cultural when Bernard Marigny had his plantation immediately below commonalties, so many having been born and raised locally. Esplanade Avenue subdivided as the Faubourg Marigny, and Period photographs of the commercial arteries of the study proceeded through the 1810s-1830s, when adjacent area show a robust economy of door-to-door locally owned plantations in today’s Bywater were platted with streets, shops serving local customers who mostly arrived on foot or surveyed into blocks, and developed with houses. The rear via public transportation. By no means was opportunity portions of each of these new neighborhoods were lower in evenly distributed, but relatively speaking, the area boasted a elevation and muddier in their soils, and thus tended to be fairly healthy entrepreneurial ecosystem. delayed in their development, lacking in their amenities, and Divestment began with the public school integration crisis of poorer in their economic and demographic circumstances. In 1960-1961, which triggered a wholesale departure of white time, they would gain the names Faubourg Noveau Marigny families from New Orleans, particularly the working-class 6th, (New Marigny) and St. Roch, and after 1852, when 7th, 8th, and 9th wards of the lower section of the city. Some jurisdictional lines were redrawn, they became, and remain, settled in St. Bernard Parish; others moved westward or the Seventh and Eighth wards. New Orleans’ wards were across the river to Jefferson Parish. They took their fiscal originally designed for the purposes of political capital with them, leaving behind diminished spending, sales representation, but after 1912, their main purpose became to 6

7th-8th Wards

Study Area • 2.5 square miles

• 20,059 residents

• 88% African American

• $27,619 median household income, 25% below city median of $37,146

• 26% poverty rate

• almost entirely flooded by Katrina

• 7 commercial clusters

• 612 licensed business

• 21 city-registered Disadvantaged Business Enterprises 1948: Rampart at St. Bernard

1948: St. Claude Avenue

1961: Gentilly Boulevard at Elysian Fields

Photos from the collection of Richard Campanella, courtesy NOPSI/Entergy. Neighborhood entrepreneurship A Transforming St. Claude Avenue Photographs by Richard Campanella May 2015 tax revenue, and land values—which in turn yielded lower members of the better-educated half of the population. real estate taxes. What ensued, from the 1960s through the Those not participating in the renaissance are turn of the 21st century, was a wholesale centrifugal shift of disproportionately native-born, minority, without a college or wealth and power outwardly, coupled with a centripedal even a high-school degree, and living in neighborhoods like (inward) movement of poverty and all its affiliated our study area—with the key exception of the higher, drier, pathologies. older, river-side flank along St. Claude Avenue near fashionable Bywater. When Hurricane Katrina struck on August 29, 2005 and ruptured levees and floodwalls, four decades of deterioration Extending Bywater-style revitalization into the heart of the exacerbated inestimably within the span of a few hours. study area will bring its successes into the heart of the Because our study area is contained within one contiguous Seventh and Eighth wards. It may also bring the sort of hydrological basin, flood levels reflected precisely the neighborhood upheaval which has embroiled communities aforesaid topographic patterns: higher lands and shallower along the St. Claude Avenue corridor, especially Bywater. Can flood depths occurring along the perimeters (especially St. we have the best of both worlds? Can the working-class Claude Avenue, which mostly evaded the deluge), and lower residents of this area economically “rise in place” and gain lands and deeper flooding—upwards of 7 feet—happening in the amenities enjoyed elsewhere, without suffering the the core, along Elysian Fields and Franklin avenues. Most of deprivations of change? the study area remained empty of residents and silenced in its economic activity for the rest of the year. Fast-forward ten years, and a stunning turnabout has BASELINE SOCIO-ECONOMIC DATA occurred. Over $70 billion federal dollars have poured into This section establishes baseline data for the study area using the city, plus insurance and other moneys, while a rebuilding city, federal, and other datasets dating from 2010-2015 (in boom helped lower regional unemployment rates to levels every case, the latest available). These figures will allow for well below that of the nation in the throes of the Great comparison and assessments if and when interventions are Recession. The gripping narrative of the Katrina catastrophe implemented in the future. and the exciting opportunity of the recovery, meanwhile, attracted educated young progressives to the city—by the Neighborhoods The study area spans 2.5 square miles, or thousands in 2005-2007, and by the tens of thousands later 1600 acres, and comprises primarily two “official” city by the 2010s. The newcomers fell under the city’s legendary neighborhoods (Seventh Ward and St. Roch) as well as the spell and, so enthralled, gravitated to the city’s iconic edges of Fairgrounds, Dillard, and Gentilly Terrace. While city historical districts—which not only exuded history, culture, authorities and urban planners emphasize these official and beautiful architecture, but sat on higher ground and neighborhoods—there are 73 of them city-wide—many of evaded Katrina’s destructive surge. Innovative, their names and limits tend to be bureaucratic constructs entrepreneurial, outspoken, and civically engaged, the rather than perceptual realities embraced by actual newcomers moved into old neighborhoods, fixed up houses, residents.15 Locally-born people living in this area would be breathed new life into the city’s night scene, enthusiastically more inclined to call this area “the Seventh Ward,” while participated in cultural traditions and started new ones, and others on the downriver edge would use “Eighth Ward” and most importantly for our purposes, started new businesses those closer to St. Claude Avenue “St. Roch” or “Bywater.” and infused the local economy and society with new vitality. Those along Gentilly Boulevard would broadly refer to that Observers inside and outside the city spoke of a renaissance area as “Gentilly.” At least five neighborhood associations in the postdiluvial city, and that zeitgeist was abetted by a operate in or near the study area: the Seventh Ward renewed sense of civic spirit among locals, not to mention the Neighborhood Center, Edgewoodpark Neighborhood New Orleans Saints’ 2010 Super Bowl victory. The completion Association, Esplanade Ridge/Treme Civic Association, of a much-improved $14.5 billion Hurricane Storm Surge Risk Gentilly Sugar Hill Neighborhood Association, Pontilly Reduction System by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Association, and St. Claude Avenue Main Street Association. 2011 complimented the renewed confidence in the city, with Demographics According to the 2010 Census (our most recent its heightened levees and floodwalls, storm-surge barriers, headcount, all subsequent population figures being city-level and enormous gates and pumps. estimates), there were 20,059 people living within this 2.5- The renaissance is real; New Orleans in the 2010s has indeed square-mile area. Because roughly 20 percent of the land is witnessed a resurgence in spirit, in investment, in civic activity, in entrepreneurism and innovation, and in real estate value. But it has also been spatially and demographically 15 Richard Campanella, “A Glorious Mess: A Perceptual History of New bounded: most of the stellar storylines emanate from the Orleans Neighborhoods,” New Orleans Magazine, June 2014 historic core, and most of the prospering parties are http://www.myneworleans.com/New-Orleans-Magazine/June-2014/A- Glorious-Mess/ 7

zoned for nonresidential (commercial or residential) uses, we Jobs In 2008, there were 3,397 jobs in or within 1000 feet of may say that the study area has a true population density of the study area (including Dillard University), of which 35 roughly 10,000 people per square mile (20,059 divided by 2.5 percent paid under $1250/month; 43 percent paid $1251- square miles X 80 percent residential). Those residents lived $3333/month; and 22 percent paid over $3333/month, most in 8,138 occupied household units, or 2.5 per household, of this last group located at Dillard. These figures are seven while another 4095 units remained vacant. years old now, and there has since been much transformation, particularly in the river-end of the study area, Racially, the population was 88 percent African-American in so it is reasonable to expect that the total number of jobs is 2010, compared to 60 percent citywide and 14 percent now closer to 4000. As most of these jobs are in the service nationwide. The next-largest racial group was white, at 8 economy with low wages and minimal benefits, labor force percent, and those 1606 residents mostly lived at the St. Claude-end of the study area. There were also 714 people participation is also relatively low. Nearly one out of every three persons over the age of 16 did not participate in the who claimed Hispanic ethnicity, 79 who claimed Asian racial labor force in 2011. identity, plus 337 who denoted “other” and 321 who claimed multiple racial identities. Crime By any measure, the study area suffers high crime rates. In most quantitative metrics, the Seventh Ward usually All these figures are now five years old, and we will not get ranks second only to Central City as New Orleans’ most accurate updates at a sufficiently high granularity (spatial resolution) until the next decennial census in 2020. Until violent neighborhood. This stigma would not quite apply to our study area, which extends beyond the official then, it is reasonable to presume that the population of this neighborhood known as the Seventh Ward, but there is no area has increased commensurately with the rest of the city, getting around the fact that a major concentration of the by around 12 percent, during 2010-2015. If so, there are likely around 22,500 people now residing in this area. Racial worst crimes occurs in the heart of our study area. Analyses by crime statistician and journalist Jeff Asher show that the proportions have likely persisted, with most incoming whites Seventh Ward has averaged 39 shootings per year since 2011, settling at the St. Roch/St. Claude end. one every nine days. (Central City had the highest, 42, while Socio-Economics This is a mostly working-class to lower- Bywater and Marigny, both adjacent to the study area, had middle-class population with significant pockets of dispersed two each. St. Roch, which straddles our study area and impoverishment, but by no means is it, or was it ever, the Bywater, had 21). When the data are normalized by poorest section of the city. The study area’s medium population, the picture worsens: the Seventh Ward had the household income (MHHI), which was only $22,227/year in city’s highest per-capita shooting ratio, at 301 residents for 2000, had risen to $27,619/year by 2010, but remained 25 every shooting since 2011. Lakeview, at the opposite end, percent below the city median of $37,146. Fully 2142 had 8,607 residents per shooting.16 Similar statistics may be households—26 percent of all occupied housing units— cited for non-gun violence. remained below the official poverty line, reporting earnings The human tragedy of this violence, and its impact on below $22,314 per year for a family of four or under $11,139 for individuals. High as this rate may seem, it matches the children and other innocents, are topics of important discussions. Its impact on small business, too, cannot be city’s poverty rate, testifying to the representativeness of the ignored. One informant interviewed for this investigation, study area as well as the overall indigence of the city—a when asked the biggest hurdle to stating a business here, circumscribed renaissance indeed. responded, “Safety is a big concern. Attracting workers is Schools While there are no public schools precisely within the tough in this neighborhood, because of real and perceived study area, there are seven within a few blocks of its crime issues.”17 perimeter. One is a high school (McDonogh #35 College Business Enterprises Preparatory School) and most others were pre-kindergarten According to records obtained from the City of New Orleans’ Bureau of Revenue, 612 licensed through 8th grade, all of them chartered. They are Robert businesses operated within the study area as of March 2015. Russa Moton Charter School, McDonogh 35 Career Academy, Nelson Elementary School, Langston Hughes Charter Most are “local” by general definition, although those with larger workforces and (presumably) revenue flows, such as Academy, A.P. Tureaud Elementary School, and the KIPP New Loew’s and Walgreen’s, were usually national chains. Of the Orleans Leadership Academy. Total enrollment in 2013 was 3689 pupils, of whom 97 percent were black (3560) and only 612 businesses, 79 percent had mailing addresses in New Orleans, and another 12 percent had addresses in the metro 2 percent were white (80). The study area is home to a substantial under-educated adult population: in 2011, there were 998 people at least 25 years old who had a formal 16 Jeff Asher, Introducing the New Orleans Neighborhood Gun Violence Index, educational attainment at or below 8th-grade level. The Advocate Blog Network: Behind the Numbers, August 7, 2015, http://blogs.theadvocate.com/behindthenumbers/ , visited August 12, 2015. 17 Interview, Hotard representative, interviewed by Louis David via email, July 2, 2015. 8

