New Orleans 3

©11 The Media Desk

"I love working here, I just can't afford to live here."

New Orleans- some local perspective.

NOLA history as the Desk understands it:
New Orleans was founded by a Frenchman from Canada in 1718. But the French realized that building a city below sea level between the river and the lake wasn't a good idea, so they gave it to the Spanish. The Spaniards took a good long look around and after a fire or two, decided that the place was just a disaster waiting to happen, so they had the sense to give it back to the French, who still didn't want it, so they pawned it off on the Americans who were just dumb enough to buy it and move a professional sports team in.

Subsequently, endless political corruption and infighting, a near miss by a major hurricane, and a man-made disaster or two have attempted to cripple the city. But so far, in spite of the best efforts by the national media and various political activists, the locals, some of whose families have been here since the beginning, refuse to give up and the heart of the city is as vibrant as ever.

      Jackie the fortune teller certainly does. (see the photo pages)
      The wheelchair bound lady is still upset with a lie that was told to those that had evacuated before the storm to get them to come back and help the City recover.
      "They said 'come back, there's jobs, we'll help pay your rent, come back.' Those where the biggest lies I've ever heard."
      She said that she had evacuated to Northern Alabama when the public was warned to get out ahead of the storm. Up there she had 'church ladies' looking after her and bringing her dinners. But the mayor and others got on TV and begged for the citizens to come back again. She did.
      "Three gay guys that came in to be waiters got their rent paid for. But they said that since I'm self employed I don't have a real job, so I was on my own."
      But since then things have begun to look up, about a month before the Desk met her she said that actor Richard Gere had come by and had her do a reading for his agent at her prime location on Royal behind the Court House.

      As was mentioned in another article in this series, the guys at Jack's Metal Arts of Decatur Street are looking to sell their building and move elsewhere in the city. The limitations of being in the Vieux Carre district where the restrictions on expansion and remodeling of existing buildings, no parking to speak of, mind numbing traffic congestion and other problems are forcing them out. They want to continue to make their high quality decorative gas and electric lanterns, but the atmosphere in the Quarter isn't as conducive to small businesses that don't cater to tourists as it should be.

      That is simply a reality of life in the Old City of New Orleans, over half of the original settlement, from Saint Phillip Street upriver to Canal Street and from Dauphine to the River, and perhaps just downriver along the French Market and upstream to the Riverwalk, the Convention Center and the casino, is a solid Tourist Zone. Period. It is about visitors sweating out the days in ugly shirts and floppy hats and then staggering down Bourbon Street all night.
      While the locals may not be absolutely enthralled with every holidaymaker from places like Toledo and Kansas City, they know that they come to town with money to spend and if they have a good time, or at least seem to, whether they remember most of it or not, they'll go home and tell their family and friends about it, and then there will be more tourists from Buffalo and Des Moines with fresh cash to spend, and the cycle will continue.

      It is that endless stream of merry makers that keep "one percenters" like the Devil on Bourbon Street going (see photo page). He spends the evenings doing magic tricks and posing for pictures for whatever the people will give him for his efforts. And what the Desk saw of his act, he's not bad.
      While most people may not recognize the double, or even triple, significance of his statement, the Desk did. Most people associate being a "1%"-er with the various outlaw motorcycle clubs whose names we need not mention here. When being a 'biker' became popular during the 1950's it was said that ninety-nine percent of motorcyclists were honest law abiding citizens and the rest were, well, otherwise. While the Devil on Bourbon Street may not be a hardcore color-wearing biker, his magic act on the street may border on being entirely legal given the massive body of regulations on what can and cannot be done in the Quarter. But the Desk didn't think that was it.
      The Desk believes it is far more likely that 'the Devil' was referring to the way some in the movie industry got shafted 'back in the day' by writing into their contracts that besides their base salary, if the movie made any money over and above production costs, then they got... one percent. Well, having that written into your contract may have seemed like a good idea, but if you start looking at the numbers from the time, some of the biggest Hollywood blockbusters of all time, you guessed it, the picture never made a dime. Fancy accounting tricks and legal stunts that are just as spectacular as any seen in the movie saw to that. So their one percent of the take turned out to be one percent of nothing.
      Oh, and the third take on the term "One Percenter"? It can refer to the one percent of the wealthiest Americans that own or control over a third of the wealth of the country. They were the ones that made money when the motorcyclists bought their bikes and the movies were released if nobody else ever saw any of the proceeds from those deals. And it isn't too likely that our Devil is one of those either.

