By Carmen K. Sisson

NEW ORLEANS — New Orleans has had a few days to get used to its newfound gridiron hero status, but if Tuesday night’s Super Bowl parade is any indication, the city –indeed, the entire state as well as the South in general – will be celebrating the 43-year old franchise’s first NFL championship for a long time.

As the smell of barbecue filled the air and the sounds of competing boom boxes, high school bands, and car stereos rang from the buildings, thousands of people lined the streets to cheer, welcoming the Saints home to a Mardi Gras-flavored tailgate party. Gold confetti littered the air as “the boys” waved and threw beads from atop their perches on borrowed floats.

The parade culminated at the foot of Convention Center Boulevard, where Sens. Mary Landrieu and David Vitter, Gov. Bobby Jindal, and Mayor Ray Nagin toasted the team with champagne.

It was a different atmosphere than the stunned, overwhelmed amazement in Sunday night’s French Quarter following the Saints’ win over the Indianapolis Colts. Then, no one could quite believe the news, and people couldn’t stop high-fiving and greeting one another with shouts of “Who dat? We dat!”

Tuesday’s parade had the usual bacchanalian rapscallions – fun lovers like the self-appointed “Popes of the Who Dat Nation,” who showed up in foam fleur de lis mitres and purloined Hilton Hotel bathrobes. But amid all the revelry lay something deeper – a quiet, humble appreciation for the city’s beloved team.

Debby Wood said she was overcome with emotion as she and her husband Donald drove over from Metairie Tuesday afternoon for the parade. After all the partying, reality is still sinking in, and with it comes the memory of just what this win means for not only the Saints and their devoted fans, but for all of New Orleans.

“The Saints – they’re like wayward sons,” Mrs. Wood said. “They don’t do the right thing sometimes, but you keep giving them money and keep supporting them. Finally it paid off. It’s like the prodigal son finally came home.”

Tears welled in her eyes. “Everyone in this city was so sad,” she said, recalling the dark days following hurricane Katrina, which left the majority of the city underwater and claimed more than 1,800 lives. “We’re not sad anymore.”

By Carmen K. Sisson

NEW ORLEANS — Nearly 24 hours have passed since the New Orleans Saints won the Super Bowl, but the party is far from over. Everywhere you go, people are talking about “the boys” — Drew Brees and Co. In a city that’s known far too much sorrow over the past few years, finally there is a reason to smile again.

Who can blame residents for wanting to laissez les bon temps roulez a little longer? For those who missed the party Sunday night — and what a wild party it was, in the French Quarter at least — there will be another chance Tuesday beginning at 5 p.m. as the streets turn black and gold once more, this time with an official parade featuring the team, as well as the original Saints mascot and local school bands.

Attendees better plan on arriving early. Thousands of fans surged to the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport Monday afternoon to greet the team’s plane, and even more are expected to hit the parade route Tuesday. Think of it as Mardi Gras, Saints-style.

Indeed, the parade will have a decidedly Carnival flair, thanks to an unprecedented joining of 10 Mardi Gras krewes, which have donated floats for the event. Festivities will begin at the Louisiana Superdome on Poydras, then turn right onto Loyola Avenue before snaking down Howard Avenue, around Lee Circle, then up St. Charles to Canal Street. A special staging area will be set up at the foot of Convention Center Boulevard, where partygoers can shout “Who dat!” long into the night.

So is the Saints’ first Super Bowl victory just another excuse for Party Central to throw a blowout, or is there something deeper at play here? Slidell resident Ed Hardy says it’s about appreciation for a team that could have moved permanently to San Antonio following hurricane Katrina, but instead, chose to return home.

“We want to show them they have all the support in the world they need right here,” said Mr. Hardy Monday at the Waffle House in Slidell. “They don’t need to go anywhere else. People here have been hungry for anything [since Katrina]. It’s been a healing process, and it helps. Anything right now helps.”

Still, it may be a long time before the city comes down from this high. As one reveler was heard saying in the French Quarter Sunday night: “Work? There’s no work tomorrow. It’s All Saint’s Day!”

Apparently, surrounding city leaders agree. If you have business in New Orleans, Slidell, or surrounding areas, you may want to finish earlier in the day. City of Slidell offices will close at noon in order to give employees the chance to attend the parade, and Orleans Parish public schools will close at 1:30 p.m.

NEW ORLEANS — The Gulf wind blows ceaselessly across weed-entangled lots in New Orleans, scattering autumn leaves across the concrete foundations where homes and businesses once stood but Hurricane Katrina scrubbed bare.

But that desolation will end, sponsors believe, thanks to an ambitious investment initiative — the Isaiah Funds, managed by Jewish Funds for Justice and sponsored by six key collaborators from the interfaith community.