The study area’s 2010 population was 88 percent African-American (compared to 60 percent citywide) and 8 percent white, most of whom lived near St. Claude Avenue. There were also 714 people who claimed Hispanic ethnicity and 79 people who identified as Asian. “This is a mostly working-class to lower-middle-class population with dispersed impoverishment, but by no means is it, or was it, the poorest section of the city.” “…the highest concentration of Section-8 vouchers are located squarely within the study area. However, there are relatively few opportunities for the other two forms of affordable living: Housing Authority (HANO) and Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) units.” Neighborhood geographies, neighborhood topographies… “…there were 612 licensed businesses within the study area… Most are “local” by general definition, although those with larger workforces… were national chains. Of the 612 businesses, 79 percent had mailing addresses in New Orleans, and another 12 percent had addresses in the metro area.” Neighborhood capital, neighborhood business… Social capital Neighborhood problems, neighborhood possibilities… area. Eight percent (46) had out-of-state address, as far away categories that are relatively more abundant than citywide. as Connecticut and Idaho, and nine were from Georgia, the Notice also the gold boxes at center-left, which highlight most. businesses that are common citywide but scarce or absent in the study area. Focusing on the most socially and/or The Bureau of Revenue data were not broken down by race economically notable categories, these gaps include or gender of owners, disallowing analyses along the lines of physicians and lawyers, general merchandise stores, and proportional representation. They were, however, categorized by their North American Industry Classification hotels and bed-and-breakfasts—an irony, given the surging popularity and high local potential for AirBnB-style short-term codes, allowing for sector analysis. NAICS codes were “developed [by] the Office of Management and Budget and rentals through the sharing economy (more on this later). adopted in 1997 [as] the standard used by federal statistical agencies in classifying business establishments.” 18 For the ASSET/GAP: SOCIAL CAPITAL, FISCAL CAPITAL purposes of this project, each of the 612 businesses, which Our study area boasts plenty of “third places,” such as barber fell into a total of 171 NAIC codes, were regrouped according shops, beauty salons, eateries, and drinking holes where to their similarities (for example, all automobile-related neighbors may meet and interact and build social capital— enterprises were aggregated). The chart Business Groupings that is, interconnections and networks between and among Within Study Area, March 2015 illustrates that retail, service, individuals, groups, and institutions.19 Add to this the many blue-collar, and skilled-trade occupations account for the vast churches and other faith-based and civic institutions, not to majority of area businesses, outnumbering professional mention front stoops, and the Seventh and Eighth wards are businesses by at least one order of magnitude. veritable havens for social and cultural capital. Most of these businesses represent the sort of Fiscal capital, however, is a different matter. To the extent entrepreneurial activity we wish to foster, in that they are that the number of storefront financial institutions reflect the mostly local; they employ local people; they create and financial capital available to that community, banks and circulate wealth in the neighborhood; and they satisfy local similar institutions are strikingly absent from both top-30 needs and wants without radically increasing real estate lists. Only three traditional bank branches currently operate values and usurping the identity and character of the within the study area, one of which has long been located neighborhood. They, in essence, are the neighborhood, and along the now-booming St. Claude Avenue. Another one, the the neighborhood and city would benefit if there were more minority-owned Liberty Bank, is currently constructing a of them. The good news is that 612 already exist. branch on Gentilly Boulevard near Elysian Fields, which is a positive step. Most other businesses categorized or grouped as financial institutions may in fact be described as ASSETS AND GAPS IN THE CURRENT STATE OF “predatory” in their loans and transactions. ENTREPRENEURISM IN STUDY AREA Fiscal capital, particularly loans at reasonable interest rates and with a tolerance for risk, has been pointed out by ASSET/GAP: EXISTING BUSINESSES, MISSING informants as a key element in an entrepreneurial ecosystem. BUSINESSES Said one founder of a nonprofit which is missioned to help By tallying businesses by their NAIC codes and comparing the other nonprofits raise funds, “the two biggest challenges are lack of time and lack of money. And those two are directly most frequently occurring categories citywide to those within 20 the study area, we can glean which sectors are over- or related. It all goes back to the dollars in the bank.” under-represented (gaps). In the graphic Top 30 Business Concurred the authors of a recent study on the subject, “lack Categories by NAIC Codes, City Versus Study Area, the arrows of access to capital has been a persistent complaint by connect the most common NAIC codes in the study area [minority business enterprises] since the first report on the (right, in red) with their respective citywide rankings at left subject was done…in 1978.” The study found that roughly (blue). Those arrows in green indicate business categories half of survey respondents “considered the lenders, investors, that are relatively more frequent in the study area compared and other key players in the finance domain to be to the rest of the city, whereas black arrows show the ‘moderately’ to ‘extremely’ helpful in accessing debt and opposite. Gold boxes highlight relatively common citywide equity capital,” and that one in five “has been helped by the businesses which are relatively rare in the study area.

These data show the study area, as well as the city, abounds in bars and restaurants, and has at least a dozen other 19 Ray Oldenburg, The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Community Centers, Beauty Parlors, General Stores, Bars, Hangouts, and How They Get You Through the Day. New York: Paragon House (1989) 18 U.S. Census Bureau, “North American Industry Classification System,” 20 Interview, Nora Ellertsen, founder of The Funding Seed, by Summer http://www.census.gov/eos/www/naics/ , visited July 7, 2015. Suleiman, July 31, 2015. 9

Domains of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems Graphic courtesy Daniel Isenberg

Business Groupings within Study Area, March 2015 Count General services 74 Auto sales, repair, taxi, and other auto-related 73 Building trades, construction related 67 Restaurants, eateries 47 Retail, all other and miscellaneous 46 Cosmetics, beauty, hair care 39 Bars and other alcohol 33 Clothing related 24 Convenience stores and/or gas 24 Food retail and related 20 Gambling 18 Professional services-medical, health 17 Professional services 15 Child care 14 Janitorial and landscaping 10 Real estate related 9 Social services, nonprofit 9 Home office 8 Schooling, training 8 Food trucks 7 Entertainment 6 Professional services-accounting 6 Professional services-STEM 6 Lending, loans 5 The 612 Businesses of Pharmacy, drugs 5 Hospitality 4 Professional services-arts 4 the Study Area, Broken Professional services-funeral 4 Professional services-legal; 3 Down by NAICS Codes Professional services-Communications; Professional services-Insurance; Sports 2 (each)

incubator programs in metro New Orleans.” 21 Among the whereas the national chain, drawing from deeper resources, incubator programs active in the region are the Small was able to fortify itself against such risk.22 Business Development Center, Operation Hope, PowerMoves.NOLA, Funding Seed, Goldman Sachs 10,000 ASSET/GAP: NONBASIC AND BASIC SECTORS Small Businesses Program, Idea Village, Accion, New Orleans A tremendous gap exists in the study area’s balance of Startup Fund and the Good Work Network. As for traditional “basic” versus “nonbasic” sector businesses. Basic-sector banking institutions, while branch offices need not business, also known as export enterprises, are those that necessarily be located within a given artery or neighborhood infuse outside money into the local economy by serving to serve an area, it helps that they are, and their presences external clients. In New Orleans, basic-sector businesses signals local economic vitality. A bank branch sends a include hotels, oil and gas, port activity, manufacturing, and message to other financial institutions that money can be digital media and filmmaking. Nonbasic or “traded” made from money in this space. While fiscal lacunas (“bank businesses, on the other hand, tend to local needs and mostly deserts”?) are detrimental, they may also point to circulate local dollars. They include food stores, pharmacies, opportunities waiting to be served. repair shops, day care, and retailers. 23 (Some businesses straddle the two sectors; for example, a gas station near I-10 “We didn’t have any money. might snag pass-through customers traveling across state Running a business is very hard. lines, while a restaurant in the French Quarter may cater to a Managing people is very difficult. mix of local and out-of-town patrons.) Generally speaking, There’s no parking. every one job in the basic sector produces two jobs in the I don’t have any experience. nonbasic sector. Yet whether we look at the jobs in our study It’s difficult to maintain quality as you grow. But if area, which are overwhelmingly service-industry positions, or you don’t, you’re going to lose all of your the business groupings or NAICS codes shown above, we see customers. the vast majority of dollars circulating in our 621 businesses— Running out of [inventory]… and in nearly all 30 NAIC categories—flow from local pockets People not showing up…. to local pockets, within little outside infusions. This being a Air conditioning. We bought all used equipment, and mostly residential neighborhood, we should not expect it to we are constantly fixing it. We finally had to buy new have a particularly high Base Ratio (that is, the ratio between equipment.” basic- and non-basic sector workers), but the denominator of —entrepreneur interviewed by Summer Suleiman, when that ratio would benefit greatly if the numerator increased. asked to identify three obstacles to his/her business. Every one job in the basic sector produces two jobs in the nonbasic sector. Our study area has extremely The demise of a well-loved local grocery store at Elysian few basic-sector enterprises. Fields and Gentilly Boulevard, offered by an informant ASSET/GAP: INCLUSIVE ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND interviewed for this investigation, may be viewed as a case DISADVANTAGED BUSINESS ENTERPRISES study of fiscal limitations on local entrepreneurism. The store had been founded by resourceful immigrants and run by the This project seeks to improve the productive capacity of the same family for five generations, serving Gentilly residents for study area’s entrepreneurial ecosystem, and given the social decades with basic foodstuffs and other necessities at inequities of the city at large as well as the paucity of affordable prices. It did so, however, by tolerating razor-thin minorities and women among the ranks of entrepreneurs, it profit margins. When the Katrina flood damaged the building particularly prizes strategies that reverse the above under- and left the neighborhood largely empty in 2005, the high representations. When we look at a map of the city’s officially costs and low demand of the recovery era wiped out profits recognized list of Disadvantaged Business Enterprises, we altogether, and the owners had little choice but to close. see, perhaps unsurprisingly, that the geography of DBEs Today, a national-chain drug store occupies that same space, generally reflects the geography of entrepreneurism rather and while it too employs local people and serves local needs, than the geography of disadvantaged populations. That is to it does not sell produce, much less at low prices, and profits say, most DBEs are located in the booming urban core, go out-of-town to corporate headquarters. The local grocer’s willingness to persevere on slim profit margins made it vulnerable to a trauma and ultimately unsustainable, 22 Interview, Dr. Robert Collins, professor of urban planning at Dillard University, conducted by Richard Campanella, May 18, 2015. 23 Victor Roterus and Wesley Calef, “Notes on the Basic-Nonbasic 21 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, Employment Ratio,” Economic Geography, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Jan., 1955), pp. 17- “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New 20; Arthur Getis, Judith Getis, and Jerome D. Fellmans, Introduction to Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. Geography, Boston: McGraw Hill, 2007. 10

