NYT: New Orleans Agrees to Give Notice on Home Demolitions

[DeepModem Mom]

New Orleans Agrees to Give Notice on Home Demolitions
By ADAM NOSSITER
Published: January 18, 2006


NEW ORLEANS, Jan. 17 - A federal judge approved a settlement on Tuesday in a lawsuit over the first demolitions of New Orleans homes ruined by Hurricane Katrina, after city officials agreed to give homeowners advance notice.

The settlement means that the city can begin demolishing homes, an emotional and symbolic act here, within a few weeks.

A group of advocates for improved housing in damaged neighborhoods filed suit against the city last month, demanding that homeowners be notified before any demolitions. The group dropped its suit with the city's agreement to provide that notification, and Judge Martin L. C. Feldman of Federal District Court signed an order dismissing it.

The standoff had become the first symbolic confrontation over the redevelopment push here, with officials moving to clear rubble from the most heavily damaged area, the Lower Ninth Ward, and community advocates resisting them. Homes, or remains of homes, were set to be bulldozed with no warning to the owners, the advocates said; officials countered that they simply wanted to clear piles of debris that posed safety hazards.

A neighborhood demonstration, news conferences and a court challenge over the demolitions filled the first weeks of the new year, initial salvos in what is shaping up as a contentious effort to transform this limping city. Advocates engineered a confrontation with bulldozers this month in an area where many homes are no more than rubble, insisting that residents be given a chance to pick through them for their possessions....


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/18/national/nationalspecial/18demolish.html

[barb162]

1. How do you give notice when you don't know where they are