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This information is pre-Katrina.
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Fischer Development Neighborhood Snapshot

Census 2000 Data Tables: People & Household CharacteristicsHousing & Housing Costs, Income & Poverty, Transportation, Employment, Educational Attainment, Immigration & Language, Disabilities, Neighborhood Characteristics

In recent years, many housing developments in New Orleans have undergone massive renovations and redevelopment. The numbers from the 2000 Census for this neighborhood are no longer accurate. Please check with the Housing Authority of New Orleans and the Fischer Resident Council for the most current status.

According to HANO documents and a June 2004 personal interview with Resident Council Vice-President, Ketosha Railer, as of that date the Fisher high rise had been demolished and the projected 100-unit senior village was 60% completed with 40 units occupied. The New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board was installing plumbing on the former Fischer high-rise site but there was no estimated completion date for the mixed income community that is to replace the high-rise.

Housing for the country's poor

In the 1930s, President Roosevelt made a commitment to provide adequate public housing for the urban poor. The passage of the U.S. Housing Act of 1937, also known as the Wagner Bill, instituted the U.S. Housing Authority within the Department of the Interior. Its mission was to provide public housing for low-income families.

A little of Fischer's history


Permission for use has been requested. Image from KID smART (kidsmart.org).

  Children from Fischer Elementary school's KidSmart program
   

The William J. Fischer Housing Development was the last conventional public housing development built in the city of New Orleans, opening in 1965 and stretching across a 48-acre tract.

It was, at the time, isolated from the rest of the West Bank community by the Mississippi River Bridge, the West Bank Expressway, Donner Canal and Southern Pacific Railroad line. The architects, Mathes-Bergman and August Perez, used the scattered site method as opposed to the traditional multitude of small courtyards. They consolidated the open spaces into several large park areas, which occupied 60% of the development's acreage. The buildings were arranged in lines to enclose the green space and were connected by breezeways. Service drives and parking areas ran the length of the site between the long buildings. Originally, there were a total of 1002 dwelling units and one elementary school, Murray Henderson. Fischer Elementary was later opened in 1967.

The complex consisted of a 13-story high-rise building for the elderly and 14 three-story low-rise buildings. In 1977, interior renovations were completed.

New times

As a result of the report of the National Commission on Severely Distressed Public Housing submitted to Congress on August 10, 1992, Congress appropriated funds to implement the "Urban Revitalization Demonstration", now known as HOPE VI.

The Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO), overseeing HOPE VI in New Orleans, is implementing a two-phase revitalization plan for the Fischer housing development. The plans include constructing a 100-unit senior village, demolishing the 13-story high-rise and redeveloping the area into a mixed income community of rental units and home-ownership units. Many of the previous residents have moved to other housing developments, scattered sites or other housing units.

Revitalization plans...

Fischer Homes, Jan/Feb 2002 (scroll down to read about Fischer)
www.hano.org/development.htm

HOPE VI PROGRAM AUTHORITY AND FUNDING HISTORY, August 2000
www.hud.gov/pih/programs/ph/hope6/history_8-8-00.pdf (requires Acrobat Reader)

Other sources of information

Neighborhood Profiles Project Document prepared by the City of New Orleans Office of Policy Planning and the City Planning Commission. Published December 1980. Study available at the Williams Research Center (non-circulating collection).

Census 2000 Data Tables: People & Household CharacteristicsHousing & Housing Costs, Income & Poverty, Transportation, Employment, Educational Attainment, Immigration & Language, Disabilities, Neighborhood Characteristics

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Last modified: October 10, 2002