A few miles away, neon lights flare to life in the French Quarter as tourists wander down the streets, mesmerized by the Southern charm and joie de vivre that has enthralled visitors for nearly 300 years. One of the city’s most iconic symbols, the streetcar, rumbles along Saint Charles Avenue, making a lazy loop through the central business district, past Loyola and Tulane, past majestic antebellum mansions resplendent with sweeping verandas and intricate patterns of century-old wrought iron.

The vitality of that part of the city will spread, thanks in part to the $4.5 million in loans and grants the Isaiah Funds has allotted for affordable housing, small business development, and coastal community centers.

Beneath a nearby Interstate overpass, a man crawls inside a tattered, sloping tent which serves as his only refuge from the rapidly falling temperatures. He’s not alone. Twelve thousand others will enact the same ritual tonight, some homeless before Katrina, others without anywhere to go afterwards. That desperation will give way to hope, thanks to organizations like the Gulf Coast Housing Partnership, a New Orleans-based real estate development company which seeks to build 10,000 new homes and bridge the gap between black and white, wealthy and poor, old and young.

There are jobs, but there aren’t enough. There is housing, but there is not enough. Yet there is growing optimism as well. There is progress, albeit slow, and there is a brighter future on the horizon, albeit distant. And there are volunteers here — people of all faiths, people from all walks of life — bonded by a common determination to bring this battered city, along with the entire Gulf Coast, back to life.

The Problem

It’s a daunting task. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita decimated 90,000 square miles in 2005, destroying 302,000 homes and leaving $150 billion in damage. More than 1.3 billion people were displaced, and for the ones who’ve returned, recovery is a slow, painful process made more difficult by governmental red tape and limited funds.

According to the Institute for Southern Studies, only $35 billion of the $116 billion appropriated by Washington has gone towards long-term recovery. More than half that money has yet to be disbursed. Less than half of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s $11 billion in public assistance funds has been allocated to long-term recovery. More than 70 percent of that money remains in FEMA’s coffers. Without significant capital to back the region’s substantial needs, redevelopment remains stilted, dependent upon a slow trickle of funds some fear will be too little and arrive too late.

The Plan

Jeffrey Dekro, senior vice president of Philadelphia-based Jewish Funds for Justice, immediately saw the challenge when he and representatives from 14 other faith-based groups toured southwest Louisiana in March 2006. Six months after Katrina, the American Red Cross was just beginning to make its way into some of the outlying areas. Despite what he says was “a massive, beautiful, immediate cash response,” people were falling through the gaps. There was no money being set aside for capital investment and redevelopment. There was no money being set aside for the future.

He talked with his colleagues at JFSJ. He talked with Catholics, Baptists, Mennonites, and Jesuits. They’d all been a formidable presence along the Gulf Coast, providing cash as well as hands-on aid, but everyone agreed: Religious institutions had a unique advantage over commercial entities when it came to long-term recovery investments. They had time to wait for their investments to mature, and they sought a far greater return — social change.

An innovative plan emerged, one that’s believed to be the first of its kind. Six partners pooled their resources: Jewish Funds for Justice, a national public foundation specializing in faith-based community investing; CHRISTUS Health, a non-profit, faith-based health system; Jesuits of the New Orleans Province, a Jesuit Order serving the South; Highland Good Steward Management, an investment advisor for non-profit institutions; and MMA Community Development Investments, a community investment program by Mennonite Mutual Aid, with strong roots in the Anabaptist faith.

Together, these men and women with different beliefs but a shared goal are working to fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah 58:12: “You will restore the age-old foundations and be called repairer of the breach, restorer of the streets in which to dwell.”

The funding, which JFSJ manages and distributes via local financial institutions, is two-pronged: A Redevelopment Loan Fund to support neighborhood-based redevelopment through loans to non-profit organizations and community development financial institutions, and an Access to Capital Grants Fund, which supplements those loans to help faith-based organizations leverage investments and provides equity to stabilize the loan fund’s borrowers.

Isaiah Funds has raised $4.5 million in loans and grants so far and hopes to have $10 million invested or placed by the end of next year.

The Projects

JFSJ formally launched the Isaiah Funds initiative May 15, 2008, with its first loan — $500,000 to the Gulf Coast Housing Partnership (GCHP), which works with non-profit, for-profit, and public sector organizations to generate affordable housing and rejuvenate and rebuild Katrina-ravaged communities throughout Louisiana and Mississippi. Though they have projects in Biloxi, Miss., Hammond, La., and Baton Rouge, La., their efforts are concentrated in Central City New Orleans, attempting to reestablish employment opportunities and revitalize the tax base.