“The City of New Orleans officially recognizes 634 DBEs who quality for [government contracts] in the sectors of Professional Services, Construction, and Good and Supplies, and 21 of them are based within our study area.” particularly the CBD and the adjoining spaces of the post- percent of DBE respondents) and Tax Administration (24 Katrina renaissance. percent). On the positive side, roughly 75-85 percent reported that they had not encountered any obstacles in The City of New Orleans runs the Disadvantaged Business Enterprises program through its Office of Supplier Diversity, basic services (electricity, water, gas, and Internet) nor in labor relations. which “oversees certification, compliance, training, outreach and capacity building for local, small and disadvantaged ASSET/GAP: TRANSPORTATION ARTERIES, businesses…to help mitigate the effects of past and present RELIABLE PUBLIC TRANSIT social and economic discrimination by increasing the utilization of certified [DBEs] in the procurement of goods Our study area is uniquely girded by five four-lane and services….”24 As of February 2015, the office had certified transportation arteries plus five major interchanges with 634 DBEs in three sectors: “Professional Services,” such as Interstate 10 and Interstate 610. As such, it is among the accounting, legal work, and architecture (41 percent); best-accessed spaces within the metropolis, so much so that “Construction” (36 percent), and “Good and Supplies” (23 the Hotard Destination Services bus company stations its percent), many of which are affiliated with construction work. fleet on Touro Street in the heart of the study area. That area While their certifications are with the city (or its agencies, is also home to the Norfolk Southern-owned Back Belt such as the Sewerage & Water Board), their locations are railroad corridor, which provides a bypass for trains that do scattered throughout the metro area and even nationwide. not need access to the Port of New Orleans courtesy the While 97 percent had mailing addresses within Louisiana, 12 city’s Public Belt Railroad. These wide and well-connected DBEs were located elsewhere, five of them in Mississippi. transportation arteries, coupled with ample commercially and A total of 21 DBEs certified to do work with the city, or 3.3 industrially zoned space along the railroad tracks, comprise a percent of all city DBEs, had addresses within the study area, unique asset which can attract entrepreneurs in light which is home to nearly 6 percent of the city’s population. industry, particularly in the food-processing and craft sector. The CBD, on the other hand, had 51 DBEs all within roughly However well accessed the study area is for motor vehicles, one square mile, by far the city’s highest absolute and roughly one-quarter of households do not have cars. Bus relative concentration. It is understandable, and perhaps service here and elsewhere is notoriously erratic, and with strategically advantageous, that minority entrepreneurs tap the exception of the new streetcar line currently under into the same networks and social spaces occupied by their construction along North Rampart-St. Claude along the river- peers. But given the high office rent and limited affordable side edge of the study area, no streetcars connect the residential opportunities in the urban core, an opportunity downtown tourism circuit with study area businesses. exists for DBEs to establish their operations in more affordable environs like the Seventh and Eighth ward, ASSET/GAP: HISTORICITY AND PROXIMITY TO especially since a substantial number of these businesses are HISTORIC CORE home-based. A major intangible asset of the study area is its historicity and Region-wide, a gap exists between the supportive presence proximity to the city’s historic core. Its building stock, which of the CBD-based entrepreneurial ecosystem and the needs includes some antebellum Creole cottages and numerous of the more broadly dispersed DBE community. A survey Victorian Italianate shotgun singles and doubles at the river- conducted by McCline et al found that while “a majority of end, plus hundreds of circa-1920s-1930s Craftsman-style [minority businesses enterprises] tended to agree that there bungalows and Spanish Revival villas toward Gentilly is a positive presence of an entrepreneurial ecosystem in Boulevard, exhibits the sort of walkable streetscapes and metro New Orleans,” 40 percent of them did “not feel that intimate urbanism increasingly sought after by suburb-weary MBEs are equitably supported as participants in this Americans. It is also located within a short drive, and in some 25 ecosystem.” Eighty percent of respondents were not even areas a long walk, of the French Quarter and the city’s most officially registered as DBEs, and a quarter of them were famous downtown neighborhoods. unaware that such a program existed. Respondents also indicated that the two policy domains which they ranked as However, in neither regard does our study area rank as a “moderate” or “major” obstacles to their success were in the “superlative.” Adjacent neighborhoods—namely the areas of Business Licensing and Permits (identified by 30 Faubourg Marigny (established 1805), Faubourg Tremé (1810), and the neighborhood now known as Bywater, which comprises five faubourgs established between 1807 and the 24 Office of Supplier Diversity, City of New Orleans, 1840s—are all older, more integral in their historical http://www.nola.gov/economic-development/supplier-diversity/ , visited architecture, more famous, and closer to the French Quarter. July 8, 2015. 25 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, Relatedly, they are also experiencing the most intense “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New gentrification pressure, bringing with it renovation and new Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. 11

amenities as well as higher housing prices and cultural 90 per square foot prior to Katrina, versus $100-$120 in 2013 change. and $115-$130 in 2014. Said one informant who opened a business on St. Claude Avenue, “The prices of houses in the Two types of official historic districts exist within the city. One is designated at the national level, through the Department of neighborhood have doubled. My sister bought a nice double here for $80,000 in 2009 and now it’s worth $250,000.” (His the Interior, and is listed on the National Register of Historic own business, not coincidentally, grew proportionally, so Places as “National Register Districts.” New Orleans is home to some of the largest urban National Register Districts in the much so he increased his staff from two to 16 employees in one year.)27 While real estate values are definitely rising, and country, and the study area contains two: the Edgewood Park along with them tax appraisals and city property taxes, one Historic District on the Gentilly (north) end, and the New could still buy a home in the study area for half the price of a Marigny Historic District toward the St. Claude end (south). Despite the federal designation, National Register Districts comparable structure in the adjacent Faubourg Marigny, whose prices easily top $270/square foot.28 are mostly honorary; they do not ensure against demolition, and their main power comes in the form of tax credits for In terms of housing affordability, another asset boasted by historical renovation and special consideration vis-a-via the study area is its relatively large stock of Section-8 units, a federally funded projects. house-based alternative for lower-income renters to living in a housing project. Maps by the Greater New Orleans Fair It is the other type of designation, Local Historic Districts, which actually has “teeth” in city planning and land-use Housing Action Center show that the highest concentration of two- and three-bedroom rentals that accept Section-8 decisions. Overseen by the Historic Districts Landmarks vouchers for federally subsidized rents are located squarely Commission (HDLC), Local Historic District designation means within the study area, especially between St. Claude and the securing of a demolition permit is much more difficult, 29 and special considerations are placed on new construction Claiborne. However, there are relatively few opportunities for the other two forms of affordable housing: there are no and renovation. Currently, only the buildings facing St. Claude Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) housing projects Avenue, plus those across St. Bernard Avenue from the study area, are within Local Historic Districts (Faubourg Marigny within the study area (although up to five are located within a one-mile radius), nor is there a substantial number of Low and Faubourg Tremé, respectively), although it is likely that Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) units. Those multi-family sometime in the not-too-distant future, Local Historic structures are mostly located along Tulane Avenue, Jefferson Districts might extended nearly to the I-10 corridor or even Florida Avenue. Davis Parkway, and other arteries. Affordable real estate affects the health of an entrepreneurial ASSET/GAP: AFFORDABILITY, RISING COSTS OF ecosystem in two ways: it allows employees to live closer to LIVING work, and it means lower commercial real estate values and taxes, which reduces costs and increases profit margins. But Data on median rent from the 2008-2012 American these lower land values also attract developers and Community Survey show that the two census tracts at the renovators, not to mention outside entrepreneurs, and while heart of the study area had rents around $546-563 per such investors bring ample benefits with them, they are also month, plus or minus $104-$122, while most other tracts prone to instigating the very neighborhood upheaval this ranged between $650-$750 per month.26 This is roughly half effort aims to avoid. the median rent of the CBD, Warehouse District, and Lower Garden District, and substantially cheaper than Tremé, ASSET/GAP: FLOOD ZONES AND URBAN RISK Marigny, and Bywater—all of which have experienced gentrification and heightened increases in the cost of living in The study area benefits from an unexpected asset: despite the five or so years since these data were collected. The being mostly below sea level—only the area between St. Seventh and Eighth wards have experienced only a fraction of Claude and North Claiborne plus Gentilly Boulevard are above this rise, though rent here too consumes an increasingly large sea level—it mostly occupies the lower-risk FEMA “B” flood portion of residents’ monthly income, especially near St. zone, which has a 0.2 percent chance of flooding in any given Claude. year. “A” zones, on the other hand, have a 1.0% chance of It is difficult to ascertain precisely how much house prices 27 have changed in our study area because these data are Interview, anonymous, by Summer Suleiman, July 31, 2015. 28 Prices only include buildings repaired or undamaged by the flood. aggregated by ZIP codes, of which there are four in our study Katherine Sayre, “New Orleans Metro Area Home Prices Still Climbing,” area. Generally speaking, home prices here were roughly $80- NOLA.com|The Times-Picayune, February 25, 2015. 29 Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center, “2009 Housing Choice Voucher Program (HCVP) Opportunity Mapping Project,” 26 “Rich Blocks, Poor Blocks” online GIS of U.S. Census Bureau American http://www.gnofairhousing.org/wp- Community Survey data from 2008-2012, content/uploads/2011/12/NOLA_Section8_2bedroom1.jpg , visited July 8, http://www.richblockspoorblocks.com/index.php , visited July 8, 2015. 2015. 12

flooding, and buildings in “A” zones must lie above a specified College Rankings, [and] ranked in the top 60 among all liberal Base Flood Elevation and be certified by a surveyor before arts colleges by Washington Monthly in 2013.”32 they are eligible for coverage in the National Flood Insurance Dillard has the potential to serve as an anchor institution and Program and thus fundable for a mortgage by most lenders. pipeline for young local college-educated entrepreneurs to Properties in “B” zones do not need elevation certificates to incubate business ideas on campus and launch them into the qualify for flood insurance, which adds not only to their adjacent neighborhood. University President Walter safety but their value and marketability. Kimbrough speaks of “signature programs in physics and By no means does this imply that the study area is free of risk film,” the latter of which could serve as a pipeline into the in terms of either Katrina-like surge deluges or rainwater state’s burgeoning digital media marketplace.33 Dillard can inundations; nearly the entire area flooded in 2005, and its also serve as a landlord for innovation centers or laboratories streets are prone to the same ankle-deep nuisance flooding that need the human resources and infrastructure of a four- that can occur anywhere depending on local drainage year accredited institution of higher learning. Dillard, conditions. The hundred or so blocks straddling Florida however, is primarily missioned for teaching, and does not around the Franklin intersection, which flooded deeply, are have a graduate program. Without the technical facilities all within higher-risk “A” zones and lie three to five feet associated with a research-missioned university and the below sea level. What is unusual is that this area is one of the specialized skillsets and career focus of graduate students, an larger expanses of below-sea-level terrain in the metropolis institution of higher learning is limited in its ability to be a that is nevertheless mostly in a more favorable “B” zone.30 local entrepreneurial catalyst. ASSET/GAP: DILLARD UNIVERSITY AS ANCHOR Prior to Hurricane Katrina and during an earlier school INSTITUTION administration, Dillard cast its eyes toward the surrounding neighborhoods, and at one point considered making land It is clear from the maps in this report that the educational acquisitions in the nearby commercial district at Gentilly attainment of the resident population inhibits a key element Boulevard/Elysian Fields, possibly for small business of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, as it curtails the number development. But the 2005 flood understandably shifted its and range of potential businesses that can be established focus back to the sustainability of the institution and the locally and can find local workforces. Metro-wide, an needs of its student body. Dillard nonetheless remains “inadequately educated/trained general workforce” ranked engaged with its neighbors: the university runs an Office of as a serious obstacle to business success among minority Community Relations funded by the Department of Housing business enterprises, with more than one out of every three and Urban Development (HUD), although it mostly focuses on respondents in a recent study describing it as a “moderate” community organizing, homeowner capacitation, housing or “major” obstacle, the highest of all measured.31 issues and job training rather than entrepreneurship and small business development. Dillard also ran a community A key asset for fostering entrepreneurship in the study area is development corporation, and while its signage can be seen Dillard University. This Historically Black College or University in and around the adjacent neighborhoods, the CDC is not (HBCU) was the product of a 1920s merger of two currently active.34 predecessor institutions of the Methodist tradition, one of which dated to the early postbellum era. Trustees moved the It is worth noting that Dillard’s peer institutions, including institution to its present-day 55-acre campus on Gentilly Delgado Community College, Loyola University, and the other Boulevard in 1931 and proceeded to build gracious Classical- local private HBCU, Xavier University, operate a collaborative style buildings amid green lawns and live oak trees. Dillard partnership funded by the Small Business Administration today has an enrollment of 1200 undergraduates in four called the Louisiana Small Business Development Center— schools: College of General Studies, College of Arts and Greater New Orleans and Bayou Region. LSBD provides Sciences, College of Business, and the School of Nursing, and assistance in writing business plans, acquiring financing, sales the most popular majors include, in descending order, and marketing, management, taxes and insurance, among Biology, Public Health, Pre-Nursing, Nursing, Business other services, and although based in Metairie, the Administration, Psychology, Mass Communication, Sociology, organization extends its services to the study area and could Music, and Political Science. The university “ranked No. 13 benefit from a relationship with Dillard.35 among all HBCUs in 2014 U.S. News and World Report's Best

32 Dillard University, http://www.dillard.edu/, visited July 8, 2015. 33 Walter Kimbrough, featured in article Jed Lipinski, “Leaders Offer Campus 30 For precise boundaries of FEMA flood zones in the city, see FEMA Risk Forecasts, Times-Picayune, September 25, 2015, page A-4. Maps, http://maps.riskmap6.com/LA/Orleans/ 34 Interview, Dr. Robert Collins, professor of urban planning at Dillard 31 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, University, conducted by Richard Campanella, May 18, 2015. “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New 35 “Welcome to LSBDC Greater New Orleans Region,” Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. http://www.lsbdc.org/gnor/ , visited July 24, 2015 13

