“You will see the restored statue of Louis Armstrong, toe and all,” Mayor Mitch Landrieu announced today at a ribbon cutting ceremony to reopen Armstrong Park. The damaging of the Armstrong statue in Armstrong Park was the final indignity in Ray Nagin’s hurried last act – the installation of a sculpture garden. When he officially [...]
Tag Archives: Ray Nagin
C. Ray Nagin Makes the Rounds
June 21, 2011 – 10:35 am
Yesterday, former Mayor Ray Nagin was on television promoting his book, Katrina’s Secrets, which was self-published through CreateSpace, as Jon Stewart noticed on The Daily Show. Nagin did this, he said, for fear that his voice would be “toned down.” “Once you turn a manuscript over to a publisher, you never know what happens,” he [...]
The Secret Garden
June 6, 2010 – 10:02 am
In one of his last acts as mayor, Ray Nagin dedicated the Roots of Music Cultural Sculpture Garden in Armstrong Park. He had to open it without all of its featured sculptures because some weren’t ready on his schedule, while one piece rested on a plywood platform because its pedestal wasn’t ready yet. Recently, the [...]
Le Triomphe Puts Auditorium Development on Hold
March 15, 2010 – 11:33 am
As Mayor Ray Nagin’s final term approaches its conclusion, he has talked about the city entering into personal services contracts and big ticket technology contracts, despite incoming Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s request that he not. One of those possible deals was taken off the table today when Stewart Juneau requested that the negotiations for a public service [...]
The more things change…
February 18, 2010 – 4:47 pm
“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose”…If you’re from New Orleans, you probably know what this means: “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Over the Mardi Gras weekend, the citizens of this fair city were regaled with the news that Mayor Nagin presented the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club [...]
Shameless
December 31, 2009 – 10:38 am
In early November, we covered the proposed redevelopment of the Memorial Auditorium as CECI – the Center for Entertainment and Creative Industry. Reviewing what I wrote, I feel like I missed something obvious – that the proposed multi-purpose entertainment complex was given its ambitious sprawl to accumulate a broad constituency, which would make it harder [...]
The New All-Purpose Everything
November 9, 2009 – 3:11 pm
At lunch time, Dooky Chase’s was a circus. There were drummers out front and Lenny Kravitz, Irvin Mayfield and Mayor C. Ray Nagin inside. To make the scene properly surreal, a woman was walking around with a young kangaroo. The occasion was the formal announcement of the Center for Entertainment and Creative Industry (CECI), a [...]
Color Our World
November 1, 2009 – 12:10 am
Considering the harsh political spotlight and the importance of an official’s image, one would think Mayor C. Ray Nagin’s words would have been well thought-out. But in the tradition of many politicians before him, Nagin has left behind a body of quotes that might bring laughter to many and infuriate others. Many of these can [...]
A Shoe Fetish
December 18, 2008 – 9:53 am
Last night, Keith Olbermann did a piece on shoe-throwing, the sort of piece that could only happen on a slow news day. He tried half-heartedly to turn it into a trend story but his guest wasn’t biting and I wasn’t either. Then I remembered the words I saw typed on a Blackberry beside me [...]
C. Ray: Master of the Moment
December 10, 2008 – 6:58 am
Yesterday ground was broken for the mixed income neighborhood on the site of what was once the St. Bernard Housing Project. Now it will be called “Columbia Citi Residences at Bayou District,” a name that leaves me nostalgic for the banal poetry of “River Gardens.” And does ”Citi” tell us about a bank with an investment [...]