GCHP project manager Sara Meadows Tolleson says the swift response compared to conventional financing and grants makes the Isaiah Funds an important resource, one GCHP will use to procure land, pay redevelopment costs, and hire architects. She says those costs are much higher than anyone anticipated, but if more groups provided similar programs to the Isaiah Funds, the Gulf could recover sooner. As of today, 42,000 people still live in FEMA trailers, and one in 25 people in New Orleans is homeless.

“If you go to the Ninth Ward, there are (few) houses,” she says, “Huge swaths of the city are now vacant, blighted properties. We’re not close to finished.”

Still, Tolleson says, people are finding renewed hope through the work of a steady stream of volunteers who continue to pour in each week. She’s particularly excited about the development which sparked JFSJ’s interest and led them to make GCHP their first loan recipient: The Muses.

Where once there was an old grocery store and now there is nothing, there will eventually stand a 4.8-acre mixed-use commercial and residential development at the intersection of Felicity and Carondelet Streets, bridging two historic corridors — wealthier St. Charles Avenue and economically depressed O.C. Haley Boulevard. On one side, the commercial conveniences of drug stores, banks, and restaurants. On the other side, cultural performances, outdoor festivals, and art exhibits. In between, affordable housing featuring all the amenities, from energy-efficient appliances and free wi-fi connections to a dog park, play area, exercise room, and business center.

Their organization, too, is working with multiple faith partners, including Jericho Road Episcopal Housing Initiative, local Progressive and Missionary Baptist churches, and others.

The Partners

The partners behind the projects are seldom seen, but their impact is integral to the success of the Isaiah Funds. MMA Community Development Investments plans to provide up to $500,000 by next year, with additional investments to be considered later.

Kenneth George, national coordinator for National Ministries of the American Baptist Church (ABC), says his office gave a $100,000 grant to JFSJ, and American Baptist Home Missions made a $300,000 contribution.

For treasurer and loan committee member Michaele Birdsall, ABC’s participation was particularly meaningful. She grew up in the lower Ninth Ward and still has family in New Orleans. She was among the initial group who toured the city with Dekro, but it wasn’t her first trip post-Katrina. She’d come to New Orleans two months after the hurricane for a grim task — bringing her father-in-law to see the remains of his home.

“It looked like a war zone,” she recalls. “When outsiders come in, they think more progress has been made than actually has, because the outlying areas haven’t received the same level of help.”

She says faith-based organizations like ABC have a unique role to play in terms of redevelopment beyond bricks and mortar, particularly in making sure people on the margins get the help and attention they need, not just as a quick fix, but as a permanent solution.

“The degree of damage, physical as well as psychological, really takes people who are going to be committed to the long-term process,” she says. “We try to take a holistic approach. The Isaiah Funds is just one piece.”

But in a perplexing puzzle where sometimes the pieces are right but the fit is wrong, or the crucial elements are missing completely, every group plays a vital role in shaping the future of the Gulf Coast. With the new possibilities of the Isaiah Funds partnership, many say they believe a brighter picture is falling into place.

NEW ORLEANS – Conversation dips and swells to the soaring lilt of the “1812 Overture,” as restaurant patrons chat amiably while waiting to be seated. French phrases swirl through clipped New York consonants and Louisiana drawls as flannel-shirted men and Chanel-suited women hunch over steaming bowls of gumbo.

This could be 1940s Paris or modern-day Manhattan. These could be paupers or princes. Time and truth have a way of getting lost here, weaving an ambiance that still enchants, even in a post-Katrina world.

Maria Impastato, who co-owns Napoleon House with her siblings, is steeped in reality. As owners of one of only 722 restaurants back up and running in New Orleans, they’re struggling to deal with a crushing loss: Only two of the 32-member staff returned after the storm. The others have become part of Katrina’s diaspora.

“They’d like to be here, and we’d like to have them back,” Ms. Impastato says. “There’s nowhere for them to live.”

The Napoleon House provides a window into where New Orleans stands 16 months after hurricane Katrina. The restaurant industry, long central to the city’s epicurean identity, is making strides in reopening its bouillabaisse of coffeehouses and cafes. But the city is far from the food capital it once was. Industry officials say barely a third of the area’s 1,880 pre-Katrina restaurants have reopened. Sales are expected to be down at least $300 million this year.

The hardship has been particularly acute in the French Quarter, due to its proximity to the water. Many restaurants suffered heavy damage and lost a disproportionate number of employees. Affordable housing near the Quarter has been slow to return. Tom Weatherly, a vice president of the Louisiana Restaurant Association, estimates that 54,000 workers were directly involved in the Greater New Orleans restaurant industry before Katrina. Only 39,000 of those people have come back.

Chains like Burger King offered a $6,000 signing bonus after the storm. Others raised wages. Still, “help wanted” signs abound in a city in which an estimated 50,000 homes were lost, and nearly half the residents have yet to return.