ASSET/GAP: CREOLE CULINARY HERITAGE, the neighborhood establishing businesses specializing in local CULINARY OFFERINGS foods, sans the pretensions and prices of the bistro scene. Examples might include the well-loved Vaucresson's Sausage The study area’s Creole heritage, tracing its origins to the Company and the very popular Buttermilk Drop Bakery, both francophone Franco- Hispano- Caribbean- African- American on or near St. Bernard Avenue. Another example outside the population of the 1700s-1800s and particularly to the gens de study area is Dauphine Café, in the Holy Cross section of the colouer libre of antebellum times, manifests itself in various Lower Ninth Ward. Opened in 2012 by a local family drawing ways today, one of which includes food and foodways. At a time when increasingly sophisticated visitors are craving upon their own traditions, Dauphine Café today is the only “authentic” local experiences and insider perspectives found white-tablecloth restaurant in the neighborhood hit hardest off the track beaten by millions of other tourists, the Seventh by the Katrina flood. The restaurant has become popular with and Eighth wards appear to be missing out on a major diners and well-regarded by food critics—a fine example of opportunity in marketing their culinary heritage—especially local entrepreneurship drawing upon local culture for local given the growing locavore and slow-foods (“foodie”) benefit, as evidenced in the charmingly earnest words of its movements. I made this point in 2003 while researching and owners: writing a chapter on Creole New Orleans for my book Geographies of New Orleans, published in 2006. It reads in [Our] menu features southern cuisine, while the part, atmosphere vibes a casual chic ambiance. Our goal is to provide you with the same quality food, While French Quarter restaurants and merchants superior hospitality, and unique atmosphere that exploit the enchanting term “Creole” to you’d expect to find in the more notable locales of authenticate their offerings, the genuine Creole New Orleans restaurants, acknowledged for their community and its businesses endure in relative outstanding southern cuisine and culturally rich obscurity in Seventh Ward neighborhoods, surroundings. More importantly, we would like you to know, "our meals will perpetually be prepared unbeknownst to and unvisited by the millions of 37 Creole-curious tourists exploring the Creole City with love and passion!” annually. Only during Jazz Fest do visitors come en masse to the Seventh Ward, yet most festival- ASSET/GAP: VOCATIONAL EDUCATION AND THE goers, though deeply appreciative of local culture, SKILLED TRADES HERITAGE do not realize they are in the modern-day heart of Creole New Orleans.36 Another legacy of Creolism is its craft tradition. Skilled To be sure, the study area has no shortage of eateries; building trades have long been associated with the black categorized by NAIC codes, there are 33 drinking places, 27 Creole community of New Orleans, from colonial and sit-down restaurants, and 19 other eateries without table antebellum times to today. Using the patronizing language of service, not to mention 11 groceries and 7 food trucks. In all, the day, the Daily Picayune wrote in 1859, roughly 1 of every 6 businesses in the study area deals in food Some of our best mechanics and artisans are to be and drink, mostly prepared food. found among the free colored [class]; they form the great majority of our…masons, bricklayers, builders, carpenters, tailors, shoemakers, &c, [and This is an asset to be promoted and an entrepreneurial sector are also] excellent musicians, jewelers, goldsmiths, to be developed, and, at least at the rapidly gentrifying St. tradesmen and merchants. As a general rule, the Claude-end of the study area, it is already happening through free colored people of Louisiana, and especially of market forces aided by government-aided historic-renovation New Orleans—the “creole colored people,” as they style themselves—are a sober, industrious and tax credits. The recent opening of the St. Roch Market, an moral class.38 “Eataly”-style food court of gourmet stalls and a common seating area set within a beautifully renovated circa-1875 Ironworking, lathing, plastering, tile-setting, bricklaying, municipal market pavilion, has been drawing rave reviews as carpentry and painting are among the professional crafts that well as criticism—even vandalism—for catering to moneyed Creoles have handed down for generations, probably since leisure diners rather than the everyday grocery needs of the Spanish colonial times. These lines of work availed to gens de local working-class populace. colouer libre (to whom the doors of many other professions were closed) a level of independence, steady work, outlets Thus, food business is both an asset and a gap, and an for creativity, and a sense of accomplishment. Their labors opportunity and a risk. An ideal scenario for entrepreneurs have permanently enriched the physical culture of New might entail local people with roots in the Creole heritage of

37 Dauphine Café, “About Us,” dauphinecafe.com, visited July 23, 2015 36 Richard Campanella, Geographies of New Orleans: Urban Fabrics Before 38 “Hayti [Haiti] and Immigration Thither,” Daily Picayune, July 16, 1859, page the Storm. Lafayette: University of Louisiana Press, 2006. 5, column 2. 14

Orleans, and much of the city’s spectacular architecture area, zoned for commerce and industry and accessible by stands as a monument to their efforts. Tracking the trucks and trains as well as buses and cars, is home to a residential patterns of these tight-knit tradition-bound cluster of fairly large construction-related enterprises, artisans provides clues to the geography of Creole New including a trade contractor, a wrecking and demolition firm, Orleans, and it shines a special light on our study area. “This two industrial and construction supply wholesalers, a metal 7th ward here was full of trade people,” recollected the late fabricator, and a large concrete plant. This area is home to Mardi Gras Indian Chief Allison “Tootie” Montana, himself a the largest concentration of the 70 or so construction-related skilled lather with deep Seventh Ward roots. “You can build a businesses among the 612 total study-area enterprises. house, really didn’t have to spend no money at all. You knew However, only a fraction of these firms comprise the sort of plasterers, you knew lathers. You knew carpenters. You knew old-line traditional skilled trades for which this neighborhood plumbers…” 39 The U.S. Census tabulated numbers for became famous; most are generally comparable to the nonwhite “craftsmen, foremen, and kindred workers” at the construction sector that would be found in any large city. census-track level in 1940, and it showed a large cluster of Given its size, zoning, and access, the Frenchmen-Elysian African-American craftsmen living in the Seventh Ward and 40 Fields-Agriculture area has potential for the ever-growing adjacent areas, precisely our study area. demand for artisanal or craft consumables, including locally According to president of the New Orleans Master Craft Guild brewed spirits and beer. One journalist, speaking to national Jonn Hankins, the heyday of the Seventh Ward master trends, described “the growing artisanal spirits movement” as craftsmen was the 1920s through 1960s, when a generation forming, along with urban agriculture and tech incubators, of local men found their skillsets, taught in the apprentice- “the holy trinity of New Urbanism.” 43 One such journeyman-master tradition, to be in high demand for the entrepreneurial firm, New Orleans Rum Distillery, has 20th-century expansion and modernization of the city. Some established itself in the heart of this nameless district, at were unionized; others worked independently; still others 2815 Frenchmen Street, and does a brisk business selling were free-lancers who pieced together successful careers as locally produced rum made from Louisiana sugar cane as well jacks-of-all-trades; all were innovators and entrepreneurs.41 as offering hourly guided tours and tastings for $10 per person, a good example of the sort of food-based, locally Sadly, this heritage has largely faded, in part due to broader placed, culturally emphatic entrepreneurial innovation cultural and social changes but also on account of the closure envisioned by this project. Note the lexicon of its promotional of vocational educational programs, the subtle stigmatization of blue-collar professions, and the well-intentioned but copy, with its accent on localism and hand-wrought authenticity: sometimes misguided prioritization of college preparation and white-collar professions above all else. Hankins estimates Old New Orleans Rum comes out of the back that this sector is at most one-third of its size during its mid- streets of our legendary Ninth Ward, [where founder James Michalopoulos] got together artists, century apex, and it lacks a pipeline of youth to keep it from brewmasters, and a couple of clever engineers to shrinking further.42 create a locally-produced masterpiece…. We source our molasses locally and our barrels are Given the city’s vast inventory of historical structures and American Oak, charred and used only once before increasing demand for renovation work and construction by fine whiskey-makers. Our rum is created batch- skills, the revival of this beautiful tradition represents an by-batch in a 150-year old cotton warehouse. We entrepreneurial opportunity of the first order. are committed to an extraordinary customer experience, supporting our local economy, and creating a rum worthy of the celebration that is Adding to the potential of this neighborhood for a building- 44 trades revival is the fact that, upon mapping area businesses, New Orleans. a little-known cluster of construction-related businesses Similarly, a craft micro-brewery named NOLA Brewing has set appears in the vicinity of the 2800 block of Frenchmen Street, up shop on a comparable large-scale, appropriately zoned, west of Elysian Fields Avenue and along Agriculture Street well-accessed and conveniently located spot along gritty and the Back Belt Railroad paralleling Florida Avenue. This Tchoupitoulas Street, while a craft vodka distillery named Bootleg Spirits is planning to open in an industrial area along Tulane Avenue in Mid City. 45 Our study area offers an 39 Allison Montana, as quoted by Spitzer, in Raised to the Trade: Creole Building Arts of New Orleans, edited by Jonn Ethan Hankins and Steven Maklansky, New Orleans: New Orleans Museum of Art, 2002. 43 Alexander Nazaryan, “Return to Fort Apache: No Longer Burning, the Bronx 40 U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. Population and Is Suddenly Hot,” Newsweek, July 3, 2015. Housing Statistics for Census Tracts, New Orleans, La.-1940. Washington, 44 “Old New Orleans Louisiana Rum,” http://oldneworleansrum.com/about- D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1942, pages 46-53. old-new-orleans-rum/ visited July 9, 2015 41 Interview, Jonn Hankins, president of the New Orleans Master Craft Guild, 45 Ian McNulty, “Homegrown Vodka Brand Will Pursue a New Generation of by Richard Campanella, July 2, 2015. Drinkers,” The New Orleans Advocate, July 9, 2015, 42 Interview, Jonn Hankins, president of the New Orleans Master Craft Guild, http://www.theneworleansadvocate.com/news/12843996-123/at-a-new- by Richard Campanella, July 2, 2015. mid-city-distillery 15

abundance of perfect spaces for this brand of entrepreneurial income neighborhood back into commerce in a way that activity, which has the added benefit of being basic-sector: honors its culturally and historically rich location.”48 that is, it brings outside dollars into the neighborhood. With all due respect to O. C. Haley Boulevard, the Seventh Ameliorating the above gaps vis-à-vis the associated assets is and Eighth wards have more than their share of culinary the subject of the next section. heritage, and could deploy a similar centralized market or food court specializing in Creole foods and with the same POTENTIAL INTERVENTIONS FOR FOSTERING emphasis on culture, community, and minority entrepreneurism. The experience of Fund17, a local nonprofit ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN THE STUDY AREA headquartered near the study area which focused on CO-LOCATION OF “FOOD, FOOD, FOOD” legitimizing the informal economy, suggests that numerous food businesses operate out of people’s home kitchens, and When asked to identify one cultural attribute of our study may have an opportunity to come out of the shadow area with the potential to become a key entrepreneurial economy through a low-capital, easy-entry mechanism such niche, one informant did not hesitate to cite three: “food, as a stall-based share food space or court. Locating such a food, food.”46 The success of the recently reopened St. Roch “Creole Foodcourt” away from the gentrification pressure of Market speaks to the popularity of boutique eateries, and St. Claude Avenue would help minimize the potentially while some have criticized St. Roch on the grounds of deleterious impacts of such an operation, as has been gentrification and cultural appropriation, its “foodie-court” insinuated about the St. Roch Market, while also forming model set in an historical ambience could be replicated by something our study area desperately needs: a visitable local entrepreneurs on their own terms in the heart of our destination. study area, in the heart of the city’s (and nation’s) Creole cultural core zone. One prototype of such a co-located cluster CLUSTER STRATEGY: CREATION OF A VISITABLE strategy can be found in the Roux Carré Market currently DESTINATION under construction at 2000 Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard, The Creole Foodcourt could form the nucleus of a feature which describes itself as “The Food Port of New Orleans,” sorely lacking in our study area: a visitable destination with an outdoor food court and gathering place that multiple things to see and do. Such a node, particularly if it celebrates the African American, Caribbean, and Latin American traditions with culinary offerings boasted a distinguishing iconography (such as the WWII and performances. The [Roux Carré] will include six Museum in the heart of the city’s museum district), could enclosed vendor stalls, a commercial kitchen, bring new demand to entrepreneurial businesses as well as covered outdoor seating and gathering space, a cooking demonstration area, and a performance infuse outside dollars into local coffers, precisely the sort of 47 stage. Parking will be provided on site. basic-sector economic activity lacking in this area. The organization behind the Roux Carré is the 501(c)3 Currently there is little reason for visitors to come to the nonprofit community development corporation (CDC) Good central part of our study area: there are no museums or tour Work Network, which is missioned to provide services to houses, no A-list historic sites, no large urban parks, and no minority- and women-owned businesses in southeastern streetcar lines (although a new line being installed on North Louisiana. Funded by the Community Economic Development Rampart and St. Claude to Elysian Fields will come close—and federal grant program, the Roux Carré strives to foster most of that traffic will go to the St. Roch Market). Even minority entrepreneurism “by providing a low-cost, low- inquisitive visitors seeking things to appreciate might be overhead means of market entry for aspiring food service pressed to spend money here, as the distinctive culture of businesses” while also “bringing vacant property in a low- this area largely plays out behind closed doors, in private space, without a storefront. A closer look uncovers some possible destination clusters:

