NEW ORLEANS — Construction crews have covered a gaping, charred hole in the second story of a historic house owned by Sen. Troy Carter, a leading candidate for Congress in a March special election.
The most visible progress in fixing the Algiers Point eyesore comes 15 months after it was ravaged by fire, but only two days after a joint WWL-TV/Times-Picayune investigation questioned years of code violations and lack of progress at the property.
Carter, a Democrat who has served on the City Council and in the state House of Representatives before his election to the Louisiana Senate in 2015, said he was a victim of faulty city code enforcement prior to the November 2019 fire and permitting delays since then.
But the city granted him a renovation permit almost three months ago, on Nov. 2, 2020, and no permits are required to cover the burned façade with Tyvek paper, to secure the house’s doors and windows or to clear high grass and debris from the adjoining lot next to the conspicuous pink house across the Mississippi River levee.
Crews started doing all those things this week after reporters and photographers from WWL-TV and the newspaper showed up to interview angry neighbors on Monday. Crews showed up to cut the grass and clean the lot on Tuesday. The news report aired Wednesday and the Tyvek paper covered the fire damage on Friday.
Carter was endorsed by former U.S. Rep. Cedric Richmond to succeed him in the 2nd Congressional District seat after Richmond left to serve as a senior adviser to President Joe Biden.
► Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the IOS App Store or Google Play.
