In 2011, I visited New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward to report on a much-ballyhooed effort to build affordable, resource-efficient, hurricane-resilient new homes for families displaced by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
The rebuilding project was the inauguration of Make It Right (MIR), a charitable foundation launched by actor and part-time New Orleans resident Brad Pitt, born of his frustration with local authorities that were slow to rebuild a predominantly Black, low-income section of the city.
MIR recruited a team of all-star (if not necessarily housing) architects, headed by Cradle to Cradle guru William McDonough, to envision 150 homes priced below cost, offered first to displaced Lower Ninth residents to encourage their return, and designed—if ultimately in odd, modern shapes and bright colors—to weather future high-water events ... including (no lie) a “floating” home.
I asked, rhetorically, if MIR was 'a real-world application or a promotional aberration.' Turns out it was the latter.
In my article, I asked, rhetorically, if MIR was “a real-world application or a promotional aberration,” and then portrayed it as a model for future public-private housing development partnerships.
Turns out it was the latter. By 2016, the leadership that spearheaded MIR’s work in the Lower Ninth (and elsewhere since) was gone, and claims of catastrophic failures from ill-conceived designs and poor construction among the 109 completed homes there were being levied, some leading to lawsuits against the nonprofit, more often leaving residents to fend for themselves ... again. (This past August, MIR was ordered to pay $20.5 million, about $25,000 per resident, to help cover the cost of repairs to its homes.)