46 Interview, Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy, professor of English at Dillard University, conducted by Richard Campanella, May 18, 2015. 47 “Food Court at 2000 OC Haley Blvd.,” Good Work Network, 48 “Food Court at 2000 OC Haley Blvd.,” Good Work Network, http://www.goodworknetwork.org/foodcourt http://www.goodworknetwork.org/foodcourt 16

Food Enterprise in the Study Area Photographs by Richard Campanella May 2015

“A Creole Foodcourt could form the nucleus of a feature sorely lacking in our study area: a visitable destination with multiple things to see and do.” Strip Malls of the Gentilly/Elysian Fields Intersection Photographs by Richard Campanella May 2015 “Food, Food, Food”

• Gentilly Ridge One visitable destination could be was installed on North Claiborne, the traffic circle was coalesced along the oak-lined Gentilly Boulevard corridor eradicated, and, due also to the social transformations (following the historic Gentilly topographic ridge) ongoing at the time, the business cluster largely connecting the Dillard University campus and its scenic disintegrated amid a milieu of divestment and decay. But lagoon (a remnant of the historic Bayou Gentilly), plus some key enterprises hung on, chief among them St. four historic cemeteries (the above-ground Mt. Olivet Bernard Circle Market, a local grocer inside a picturesque and the Jewish below-ground burial places of Ahaves circa-1920s Spanish Revival municipal market. The Shalom, Anshe Sfard, and Beth Israel), with the bustling Katrina flood led to more destruction, but, aided by commercial intersection with Elysian Fields Avenue. Here grants and a spirited revival of the Tremé community, could be located the aforementioned Creole Foodcourt the market reopened in 2013 and the potential now along with other neighborhood-themed enterprises. Just exists to use it as the nucleus for something akin to the a few blocks north of the intersection, by Brother Martin Creole Foodcourt as well as other small-scale artisan High School, lies the site of a Civil War fortification that is food processing business, such as Vaucresson's Sausage entirely unmarked and unremembered. That intersection and Bachemin Meat Market (“Home of the Original lies three rectilinear miles south by bus, car, or bike to Creole Hot Sausage”). The benefit of this locale is its the French Market, and two miles straight north to the relative proximity to the downtown tourism circuit, yet University of New Orleans and the Lake Pontchartrain distance from the trendy St. Claude corridor. Creole shore, where plans are in motion to recreate the famed foods businesses established here by neighborhood Pontchartrain Beach swimming area.49 One can envision entrepreneurs would preserve and monetize local a time when visitors and residents alike travel Elysian traditions while bringing inquisitive visitors into the heart Fields between the historic districts by the river and the of the Creole Seventh Ward. It could also be proximate to recreational facilities by the lake, cutting straight across churches such as Corpus Christi, with their after-mass our study area, and with the option of stopping by at the lunch crowds, and social institutions such as the Autocrat Gentilly intersection for cultural sightseeing and a Club, as well as the spontaneous street events and memorable lunch. second-lines that occur on St. Bernard Avenue on weekend afternoons. “The new streetcar line coming down Rampart [is] • New Orleans Master Crafts Guild Given the study area’s going to really boost our walk-in sales, and allow a ample light-industrial zoning as well as its building-craft lot of people to come in visiting this part of town. The festival culture of New Orleans really impacts heritage, an opportunity exists to create an alternative our business in a big way. It’s the volume of people visitable space where the skilled trades and crafts are that come in to visit and spend money…. taught, demonstrated, practiced, and base-camped. This The Medical Center is going to be huge. Not just the idea is detailed in the next section. patients, but all those employees.” --informant on St. Claude Avenue, on the roles played by amenities, accessibility, anchor institutions, and visitable NEW ORLEANS MASTER CRAFTS GUILD destinations in entrepreneurial ecosystems, major elements of which are missing in most of our study area. The New Orleans Master Crafts Guild is the brainchild of Jonn Interviewed by Summer Suleiman, August 3, 2015. Hankins, former Executive Director of the New Orleans African American Museum as well as a development director • St. Bernard Circle For nearly a century, the intersection of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Foundation, Jazz of St. Bernard Avenue and oak-lined North Claiborne Orchestra, and Museum of Art (NOMA). Mr. Hankins has formed a beautifully landscaped traffic circle amid been an advocate for a building-trades revival ever since he hundreds of black-owned businesses, a local directed the award-winning Raised to the Trade exhibit at entrepreneurial ecosystem if ever there was one. NOMA in 2003 and co-edited its accompanying book. Starting in 1966, the trees were felled, the I-10 overpass Hankins, who is also a partner with the social innovation initiative Propeller, notes that “by 2020, the demand for 49 It is worth noting that, from 1831 to 1932, a well-known urban rail line skilled building trades craftsmen—in masonry, plaster, known as the Pontchartrain Railroad traversed this route bringing residents carpentry, and ironwork—is expected to increase by 14%, yet to the lake and visitors to the city. Perhaps someday a streetcar line can be reestablished along Elysian Fields. vocational training programs in New Orleans are in decline. 17

The Guild provides training with some of the best craftsmen has the potential to attract entrepreneurs in the emerging in the area to fill this gap.”50 market of sustainable or artisanal products. These might include craft distilleries or breweries; coffee-bean roasting; “An Idea Village for the skilled trades!” food processing for local foodstuffs such as pepper sauces, spices, sausages, wild meats, and po-boy bread; and hand- —Jonn Hankins on his vision for the New Orleans crafted furniture. Such products benefit—in terms of quality, Master Crafts Guild, interviewed by author, July 2015 cost, marketing, and perception—from being manufactured in New Orleans, especially among younger demographics who In an interview for this investigation, Hankins, whose guild is tend to fetishize localism, authenticity, and sustainability. The currently operating out of provisional space, expressed a high New Orleans Rum Distillery is a premier example of such an degree of interest in creating a permanent visitable enterprise already established in the study area, and there is workspace for the building trades where young people can be space for more. An opportunity exists to encourage such apprenticed, where local people can take classes, and where enterprises through tax-incentivized zones or overlay districts visitors can watch demonstrations and buy hand-crafted (see next section) in clustered spaces such as the Frenchmen- products made in New Orleans right before their eyes. He Elysian Fields-Agriculture industrial zone along the railroad tracks. This area also has the right attributes for “B2B thinks of it as sort of “Idea Village for the skilled trades,” or a Businesses”—that is, business-to-business enterprises, whose Propeller-style maker-space dedicated to reviving main customers are other firms or organizations rather than entrepreneurism in sorely needed trades of carpentry, consumers. Some are already here, including Hotard Buses, masonry, bricklaying, lathing, plastering, iron-working, which, through its headquarters on Touro Street, operates a electricians, tailoring, and beading. Part institute, part fleet of 40 buses and employs 150 reporting to that location. workshop, part demonstration and destination, the New The area is also home to Volunteers of America (VOA), which has interacted beneficially with its neighbor. Stated an Orleans Master Crafts Guild could be located in the informant with the bus company, “Hotard uses some VOA Frenchmen-Elysian Fields-Agriculture area where the New resources to wash buses; they think other businesses may be Orleans Rum Distillery currently operates and conducts tours, able to work with VOA also if they knew what was giving twice the reason for people to visit. The space and the available.”51 mission could also be expanded to include other crafts, such The uptown crowd is coming [to St. Claude] as the manufacture of handmade carnival throws and trinkets because it’s cool. Some of the most trendy and (increasingly in vogue) and Mardi Gras Indian suites. In the innovative restaurants in the city are over here now. This is where the thriving art community is. It’s here. same way Blain Kern Studios has turned the production of It’s not Julia Street. parade floats into a year-long visitable destination—Mardi —entrepreneur on St. Claude Avenue, August 2015. Gras World in the Lower Garden District—the New Orleans Can the same occur in the rest of our study area?—and Master Crafts Guild can turn the skilled-trades heritage into if it did, will gentrification necessarily follow? an educational institution and must-see destination in the OVERLAY DISTRICTS heart of the Seventh and Eighth wards. An overlay district is a zoning technique designed to CLUSTER STRATEGY FOR LIGHT INDUSTRY, encourage or discourage certain land uses in a specified area ARTISAN PRODUCT MANUFACTURING, AND B2B already under a larger zoning ordinance. The term comes from the visual of “laying over” a patch upon a typical land- BUSINESSES use map and effectively revising a portion of it. Critics hold that overlay districts represent a sort of sanctioned spot While New Orleans, a port and mercantilist city, has never zoning, in which previously agreed-upon principles are set been a major manufacturing center, it has had more industry aside for a particular area. But so long as the modifications go than commonly thought (especially during World War II) and through the proper civic and legal processes, overlay districts retains industrial potential, with a steady stream of raw can accurately reflect local values and priorities and can be materials arriving at its docks and unsurpassed access to effective in improving or preserving arteries, neighborhoods, national and world markets. Our study area is too removed and sites of particular historical and environmental value. from the river for heavy industry, but, with its unique inventory of spacious and accessible light-industrial zones,

50 “New Orleans Master Crafts Guild—The Pitch: Jonn Hankins,” Propeller, http://gopropeller.org/ventures/new-orleans-master-crafts-guild/ visited 51 Interview, Hotard representative, interviewed by Louis David via email, July July 27, 2015. 2, 2015. 18

Commercial and Industrial Zoning in 2800 Frenchmen- Elysian Fields- Ag Area, along Back Belt Railroad Photographs by Richard Campanella May 2015

“In the same way Blain Kern Studios has turned the production of Mardi Gras parade floats into a year- long visitable destination in the Lower Garden District, the New Orleans Master Crafts Guild can turn the skilled-trades heritage of the Creole Seventh Ward into an educational institution and must-see destination in the heart of the study area.” Planning and zoning as entrepreneurial catalysts

