Lambert criticizes calendar for "dreamscape of the future"

Although it doesn't look like Paul Lambert's complaint will go anywhere, his point that the UNOP process is going to take too long deserves serious consideration.

The City Council resurrected a much smaller, older contract to Lambert's firm, Lambert Advisory, upgrading it to a plum noncompetitive deal to offer assistance to any of the 49 flooded neighborhoods which might request support in developing their rebuilding plans.

David Voelker, an LRA member who serves on the Community Support Foundation board, admitted that the UNOP "dreamscape for the future" projects may not get started until sometime in 2007.

The Lambert complaint echoes a comment I heard from a New Orleans East resident at the Tuesday UNOP meeting. He said a firm that was working on his neighborhood's plan couldn't compete for the citywide UNOP effort, and said he'd heard rumblings that the UNOP process might fail, just like the BNOB plan before it. I now have to believe that the firm he was talking about was Lambert.

It's really disgraceful how planners and developers are slobbering all over themselves for a share of the money that rightfully should go to neighborhoods. Some of those neighborhoods have already completed their plans, and are ready to get their money to rebuild right now. Why should they have to wait for the stalled city government to catch up?

And I'm not particularly fond of the expression "dreamscape of the future."

Related:

See Editor B's comment in this earlier post.

Tags: Hurricane Katrina | New Orleans | Louisiana | We Are Not OK | Rebuild New Orleans | Unified New Orleans Plan | UNOP