NEW ORLEANS -- Euritici Durane is a New Orleanian, a grandmother, and a resident afraid to walk through her own St. Roch neighborhood.
"We don't feel this area is safe enough to do that anymore," said Durane.
On Thursday evening, however, she had serious backing on her walk through the neighborhood. Uniformed New Orleans Police officers lined the path, the mayor and police chief lead the way; but on any other day, it is the residents manning the front lines -- often in the shadows of blight and the crime it lures in.
"No one seems to care about what happens because I’ve made several calls about houses that are blighted and grass no one is attending to," said Durane.
In 2008, the city of New Orleans scored $2.3 million from a federal grant program designed to aid cities and states rehab blighted property and buy up foreclosed buildings in hopes of renovating them and getting them back into commerce. But the Neighborhood Stabilization Program requires cities and states to use the money by September. According to the federal department of Housing and Urban Development, New Orleans hasn't dedicated a dime and is in danger of being forced to give it all back.
"$2.3 million dollars, that's significant to neighborhood stabilization," said Jackie Clarkson, New Orleans City Council vice president. "Who needs it more right now than New Orleans? So I’m very upset right now that it hasn't been obligated."
The state of Louisiana scored $34.2 million from the program, but has only obligated less than half. According to a spokeswoman for the state, the Louisiana Housing Finance Authority is in the process of trying to obligate the remaining millions before the deadline passes.
Baton Rouge was the other entity in Louisiana to be awarded funding through the program's first round, earning $2.3 million. The city has so far dedicated $445,013. Again, New Orleans was given $2.3 million, but has so far obligated nothing.
"If you could concentrate the resources and in one or two neighborhoods and do 10 or 20 houses in a three or four block area, you could do a lot," said Ron Christner, associate professor of finance and Real Estate at Loyola University.
Housing advocate James Perry says the lack of spending is a sign of bigger troubles.
"It demonstrates a systemic problem that we've had in city government actually spanning several mayors," said Perry.
The money sat unused in New Orleans for nearly a year and a half under former Mayor Ray Nagin.
"They haven't gotten it off the ground," said Cedric Grant, New Orleans deputy mayor.
Grant says the Landrieu administration is taking steps to use all the money before the deadline by getting permission from HUD to use the millions to build new transitional housing in the city, by giving it to non-profits like the Salvation Army or UNITY.
"We'll be able to provide them more funding to take this increased homeless population off the streets."
Which for now, doesn't seem to solve Durane's neighborhood blight problem, but hopes that won't stop her or the city from moving forward.