New Orleans’ recently adopted Comprehensive Zoning Today, Freret is a new mini-Magazine Street, and with that Ordinance details the city’s specialized zoning districts, success have also come inexorable concerns about among them Urban Corridor (UC) Overlay Districts along commercial and possibly residential gentrification, as the arteries such as Gen. De Gaulle and Chef Menteur Highway, handful of pre-existing local retailers have been largely which aim to prohibit certain nuisance land uses, and squeezed out. Since then, St. Claude Avenue has also been Residential Diversity Overlay (RDO) Districts, which attempt designated an AC overlay district and has been experiencing a to return the archetypal corner grocery and other small local comparable transformation (including along our study area), storefront businesses to blocks previously zoned exclusively although the impacts of gentrification in Bywater and St. for residential. Roch have been more intense than in the vicinity of Freret, whose abutting residential blocks were generally more One of the most dramatic examples of the effectiveness of an overlay district is the Arts and Culture (AC) district on Freret prosperous to begin with. Street between Jefferson and Napoleon avenues in uptown New Orleans. Like the historic arteries in our downtown study “We got a liquor license immediately as soon as we area, Freret bustled from the early 1900s through the 1970s applied for it, and other businesses had tried before but suffered divestment and decay over subsequent decades. us and did not get licenses…. With city-sanctioned It retained its potential, however, courtesy its structural gentrification, [they’re] allowing a lot of things historicity and walkability as well as its convenience to happen that they weren’t letting happen before.” prosperous uptown neighborhoods and nearby Loyola and —entrepreneur on St. Claude Avenue, July 2015 Tulane universities. After Katrina, which inundated the street with shallow floodwaters, the area was ripe for revival. There is another type of “cultural district,” derived from a In 2007, the City Council and City Planning Commission state law rather than city ordinance, and of the 22 cultural approved the Freret Street Arts and Cultural District, which districts within New Orleans, some are (confusingly) also city- “seeks to preserve the area's small to medium-scale level AC overlay districts. But the state cultural districts are commercial uses, encourage a balance of daytime and more modestly missioned, to encourage the sale of art and nighttime uses, and foster development of arts-related restoration of historic architecture through tax breaks, rather uses.”52 The overlay expanded the permitting for restaurants, than to transform commercial arteries through zoning and cocktail lounges, coffee shops, art galleries and studios, land use changes. Among them is the recently expanded and theaters and performance venues, all of which would be renamed Tremé/7th Ward (previously Bayou Road and African approved to operate well into the evening. It also prohibiting American Heritage) Cultural District, which covers the entire liquor stores and go-cups. The Freret AC created space for eastern (upriver) side of our study area, as well as the St. new nighttime businesses in a post-Katrina era that coincided Claude AC on the riverside flank.54 with the emerging resurgence of civic spirit. The newly approved Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance of The change was dramatic. “In 2009,” wrote a local journalist, 2015 further distinguishes among four types of Arts and six coffee shops and specialty eateries “opened their doors; Cultural overlay districts, labelled AC-1, AC-2, AC-3, and AC-4, by 2011, restaurants were on nearly every block and the each specifying slight variations in what is permitted, whole city was talking about the Freret renaissance.” Creative especially in regard to potentially contentious live music entrepreneurs in the private sector deserve the credit for venues.55 Freret Street is in the AC-2 category, and given its bringing about Freret’s transformation, but they were dramatic turnabout, offers a prototype for our study area. enabled by the overlay to the zoning code brought about by Should the Tremé/7th Ward Arts and Culture Overlay District City Hall. As a result, a deteriorating artery with “a single be retooled to affect Freret-like change? Would such a restaurant” had within four years boasted “14 blocks of transformation breathe new life into the fading Creole- highly-lauded cuisine, new entertainment venues and influenced businesses and eateries along St. Bernard Avenue, businesses ranging from a dog-groomer to a craft-cocktail or would it bring in bistros and art galleries and trigger the 53 lounge.” familiar gentrification cycle already occurring on St. Claude? In fact, nearly all of the commercial arteries in our study area—St. Bernard, Gentilly, Elysian Fields, Claiborne, St. 52 Article 10 - Overlay Zoning Districts, Miscellaneous Zoning Districts, Planned Development Districts and Design Review Districts, New Orleans Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance, 54 Resolution No. R-15-72, New Orleans City Council, February 26, 2015, https://www.municode.com/library/la/new_orleans/codes/zoning?nodeId= Councilmember Ramsey. ART10OVZODIMIZODIPLDEDIDEREDI , visited July 25, 2015. 55 Article 18, Overlay Zoning Districts, Adopted Comprehensive Zoning 53 Robert Morris, Good Neighbors: Freret’s Revival Has Largely Avoided the Ordinance Effective August 12, 2015, http://www.nola.gov/city- Issues That Often Accompany Gentrification,” The Uptown Messenger, planning/adopted-comprehensive-zoning-ordinance-effective/ visited July August 12, 2013. 26, 2015. 19

Claude—are in some form of overlay district in the new 2015 San Francisco, began to legalize the live/work concept by Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance, either Arts and Culture, adapting building and zoning regulations to accommodate Historic Urban Corridor (HUC), Residential Diversity (RDO), them.”57 Enhancement Corridor (EC), Corridor Transformation (CT), or The building stock of our study area does not really lend itself a Character Preservation Corridor (CPC), and sometimes more to loft-style mixed-use. But it may allow for legally permitted than one. The result is a rather confusing inventory of barely live/work zoning in one- and two-family houses, which could distinguishable interventions that will likely have little street- foster homegrown entrepreneurship in a convenient and level impacts. But this should not remove from the table the cost-effective manner. Windshield surveys of the study area potential power of an incentivizing, well-crafted overlay already reveal an extraordinary number of houses district. Perhaps one may be designed to encourage light repurposed for commerce—day care centers, barber shops, industry and the skilled trades rather than the entertainment professional offices, even auto repair—and while it is unclear and service sector. Consider, for example, the previously if residences also still exist inside these edifices, the adaptive described Frenchmen-Elysian Fields-Agriculture area, where utilization of these buildings testifies to the creative an overlay might be established to zone-in and incentivize the entrepreneurism of the local population. Permitting live/work establishment of artisan workshops, building-trade base zoning could dramatically reduce the entry capital needed to stations, shared-spaced facilities with specialized equipment, start a small business, and could bring out of the shadows the and other forms of light industry. Other opportunities exist in uncounted but likely large number of informal “cottage” other parts of the study area, including along Gentilly businesses that operate off-the-books in people’s houses. Boulevard, for overlay districts with just enough “teeth” to effect positive transformation, but without the “bite” of Of course, regulations would have to be in place to ensure neighborhood upheaval. one person’s commercial life does not interfere with a neighbor’s residential life. Live/work zoning might be best LIVE/WORK ZONING suited to allow quiet, indoor, low-traffic types of businesses, such as personal or professional services, crafting, hobbies, Some cities in the United States have created “live/work” computer and online work. zoning to permit a building or space to be used jointly for both residency and commerce. This may seem novel today, One informant noted the recent trend of owners of large states the American Planning Association, “but it was the houses seeking zoning variances to convert their structures to 58 norm until the early decades of the twentieth century. rentable meeting halls. Such conversions may be viewed as Storekeepers, trades people, doctors, lawyers, and others an entrepreneurial adaptation toward the relatively higher commonly lived upstairs from or adjacent to their shops or demand of the commercial market (for banquets, parties, offices.”56 Indeed, the phrase “born above the store” draws public and private meetings, etc.) and away from the lower proudly from this historical intermixing of land uses, and such demand for a residency in a particular area. Alternately, they convenient arrangements saved those who practiced it may disrupt the quality of life of immediate neighbors, create substantial amounts of time and money. They also led to parking and noise conflicts, and represent intrusions into conflicts with neighbors, which in turn affected property otherwise stable residential areas. This particular case study values and caused litigation. These factors, plus auto- illustrates that one person’s local entrepreneurship may be accessibility and suburbanization, drove planners away from another person’s neighborhood nuisance, and that balance mix-use cityscapes and toward single-use (Euclidean) zoning, must be struck. which aimed to spatially disassociate residential and SHORT-TERM RENTALS, AIRBNB, AND THE commercial land use. SHARING ECONOMY The idea of strictly segregating land use began to be challenged with the rise of preservation and the rediscovery “The sharing economy is a prime example of social of the inner city, which brought with it a renewed innovation,” posited a writer in the Stanford Social Innovation appreciation for light commerce intermixed within residential Review. “At a basic level, sharing [is] economically efficient, areas. The 1970s also saw deindustrialization and the closure environmentally sustainable, and community-oriented.” 59 of old factories in inner cities; many were demolished, but others, prized by artists as ideal studios as well as cheap and convenient residences, were converted to lofts with both 57“Model Live/Work Ordinance,” Model Smart Land Development living and working space. “By the late 1980s,” writes the APA, Regulations, American Planning Association, March 2006. “a number of cities, including New York, Boston, Chicago, and 58 Interview, Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy, professor of English at Dillard University, conducted by Richard Campanella, May 18, 2015. 59 April Rinne, “The Sharing Economy, Through a Broader Lens,” Stanford Social Innovation Review, February 2015, 56“Model Live/Work Ordinance,” Model Smart Land Development http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/the_sharing_economy_through_a_bro Regulations, American Planning Association, March 2006. ader_lens , visited July 28, 2015. 20

Residences and Commerce, Residences as Commerce Photographs by Richard Campanella May 2015

“Live/work zoning could dramatically reduce the entry capital needed to start a small business.” “The sharing economy is a prime example of social innovation,” posited the Stanford Social Innovation Review. “ [It is] economically efficient, environmentally sustainable, and community-oriented.” The premier sharing sector that could offer an opportunity for home- based entrepreneurship in the study area is AirBnB—although it too could come at a community cost.”

The premier sharing sector that could offer an opportunity licensed bed-and-breakfasts at an unfair disadvantage, since for home-based entrepreneurship in the study area is they pay the taxes and must abide by the safety codes AirBnB—although it too could come at a community cost. sidestepped by most AirBnB rentals. Most AirBnB operations are technically illegal according to New Orleans’ short-term On AirBnb.com, people offer extra rooms or houses for rent rental ordinances, “but the city traditionally has been lax on a short-term basis to visitors seeking a lower-cost and about enforcing the law.”61 more interesting alternative to staying at hotels and traditional bed-and-breakfasts. A system of mutual reviews How may AirBnB and the short-term rental/sharing economy keeps everyone honest, and by flying beneath the radar of be made maximally beneficial and minimally intrusive to the taxes, licenses, and codes, listers turn extra rooms into cash study area? One answer is by legalizing them in exchange for and guests get a superior experience at a lower price. Over regulation, after which they may be nudged to spread out by 100,000 guests spent time in such arrangements in New encouraging them in certain spaces and among hosts meeting Orleans each year, and the practice has transformed, for certain requirements. For example: better or worse, certain neighborhoods. “Proponents of • Reward “stayers”—that is, homeowners who have short-term rental services, wrote Kevin Allman and Alex remained at the same address for an extended period of Woodward in a recent Gambit article, “praise how easy they time—by granting them advantages on legal short-term are to use, how they give travelers a chance to see how rentals, either with easier licensing, a lower tax rate, or [locals] really live, and their competitive cost[;] detractors say higher floor above which hosts must pay city taxes. services like Airbnb…take up apartments that otherwise • Create an overlay district or other incentivized zoning to would be rented by locals, turn traditionally residential encourage short-term rentals in areas that have little neighborhoods into tourist zones, and leave hotel and motel such activity. Alternately, create similar zones to restrain rooms empty (and not paying occupancy taxes).”60 such activity in areas that have an excess, with the goal An analysis of the spatial distribution of recent AirBnB listings of spreading them out and nudging demand into new shows a rather predictable pattern: the vast majority are supply spaces. In a similar way as New Orleans’ Place- offered within or near the historical districts closer to the Based Planning Districts “focus resources in targeted Mississippi River, clustered in the French Quarter and the places [to create] a compounding effect,” and its Direct trendy downtown “renaissance” neighborhoods of the Homebuyer Assistance Program “provides down Faubourg Marigny and Bywater. These areas are, generally payment and closing costs subsidies,” Place-Based speaking, older, more famous, economically more vibrant, Planning Districts may also be used to encourage or wealthier and racially more white, higher in elevation, and discourage short-term rentals toward create an optimal host to the overwhelming majority of the city’s nearly ten spatial distribution and set of entrepreneurial million annual visitors. Those few listings on the fringes of this opportunities.62 geographical pattern tended to get lower scores from guests • Provide incentives or training to encourage MBEs and on the appeal of their hosts’ locations. DBEs to get into the business, using their own Within our study area, we see the same pattern at a households. microscale: blocks closest to gentrifying St. Claude Avenue UNBUNDLED PROCUREMENT FOR had the most AirBnB offerings and the highest ratings, while all other areas, covering three times the acreage, had but NEIGHBORHOOD DBES one-tenth the number of listings. For disadvantaged enterprises, government procurement At its best, AirBnb and other shared short-term rentals turns contracts can offer a key source of steady business. The City homeowners and renters into entrepreneurs by providing (in of New Orleans officially recognizes 634 DBEs who quality for theory) a cash income stream at minimal expense, while such work in the sectors of Professional Services, bringing outside dollars into the neighborhood and its Construction, and Good and Supplies, and 21 of them are businesses. They are, in effect, a form of live/work arrangements, in which a home also becomes an income. When the listings get too intensely clustered, however, they start to rob local tenants of rentable real estate, change a neighborhood to a transient space, and put legitimately 61 Kevin Allman and Alex Woodward, “Short-Term Rental Laws in New Orleans, Gambit Weekly, March 9, 2015, http://www.bestofneworleans.com/gambit/kevin-allman-and-alex- woodward-on-short-term-rental-laws-in-new-orleans/Content?oid=2594351 60 Kevin Allman and Alex Woodward, “Short-Term Rental Laws in New visited July 28, 2015 Orleans, Gambit Weekly, March 9, 2015, 62 City of New Orleans, “Soft Second Mortgage Program” and “Place Based http://www.bestofneworleans.com/gambit/kevin-allman-and-alex- Planning,” http://www.nola.gov/softseconds/ and woodward-on-short-term-rental-laws-in-new-orleans/Content?oid=2594351 https://data.nola.gov/Archived/Place-Based-Planning/ssw4-9pg7 , visited visited July 28, 2015 July 5, 2015. 21

