New Orleans Finally Starts Addressing Its Housing Affordability Crisis

If any city should have accessible, low-cost housing, it’s New Orleans. The city’s economy revolves largely around tourism. That means a bunch of jobs waiting tables, bartending, and cleaning hotel rooms—the kind of work that doesn’t bring in high enough wages to rent market-rate condos, let alone buy a house. But some, mainly developers, maintain that construction and insurance costs are too high, and subsidies too limited, to build housing that’s within those workers’ price ranges.

A new ordinance passed by the city hopes to bridge this gap. Under an amendment to the city’s comprehensive zoning ordinance signed into law on September 9, developers can now take advantage of density bonuses awarded to those who include below-market units when building multifamily dwellings (apartment/condo buildings). As NOLA.com reporter Robert McClendon explains it: