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HBI Makes Strides Rebuilding New Orleans
On last month’s fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the recently renamed Harmony Oaks community received local and national media coverage as an example of the ongoing efforts to rebuild New Orleans.
Among the participants in the Department of Housing and Urban Development's large-scale public housing project are students from the Home Builders Institute's (HBI) Operation Reconstruct program in New Orleans. The new development is being sponsored by Urban Strategies and McCormick, Baron, Salazar, a for-profit building firm.
The homes are being built on the former site of CJ Peete, which was slated for renovation prior to Katrina and torn down after the storm.
Past CJ Peete residents are involved in the rebuilding effort and have received training in the residential construction trades from Operation Reconstruct through the industry-sponsored Pre-Apprenticeship Certificate Training (PACT) curriculum,
The first Harmony Oaks rental units are scheduled for occupancy by year’s end and the entire 460-unit development is expected to be completed next year. The community will consist of 193 public housing units; 144 tax credit units that can be rented using rental assistance vouchers; and 123 market-rate rental units. Redevelopment plans also include a state-of-the-art elementary school with recreation and health facilities.
“Rebuilding in New Orleans has been ongoing since Hurricane Katrina and we are finally seeing encouraging results in some of the most devastated residential areas,” said HBI Chairman M. M. “Mike” Weiss, CGR, CGB, GMB, CAPS. “Operation Reconstruct has been active in New Orleans since the beginning of the rebuilding process and HBI is proud to provide former residents with the skills to help rebuild their neighborhoods and return to their homes with dignity.”
Based in Jefferson Parish, HBI’s Operation Reconstruct New Orleans was initiated in partnership with Paxen Inc. and has been renewed through 2010; it is funded by the Jefferson Parish Workforce Investment Board (WIB).
HBI has also been awarded a $75,000, six-month planning grant from Baptist Community Ministries (BCM) to bring a public safety, offender re-entry program to the parish in partnership with local policymakers, stakeholders and the Greater New Orleans Home Builders Association. The program is being modeled after Operation Reconstruct programs in New Orleans and Mississippi.
For more information on Operation Reconstruct or the PACT curriculum, e-mail Dennis Torbett at HBI, or call him at 800-795-7955 x8908.
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