based within our study area.63 Most of these entrepreneurs like the Idea village, Propeller, [and] 4.0 Schools that are are small operations with limited work forces, and therein lies specifically there to provide whatever support is needed. The a problem: governments and corporations are inclined to more that you can do with that, the better.”67 The notion of “bundle” procurement requirements, because it saves them an ombudsman or maven facilitating connections between time and effort to lump together related tasks and negotiate and among elements of the study area’s entrepreneurial with a single provider for the package deal. But bundling ecosystem, including City Hall as well as state, federal, and oftentimes excludes DBEs from competing because, while corporate procurers, warrants further consideration. One they are able to deliver on some components of a Request for entity, Metro New Orleans Sourcelink, was originally Proposals (RFP), they may be too small to deliver on all of designed for this purpose, but, according to the researchers them. A company that advises government contractors offers behind the recommendation, is “underfunded and lacks the this example of bundled procurement and its impacts: focus to fulfill its original purpose.”68 Your company provides landscape maintenance services at a local army base. Nine months before RESTRAINED REGULATORY ENVIRONMENTS AND the end of your contract, you learn that ONE-STOP LICENSING contracting officers are in the planning stages for a new RFP that will seek one contractor to perform In addition to leadership and communication, the premier nearly all the base's facilities services, including building maintenance, janitorial, laundry, food and, recommendation of the National League of Cities for local yes, landscape services. Although you've been a authorities to support entrepreneurs was a sensible model contractor with a stellar performance regulatory environment. Too little regulation, of course, record, your company has no chance of winning paves the way for corruption, unfairness, and a lower quality the contract because it has no experience beyond landscape services.64 of urban life; too much regulation impedes the efficiency and profitability of small businesses while creating uncertainties DBEs interviewed in a recent study held that that this practice and barriers for new entrepreneurs. The result: larger excludes them from competing on many government companies who have mastered the maze and/or can absorb purchasing opportunities. The authors of the study the hassle end up dominating the marketplace. 69 The recommend that procurement be unbundled by contracting representative of a company urged that City Hall “improve officers and set forth in RFPs in an itemized fashion, with the responsiveness and flexibility of its permitting;” for example, office acting as a primary contractor of sorts.65 “to get certain permits for operating in restricted ENTREPRENEURIAL OMBUDSMAN neighborhoods, only some city employees can handle their requests, and if that person is unavailable, we’re not able to Relatedly, the authors call for the establishment of an get a permit.”70 entrepreneurial ombudsman, which they liken to the role of To its credit, City Hall has implemented a One Stop App to the “maven” in Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point and streamline licensing and permits through a single online node define as “an individual designated to resolve issues and (http://www.nola.gov/onestop/). The app allows manage connections between [enterprises] and larger entrepreneurs to obtain occupational licenses, Certificates of entities…. This ombudsman would both strengthen the Necessity and Public Convenience, and specialized permits for connection between MBEs and the various elements of the electrical and mechanical contractors as well as taxi drivers ecosystem[,] sharing information and facilitating meaningful and tour guides. Compared to years prior, New Orleans has interactions between otherwise disconnected business succeeded in simplifying these processes, although 66 folks.” One informant corroborated the need for a strategic imperfections certainly remain. Among DBEs in greater New support person as well as a network of advocates. “A well- Orleans (not just in Orleans Parish), respondents to a survey rounded mentor [would help],” said the director of a social ranked regulatory bureaucracy items among the more serious entrepreneurship nonprofit. “I think having support systems obstacles they encountered, namely business licenses,

63 Office of Supplier Diversity, City of New Orleans, 67 Interview, Nora Ellertsen, founder of The Funding Seed, by Summer http://www.nola.gov/economic-development/supplier-diversity/ , visited Suleiman, July 31, 2015. July 8, 2015. 68 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, 64 “Contract Bundling,” FedMarket, “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New https://www.fedmarket.com/contractors/Contract-Bundling- , visited July Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. 24, 2015 69 J. Katie McConnell, Christiana McFarland, and Brett Common, “Supporting 65 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, Entrepreneurs and Small Business “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New A Tool Kit for Local Leaders,” National League of Cities/Center for Research Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. and Innovation, 2011 66 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, http://www.nlc.org/File%20Library/Find%20City%20Solutions/Research%20I “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New nnovation/Economic%20Development/RI_SmallBizToolkit-2012-Web.pdf Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. 70 Interview by Louis David via email, July 2, 2015. 22

permits, and the calculation and payment of taxes. 71 Louisiana is the best spot for that,” Morris told New York Softening these barriers would aid the formation of new Times affiliates in 2014. “So if you spend $100 million on small businesses and bring existing ad-hoc enterprises out of your movie, just for shooting in Louisiana and follow all the the shadows and into the formal economy. rules, then you can get $30 million back.”72 Given Dillard’s position in the study area, its mostly local and regional

student body, and the entrepreneurial potential of film and CONCLUSIONS digital media, opportunities exist for Forward Cities to collaborate with Dillard and Prof. Morris toward film-based This Forward Cities report, commenced in late 2014, sought business development in or near the study area. to understand and improve the entrepreneurial ecosystem of (3) “Food, Food, Food” There was universal support for a neighborhood specifically selected for its position at the promoting food-based enterprises in all the forms described heart of New Orleans society—but at the margins of the city’s in this report, particularly since many of these operations post-Katrina “renaissance.” Through research and data currently exist in the informal economy and can benefit by analysis conducted throughout 2015, council members have becoming legitimate and growing. In this regard, we look found substantial assets as well as gaps in the area’s potential forward to collaborating with nonprofits such as Broad for “gentrification-proof” local business development, and Community Connections as well as Fund17 toward creating have documented ten potential interventions toward that food-related opportunities in a neighborhood that is—or end. We conclude with three specific recommended should be—famous for its culinary heritage. interventions selected by council members after a field trip, This selection does not indicate that the other potential two follow-up meetings, and ongoing discussions with interventions do not deserve attention or action, but rather neighborhood representatives in the autumn of 2015. They that the Council has recommended starting and focusing with include: these three. We look forward to moving into an action and (1) Formalizing the Informal Economy (a.k.a. “Legitimizing implementation phase in the coming years. the New Orleans Hustle”) A common theme running through this report is the presence of de facto entrepreneurism flying under the radar of economic statistics because it is unpermitted. A number of the potential interventions cataloged herein can be addressed by focusing on attempts to bring informal businesses out of the shadows and into legitimacy by the easing of permitting processes, simplifying paperwork, tax advice, the greenlighting of residency usage as workplace, and the streamlining of bureaucracy for microbusinesses. Nonprofits headquartered in or near the study area, such as Fund17 (www.fund17.org, whose “theory of change” reads “we believe that by equipping entrepreneurs with an arsenal of skills and resources, we can build capacity within the informal economy [and] help transition entrepreneurs’ hard work into sustainable livelihoods”) could be marshalled and empowered to take Forward Cities’ 2015 research into action in 2016 and 2017. (2) Empowering the Dillard University Film Program Forward Cities’ research brought to our attention an academic asset that has garnered little attention citywide: Dillard University’s Film Studies Program. Run by Prof. Keith Alan Morris, this program equips students with technical skills in the making of films as well as the educational background of film studies, at a time when Louisiana’s film industry is burgeoning due to generous tax credits. “The production goes where they can get the most bang for their buck and

72 “Louisiana Takes Top Spot as Movie-Making Capital,” The New York Times 71 Richard L. McCline, M. von Nkosi, Adrine Harrell-Carter, and Emily Boness, Student Journalism Institute, May 28, 2014, http://nola14.nytimes- “Expanding Opportunity for Minority-Owned Businesses in Metro New institute.com/2014/05/28/louisiana-takes-top-spot-as-movie-making- Orleans,” The New Orleans Index at Ten, July 2015. capital/ 23

APPENDIX: ORGANIZATIONAL INVENTORY

Accion Primary organization contact person: Jarrett Woods Organization website: https://worknola.com/employer/accion-texas-louisiana Organization address: 3330 N. Causeway Blvd – Suite 446 Metairie, LA 70002 Organization phone number and email: [O] 504-270-9081 [email protected] or [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “ACCION Texas-Louisiana is a non-profit micro enterprise development program based in San Antonio with operations in Texas and Louisiana (Alexandria, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Shreveport). ACCION is dedicated to increasing incomes and creating jobs in low-income communities by providing micro entrepreneurs with access to credit and business support services not available from the commercial banking sector. We offer a “hand-up” to those striving to support themselves and their families through small business initiatives. Through our loans and services, we help micro entrepreneurs strengthen their businesses, stabilize and increase their incomes, create additional employment and contribute to the economic revitalization of their communities.”

Broad Community Connections Primary organization contact person: Jeffrey Schwartz Organization website: http://broadcommunityconnections.org/ Organization address: 300 N Broad Street, Suite 208, New Orleans, LA 70119 Organization phone number and email: 504.722.3628 What services does the organization provide? “Broad Community Connections is a non-profit, community development organization devoted to revitalizing the Broad Street corridor by promoting the economic, residential, and cultural development of its diverse surrounding neighborhoods.” Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? If so, specify. In and near Broad Street, intersecting partially with our study area.

Dillard University Film Program Primary organization contact person: Prof. Keith Morris Organization website: http://www.dillard.edu/ Organization address: Dillard University, 2601 Gentilly Boulevard, New Orleans, Louisiana 70122 Organization phone number and email: (504) 816-4548, [email protected] What services does the organization provide? University-based film program for both technical and theoretic education in the film arts and trades. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Yes; Dillard students and affiliates

Fund17 Primary organization contact person: Haley Burns Organization website: http://www.fund17.org/ Organization address: 1000 North Broad Street New Orleans, LA 70119 Organization phone number and email: 504.656.4177 Haley Burns What services does the organization provide? “Our business services are paired with personal finance advice to help our entrepreneurs plan and save for the future.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? Fund17 targets informal businesses and guides them to become formal enterprises. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? If so, specify. Fund17 works in all 17 wards of New Orleans (hence the name) but is based on Broad Street, near our study area.

Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program Primary organization contact person: unclear Organization website: http://www.goldmansachs.com/citizenship/10000-small-businesses/US/ Organization address: Delgado Community College. Organization phone number and email: unclear

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What services does the organization provide? “Small business owners who participate in the 10,000 Small Businesses program gain valuable skills and experiences which help them to grow their revenue and create jobs at a higher rate than the national average, even 18 months after graduating.” In New Orleans it is headquartered in Delgado Community College.