      The Bouncer who gave us the title for this article works at a couple of the clubs in the Bourbon Street area. While he was busy and couldn't really take the time to discuss the ins and outs of working in the Quarter and getting some people to come into his club while keeping others out, he did mention that he used to live on the 'backside' of the Quarter before Katrina. But after the storm his rent went up and now he can't afford it, so he lives on the West Bank and commutes.
      One sign of the area 'booming' is what the average rent of an apartment in the area is. A one bedroom apartment can easily run fifteen hundred dollars a month. And that didn't include a parking spot! The listings in the papers for the area are full of condos and some time shares and things like that, but if you're working for tips or part time someplace, those aren't the kinds of places you can live in.
      One sign of the area being in trouble is how many empty buildings there are. The second floors of most of the buildings a block either side of Bourbon Street are empty. 'For Sale' and 'For Lease' signs are everywhere. Some are for business space, others are for living quarters. But on many of them, even the 'recently reduced' sticker on it have started to fade from age. Yes, some of the businesses there are doing well and going strong, but others are struggling, and a few, like Jack's Metals, are looking to get out so they can stay in business. (see links on "Tourist" article page)
      Just judging by appearances, it would seem that the building owners are making more from the various 'urban funds' by having their properties sit empty than they would be by renting it out, and the way it is, they don't have to fix the toilet when the tenant calls and complains. Otherwise, instead of proclaiming that a storefront is 'reduced' to three hundred dollars a square foot, they'd be telling you that you get a month's free rent with a signed lease or some other incentive to get people to at least call to come look at it. One empty building that the Desk looked through the windows into hadn't had anybody other than the resident ghost passing through for a long, long time. The cobwebs across the doorframe hadn't been disturbed in ages.
      A 'local's bar' called Tango's Lounge, a block or so off Rampart on Bienville, is virtually surrounded by places that are for sale or rent, again, both commercial, like a service garage that looks like it had been used until recently. But unless you had a good gig going in, or could talk your way into one of those programs that would pick up the rent until you got established, it probably isn't a viable option for a startup business.

      The hotel employee that gave us the title to the 'tourist' article thinks that overall, New Orleans is back, or at least it is heading that way. From what he sees, tourism numbers are up, the people that are coming have a little more money to spend, and the general mood of things is better than it had been. The oil spill put a damper on things as the media talked about dead birds and contaminated beaches, but, New Orleans isn't a beach town, that's not what its about, people don't come there to go surfing, but the news coverage hurt the city anyway.
      That seemed to be a recurring theme. Most of the news coverage that you see about the town is negative, and it all seems to be yet another body blow to a town that hasn't had any good news since the Union ships sailed up the river to seize the city during the War Between the States (that's the Civil War to you Yankees). You can still get a chamber pot with the image of Union General Benjamin ("the Beast") Butler at the bottom, so highly was that Northern import regarded at the time.
      Well, there was that thing about the Saints and that football game, but there are people, at least a couple of them anyway, in town that aren't rabid sports fans. But there are other things going on in town such as concerts and conventions and festivals that pack people in from miles around, and do so in parts of town other than the French Quarter.

      That's just it isn't it?
      There is a lot more to Greater Orleans Parish than just the old Vieux Carre that Monsieur Le Moyne laid out as his new capital of the French Colony back in the Seventeen Teens.
      But like it or not, the French Quarter is the Soul of New Orleans, if not its beating heart, and as goes the quarter so goes the town. Or at least a good piece of it. Tourism is one of the major industries for the entire area, and the Quarter is a sizeable chunk of that. If something else happens to interrupt that traffic, namely that the people that support the tourists industry, such as the bouncer and the dancing girls he looks after, and the hotel workers, and even the fortune tellers and street magicians like our Devil, if they can't afford to work there any more, whether due to regulations, the cost of commuting or whatever, then the tourists will think twice about going. They will probably never totally stop, as some people still go to Centralia, Pennsylvania to see- nothing.

[Note to explain obscure reference:
      In 1962 a small fire in a trash pit just outside of town spread to an exposed coal seam and began one of the largest and longest lasting underground mine fires in US history. Since then the town of Centralia has essentially ceased to exist, as toxic smoke seeps from the ground, holes open as the surface subsides, and roads and foundations buckle from the heat from below. In 1984 the government bought out most homeowners in the area and in the nineties the state condemned what remained of the town as unsafe.
      Today, a few interested people venture down the closed highway to see what's left of a once thriving mining town.
End note]

      Like others that work in the area, they do what they do to, and for, the tourists that come to town with their silver dollars. Like in the good old song the Desk heard on the radio at its hotel that was later being played by a cover band on Bourbon Street.....

"And I don't own the clothes I'm wearing,
And the road goes on forever,
And I've got one more silver dollar,
But I'm not gonna let 'em catch me, no
Not gonna let 'em catch the Midnight Rider."

Midnight Rider, by the Allman Brothers Band, words and music by Allman and Payne, album Idlewild South, Capricorn Records, 1970

      In short, "New Orleans isn't only back, in some ways, it never left....
            ......Ya'll Come now ya hear?"

-30-

To Picture Page 1

To Article Page 2 Warning: Adult Theme!

To Article Page 1

The New Orleans "Warnings and Disclaimers" Special Edition

And a page of photos best called Other Stuff

[NOTE: What started out as a simple vacation turned into a week long look at the heart of the City of New Orleans by the Desk. This article and accompanying photo display pages are the results of that effort. All observations are by the Desk, all conclusions are his own, and may not represent anything in the real world from, by, or of anybody else.
    All photos were taken by either the Desk, or Mrs. Desk, who owns and controls the copyright of said images. All names and identifying marks, including the city, various buildings and businesses, and everybody and everything else are owned by their respective owners and are used here as part of this journalistic effort. If any said entity objects to their inclusion, said words and image will be removed. They may contact the Desk at: DrLeftover{!a~t!}TheMediaDesk{!d0t!}com (email scrambled due to spammer robots).
   The online presentation of this article and related photos is owned by TheMediaDesk.com, please see the following for further information: http://www.themediadesk.com/files/copy.htm
    -thank you ]