For well-known restaurants like Napoleon House, the problem isn’t customers as much as staffing. To cope, the restaurant has limited its menu and scaled back its hours, reducing revenue by 50 percent.

Impastato and her brother, Sal, pull double shifts Fridays through Wednesdays, arriving at 9 a.m. and often not leaving until 2 a.m. the next day. They share duties with Sal’s wife, Vivian; their sister, Janie Lala; and her husband, Leonard. Four others round out the crew.

The strain is evident. It’s lunchtime here, and Impastato is a one-woman dynamo, pushing through the dense crowd, arms laden with the same thick, crusty muffulettas her Uncle Joe made famous in 1920. She stops to tally a check, then hurries back to the kitchen to take another set of plates from Sal. Across the room, a young waiter narrowly avoids a collision with bartender Greg Cowman, who’s squatting in a walkway, taking an order. This is a well-choreographed dance, just another day in the harsh reality of the new Big Easy.

***

Erected in 1814 by Mayor Nicolas Girod, this French Quarter landmark has seduced locals and tourists for almost two centuries with a blend of romance and intrigue. According to local legend, the ornate edifice, outfitted with Carerra marble and mahogany, was intended to serve as a refuge for exiled emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, who was to be spirited away by a band of sympathizers. There’s only one problem: Napoleon died in 1821 before he could ever step foot in the three-story structure.

In 1920, a brash young Italian named Joe Impastato bought the property and began a legacy. What started out as a grocery store quickly became known as the place for good food and good times. The atmosphere was cemented when he began playing classical music and operas on his Victrola.

Impastato says her father, Peter, was determined to continue in that vein when he took over after World War II. Let Bourbon Street have its burlesque montage. There would be none of that at Napoleon House. “It wasn’t a rowdy place,” she says. “Daddy would have turntables playing and Christian pamphlets like you’d see in church. He was like a missionary.”

Deeply religious, Mr. Impastato became known for his generosity. He brought beggars in for hot bowls of jambalaya. He offered the upper chambers, once reserved for royalty, to homeless people. Everyone was equal in Peter Impastato’s world.

Still, it was a bar, and he kept his five children shielded. It wasn’t until after he died in 1971 and they took over the business that they fully understood the life of the man they called “Daddy” and his legend.

“He lived his faith, and we were very aware of that,” Impastato says. “But as young children, we were never down there. We didn’t realize what Daddy went through.”

It hasn’t been easy keeping Napoleon House running. In the dark days following the storm, amid the stench of rotten food and sounds of blowflies, Impastato says they worked night and day, holding the memories close to their hearts. There was never any doubt they would reopen. The bigger question was – and is – how long will it take for things to return to normal.

***

Sherry Lopez, a longtime customer, sees reasons for optimism. Though she misses the full menu, she says it’s a relief to see her favorite landmark open again. As a young couple, she and her husband celebrated many happy occasions here. When they parted amicably 20 years later, they sat at their favorite table in the back corner one more time and planned their divorce.

“People from all walks of life come through here,” Ms. Lopez says as a horse-drawn carriage passes outside. “People sit at the table and play chess and get into intellectual arguments.”
(Photograph) ELEGANT DECAY: Napoleon House is an ornate French Quarter landmark that, like many New Orleans restaurants, has struggled after hurricane Katrina.
CARMEN K. SISSON

For many, the appeal of Napoleon House lies in its unflappable sameness. Ric Rolston says it’s always his first stop when friends from out of town visit, partly for the food, but mostly for the atmosphere. “It’s an institution,” he says, gazing at the peeling plaster walls and eclectic mixture of Napoleon-themed paintings and busts. “There’s nothing more ‘French Quarter’ than Napoleon House. It’s elegant decay.”

Waiter Denny Moore agrees. An avid customer before Katrina, he was thrilled to join the staff – a coveted position that used to have a waiting list. Mr. Moore began as a busboy last year and was recently promoted. He admits the long hours and lack of staff can get stressful, but he feels privileged to work here. “It’s a special place, owned by very special people,” he says, sipping a frothy mug of hot chocolate in the shade of a back patio. “They’ve embraced me like family. I looked for that all my life and never seemed to find it until I came here.”

For the Impastatos, this is home. As Maria Impastato walks through the rooms where her father once walked, she’s besieged by memories. She and her siblings spent long summer afternoons chasing one another up and down the spiral staircase. On pretty days, they’d take picnic baskets piled high with sandwiches to Jackson Square for al fresco feasts and skip up the steps of St. Louis Cathedral.

Even then, there was nowhere else they’d rather be. “We’re here and we’re doing our best,” she says. “We’d like to come back to what we had before, but for now we just keep going.”