Good Work Network Primary organization contact person: Phyllis Cassidy Organization website: http://www.goodworknetwork.org/ Organization address: 2028 OC Haley Blvd New Orleans, LA 70113 Organization phone number and email: 504.309.2073 What services does the organization provide? “Good Work Network is a 501(c)3 organization that provides business development services to minority- and women-owned businesses throughout a 15-parish region in Southeast Louisiana. We aspire to help minority- and women-owned businesses start, grow, and succeed. We envision a community where the economy is diverse and inclusive and where all dedicated and competent entrepreneurs have access to the resources they need to succeed. Good Work Network strengthens small businesses by developing members’ skills, enabling them to realize their full potential. We work to increase market connections so small business owners may become active participants in the local economy. Read more about programs we offer or contact our staff, who are dedicated to improving economic inclusion and who are responsive to the specific needs of each member.”

Junior Achievement of New Orleans Primary organization contact person: Gail Smith Organization website: www.juniorachievement.org Organization address: 5100 Orleans Ave. New Orleans, LA 70124 Organization phone number and email: 504.569.8650 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “Junior Achievement has been promoting business education since 1919, first through an after-school secondary program, and later through in-school partnerships with educators. Students who participate demonstrate a significant understanding of economics and business concepts, particularly those who participate in programs at consecutive grade levels, according to independent evaluators.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? “Junior Achievement starts in the classroom. Our unique delivery system provides the training, materials, and support necessary to bolster the chances for student success. At your invitation, we help arrange for business people and local community leaders to visit your classroom a few times or throughout the semester. They volunteer to share their workforce experience with your students, all while teaching sound economic principles and reinforcing your class curricula.”

Louisiana Small Business Development Center Primary organization contact person: Carmen Sunda Organization website: https://www.lsbdc.org/ Organization address: 330 N. Causeway Blvd. Suite 447 Metairie, LA 70002 Organization phone number and email: 504.831.3730 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “LSBDC offers many different services to help you grow your business, including Business Plans, Financing, Financial Analysis, Sales & Marketing, Management, Taxes & Accounting, Human Resources, International Trade, Risk Management, Technology Commercialization, Supplier & Economic, and Gardening.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? Initial idea. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

New Corp Business Assistance Center Primary organization contact person: Vaughn R. Fauria Organization website: http://www.newcorpinc.com/ Organization address: 2924 St Bernard Ave, New Orleans, LA 70119 Organization phone number and email: (504) 208-1700 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “NewCorp Inc. is a 501(c) (3) organization whose mission is to be an economic development catalyst by providing technical and financial assistance to small and emerging businesses to improve their basic business capabilities by way of training, counseling, planning and financial products and services.”

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At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? All. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Entire city.

New Orleans BioInnovation Center Primary organization contact person: Kris Kahlil Organization website: www.neworleansbio.com Organization address: 1441 Canal St. New Orleans, LA 70112 Organization phone number and email: 504.680.2973 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “NOBC is a nonprofit business incubator dedicated to fostering entrepreneurship and supporting Louisiana innovators as they develop life-saving new technologies. Tenants and clients supported by our program teams include startups developing innovative new medical devices, therapeutics, diagnostics, digital health platforms, clean technologies, and more. All promising to improve global health, these technologies range from cancer and diabetes treatments to urban farming and water remediation solutions.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? Specialized biomedicine efforts already with business plans and initial resources. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

New Orleans Business Resource & Entrepreneurship Center Primary organization contact person: Organization website: http://www.neworleansec.com/ Organization address: Business & Entrepreneurship Center of GNO, 2115 Carondelet Street Second Floor New Orelans, LA 70130Organization phone number and email: 504-620-9647 What services does the organization provide? “The Business Resource & Entrepreneurship Center (BREC) partners with private, public and nonprofit resources to build strong, sustainable and successful businesses in New Orleans and surrounding parishes. Small businesses create wealth, develop new and higher paying jobs and contribute to Louisiana's economic health. The BREC offers free or low-cost assistance and business training under one roof. An assistance center for the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses, Capital One Bank Small Business and Louisiana Economic Development. BREC also helps businesses qualify and participate in the state's Small & Emerging Business Development (SEBD) program. Technical Assistance often refers to what most people consider standard business assistance. At the Business Resource & Entrepreneurship Center there is a variety mentoring and assistance available through one-on-one consulting, group classes and referrals to tailored programs. Programs for established owners may be focused in improving or expanding their business.”

New Orleans Master Crafts Guild Primary organization contact person: John Hankins Organization website: http://neworleanscraftsmen.org/ Organization address: New Orleans Master Crafts Guild PO Box 50601 New Orleans, LA 70150 Organization phone number and email: Jonn Hankins [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “Established in 2012, the Guild was set up to address the growing need for a class of skilled laborers to maintain New Orleans’ historic building stock. Building on local craftsmen traditions, including apprenticeship training and ground-level networks, the Guild seeks to revive the building trades for a new generation of builders.”

New Orleans (City of) Office of Supplier Diversity Organization website: http://www.nola.gov/economic-development/supplier-diversity/ Organization address: Office of Supplier Diversity, 1340 Poydras Street, Suite 1000, New Orleans, LA 70112 Organization phone number and email: (504) 658-4200 What services does the organization provide? “The Office of Supplier Diversity is the City's department that oversees certification, compliance, training, outreach and capacity building for local, small and disadvantaged businesses in the City of New Orleans. The office was created to help mitigate the effects of past and present social and economic discrimination by increasing the utilization of certified disadvantaged business enterprises in the procurement of goods and services by the City of New Orleans.”

New Orleans Startup Fund

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Primary organization contact person: Organization website: neworleansstartupfund.org/ Organization address: 1100 Poydras Street, Suite 3475, New Orleans, LA 70163 Organization phone number and email: 504-527-6900 What services does the organization provide? “Are you an entrepreneur with a promising idea but are struggling to raise necessary funding? The New Orleans Startup Fund provides capital to early-stage ventures located in the Greater New Orleans area. We are seeking to invest in high-growth companies with viable business plans that project growth of at least $20 million in five years. Investment sizes range between $25,000 and $100,000. In addition to providing seed capital, The Startup Fund offers expert technical assistance to its portfolio companies and will connect you to our network of angel investors and venture capitalists for follow-on investment.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? “The Fund exists to accelerate the growth of early-stage, pre-revenue companies looking for proof-of-concept capital.” Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? “The New Orleans Startup Fund is a nonprofit venture fund focused on business creation and innovation in the 10-parish Greater New Orleans region.

Operation Hope Primary organization contact person: Bill Norris Organization website: http://www.operationhope.org/neworleansla#sthash.EG8IeX6W.dpuf Organization address: 1215 Prytania Street, Suite 103, New Orleans, Louisiana 70130 Organization phone number and email: 504-309-6153 x4. [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “The New Orleans HOPE Financial Dignity Center provides on-the- ground, in-person support to people looking to take back their lives by getting their financial house in order. We are there every step of the way as renters become homeowners, small business dreamers become small business owners and the hope-less become the hopeful. Here at the HOPE Center, you will receive one-on-one counseling to remove whatever challenges you face in your goal to get your credit back on track, buy a home, stave off a foreclosure, grow your small business and more.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? Initial idea. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

PowerMoves.NOLA Primary organization contact person: Leslie Jacobs Organization website: www.powermovesnola.org/ Organization address: Organization phone number and email: 504-408-1038 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “PowerMoves.NOLA is a national initiative to deploy innovative ideas, fresh approaches, and an overall commitment to equity and diversity as a growth strategy to address the generational obstacles that prevent minority entrepreneurship. Leveraging the thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem, resources, and culture of New Orleans, PowerMoves.NOLA’s mission is to increase the number of venture-backed minority-founded companies locally and nationally. Through its fellowship program, pitch competitions, and boot camp, PowerMoves.NOLA acts as a catalyst, providing early-stage and high-growth minority entrepreneurs with access to capital, advisors, and the support they need to succeed.”

Propeller Primary organization contact person: Julia Stewart Organization website: http://gopropeller.org Organization address: 4035 Washington Ave. New Orleans, LA 70125 Organization phone number and email: 504.345.9946 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “Propeller is a 501c3 nonprofit dedicated to supporting social innovation in New Orleans… by incubating ventures that have the potential to solve our city’s most pressing issues. Our vision is to build a critical mass of entrepreneurs tackling key challenges in our issue areas of food security, water management, healthcare, and educational equity in order to make significant change for underserved individuals.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? “At the heart of Propeller’s mission and impact lies our Impact Accelerator, designed to support social entrepreneurs throughout the business lifecycle—from idea, to beta, to growth. Since June 2011, Propeller has accelerated 90 new ventures, including a

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health-focused School Food Authority, Louisiana’s first regional food hub, a wetland mitigation bank, and a maternal health collective.” Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

St. Claude Main Street Primary organization contact person: Gee Lauder Organization website: http://stclaude.org/ Organization address: St. Claude Main Street, 3700 St. Claude Avenue, New Orleans, LA 70117 Organization phone number and email: What services does the organization provide? “St. Claude Main Street promotes and supports an economically thriving and culturally rich crossroads of historic communities in New Orleans including the neighborhoods of St. Roch, Bunny Friend, St. Claude, Bywater, and the Faubourg Marigny. We work within the larger St. Claude Cultural District, with specific focus on the development of St. Claude Avenue from Elysian Fields to Poland Ave.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? All, though not specifically focused on entrepreneurship. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? See above.

St. Roch Community Development Corporation Primary organization contact person: Ben Mcleish Organization website: http://strochcdc.org/ Organization address: 2025 St. Claude Ave, New Orleans, LA 70116 Organization phone number and email: 504-564-7739 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “Our mission is to serve as a catalyst to help lift people out of material and asset poverty and wholistically restore our community. St. Roch CDC is a 501(c)3 Christian organization which partners with local churches and other like-minded organizations to empower individuals and revitalize the St. Roch neighborhood and similar under-resourced New Orleans communities…. We seek to equip people with training and resources to improve their lives & community and connect people with a broader network of people who will help champion their efforts so that dignity, families and our community is restored.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? “We do this by: equipping individuals & families for success with their personal finances; providing soft skill jobs training to help people obtain gainful employment; empowering entrepreneurs to launch or grow small business enterprises; connecting people to allies who will champion their efforts; developing affordable housing; building family, community and cultural assets; advocating for justice and equity.” Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Greater St. Roch, including parts of our study area.

The Idea Village Primary organization contact person: Jon Lindquist Organization website: www.ideavillage.org Organization address: 515 Girod St. New Orleans, LA 70130 Organization phone number and email: 504.304.3284 [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “The Idea Village is an independent 501c3 nonprofit organization with a mission to identify, support, and retain entrepreneurial talent in New Orleans.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? All, but particularly those en route with specific ideas. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

52 Businesses Primary organization contact person: Jason Seidman Organization website: www.52businesses.com Organization address: s 70119, 324 S Pierce St, New Orleans, LA 70119 Organization phone number and email: [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “52businesses helps would-be entrepreneurs start a new business (for or non-profit)…. It’s similar to an accelerator/bootcamp, which immerses that week’s entrepreneur in all things business,

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using a unique curriculum…. Utilizing our network and support system, we’re able to provide a week’s worth of mentors, meetings, deliverables, and “homework” with everyone from accountants and lawyers to marketers and investors. Using this pro-bono network allows our team to operate with almost no overhead….” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? From the initial idea. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

4.0 Primary organization contact person: Raphael Gang Organization website: 4pt0.org Organization address: 643 Magazine St. Suite 206 New Orleans, LA 70130 Organization phone number and email: [email protected] What services does the organization provide? “Driving innovation in American education – a place that’s resisted change for decades – takes a diverse set of people who take the work seriously without taking themselves too seriously. We’ve built charter schools. We’ve run EdTech companies. We’ve built houses and organized communities. We do as much as we can with as small of a team as possible.” At what stage(s) of business development does the organization help entrepreneurs? Specialized education start-ups. Does the organization serve a defined geography, population, and/or industry? Citywide.

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