The Fight Over Public Housing In New Orleans

"The heritage of suspicion and misery separating this city's poorest residents from its comfortable classes is playing out in a fierce battle over the future of the public housing projects here, a fight in which the shelter of as many as 20,000 people is at stake.

It has raged ever since the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development announced plans last June to demolish four of the largest projects in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and no amount of assurances that the agency wants to replace the crime-haunted, aging brick structures with something better has calmed the anger of former tenants.

This month, under pressure, the department reiterated that it might allow some tenants to return while proceeding with redevelopment; a face-off in U.S. District Court in New Orleans on Friday between tenant advocates and department lawyers could be decisive."