city government

Danae Columbus: Is Frank Scurlock the “Gorilla Man” of the mayor’s race?

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Wealthy entrepreneur and world traveler Frank Scurlock, who recently submitted one of the failed bids to redevelop the Six Flags site, is a strong contender the most unconventional candidate to announce for mayor in this cycle. Some even call Scurlock “the Rodney Fertel” of 2017. Fertel was the husband of the late restaurateur Ruth Fertel who founded the Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse chain. He ran for mayor in 1969 with one campaign promise — to acquire a pair of gorillas for the Audubon Zoo. Fertel became known as the “The Gorilla Man” and was memorialized in the book The Gorilla Man and the Empress of Steakby his son philanthropist Randy Fertel.

public safety

30 people displaced after Cambronne Street fire

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Thirty people were left without a home Wednesday evening after a fire on Cambronne Street in a building that the New Orleans Fire Department said lacked a working smoke alarm, authorities said. The building at 3521 Cambronne caught fire shortly after 6:30 p.m., and took nearly an hour for firefighters to bring under control, according to a NOFD news release:

On Wednesday, April 12, 2017 at 6:37 p.m. the New Orleans Fire Department (NOFD) received a 9-1-1 call reporting a residential fire in the 3500 block of Cambronne St. Dispatched at 6:37 p.m., the first NOFD company arrived on the scene of 3521 Cambronne St. at 6:42 p.m. and found heavy smoke and fire already through the roof of an occupied two-story, wood-framed four-plex. Upon arrival firefighters immediately began a primary search of the uninvolved parts of the structure.

schools

Orleans Parish superintendent recommends giving McMain charter to InspireNOLA, closing Mahalia Jackson

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Eleanor McMain Secondary School should be converted into a charter school and governed by the growing InspireNOLA charter network, and Mahalia Jackson Elementary School should be closed in 2018, based on new recommendations by the Orleans Parish School Board. For details, see the full news release from the Orleans Parish School Board:

Orleans Parish School Board Superintendent Dr. Henderson Lewis Jr. announced today his intent to make two recommendations to the Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB) during its April board business meeting. The first will be a recommendation to close the K-6 portion of Mahalia Jackson Elementary School at the end of the 2017-2018 school year. The second recommendation would enable InspireNOLA to operate Eleanor McMain Secondary School as a Type 3 conversion. Both recommendations will be presented to the School Board on Thursday, April 20.

crime

Man killed in shooting at Freret and Peniston, police say

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A man was shot to death Wednesday evening near Freret and Peniston streets in the Milan neighborhood, New Orleans police said. The shooting had one male victim, NOPD spokeswoman Ambria Washington said shortly before 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 12. Further details were not immediately available. Anyone with information is urged to call the NOPD Sixth District station at 658-6060 to speak to a detective, or CrimeStoppers at 822-1111 to leave an anonymous tip that could be eligible for a cash reward.

colleges

Ancient Egypt lectures continue at Tulane with discussion of obelisks

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The popular series of lectures on ancient Egypt at Tulane University will continue next week with a discussion of the fate of Egyptian Obelisks, officials said. Dr. Luigi Prada of the University of Oxford will present a lecture titled “Egyptian Obelisks in the Eternal City: Cultural Appropriation of Ancient Egypt in Imperial Rome” at 6 p.m. Wednesday, April 19, in Jones Hall room 204 on the Tulane University Uptown Campus. “Today, there are more obelisks standing in Rome than there are in all of Egypt — with more to be found in other locations around Italy and what used to be the Roman Empire,” according to a description of the event. “Starting with Augustus and for centuries since, the Romans removed from Egypt tens of obelisks to display in their cities as monuments to their power. But the Roman interest in Egypt’s obelisks was not limited to their re-use as political propaganda.

business

Former Cafe Freret building under renovation as owner seeks new restaurateur

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The building that was home to Cafe Freret for 11 years until the end of 2015 is now undergoing structural renovations as its owner seeks a new restaurateur to take over the space. Cafe Freret, a university-area grill and brunch spot on the corner of Lowerline Street with a large outdoor seating area and a following among dog owners, closed in late December 2015, according to a note on its Facebook page. In January 2017, the owners of the building — Paul and Jody Ferchaud of Honolulu, Hawaii — received permits for $150,000 in structural renovations of the vacant building, to repair the foundation, the first-floor walls, and the second-story ceiling supports, according to documents filed with the city. Jody Ferchaud — whose family has owned since at least the 1980s, according to online property records — said she hopes to find another restaurant to take the place of Cafe Freret when renovations are complete. “The property is currently zoned for a specialty or full service restaurant,” Ferchaud said.

crime

Pine Street home targeted by armed intruders in second robbery a week later, police say

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A home on Pine Street where a resident was robbed at gunpoint by four intruders last week was targeted again by a group of three gunmen overnight, New Orleans police said Tuesday morning. Around 2:45 a.m. Tuesday, April 11, a 21-year-old man was sitting in his bedroom in the 900 block of Pine Street (between Burthe and Freret streets) “when he heard banging at the door and the front door immediately being kicked in,” according to the initial NOPD report. Three assailants came into his bedroom, one with a gun who was demanding “money and drugs,” the report states. “The victim advised he didn’t have anything at which time the other two subjects ransacked the room,” the report states. “The armed subject again demanded money and struck the victim under his left eye with the butt of his gun.

schools

Lycee Francais preparing to launch French-curriculum high school in two years

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With the launch of their long-planned French-immersion high school now only two years away, educators at Lycée Français de la Nouvelle-Orléans are now taking steps to plan the curriculum and degrees their students will learn, officials said. The school currently serves 723 students in preschool through sixth grade. It will add a seventh grade in the coming school year, and an eighth grade the following year, leading to the creation of the ninth grade in the fall of 2019 and thus launching the area’s first French-curriculum high school, said academic director Marina Schoen. The school plans to place the high school on the Priestley campus site on Leonidas Street in Carrollton that it is currently in the process of renovating, Schoen said. With a facility plan underway, school officials are now working on the curriculum for the school with “a sense of urgency,” Schoen told the Lycee Francais governing board on Monday night.

public safety

Central City apartment building catches fire, but no injuries reported

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A four-unit apartment building on South Salcedo Street caught fire over the weekend, but no one was injured and New Orleans firefighters were able to keep the blaze contained to the apartment where it started, authorities said. Heavy smoke in the sky in the area of Washington Avenue and Earhart Boulevard was noticed by the firefighters on Engine 16 shortly before 2:30 p.m. Saturday, April 8, and they found it coming from a two-story brick apartment building at 1308 South Salcedo Street, according to a New Orleans Fire Department news release. Based on the amount of fire coming from the top right unit in the building — and the potential that residents might be home for the weekend and trapped inside — the firefighters radioed for backup and began to battle the blaze. A total of 17 NOFD units with 42 personnel managed to keep the blaze contained to the apartment where it started, and they brought it under control by 2:50 p.m., the report states. Three of the four units in the buiding were occupied, but no one was injured and two of those three units suffered only minor smoke damage, the report states.

blight and demolition

Former service station on Carrollton Avenue to be torn down, replaced with coffee shop or sports bar

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A former South Carrollton Avenue service station with a long distinctive overhang was approved for demolition this week, and the new owners plan to replace it with either a sports bar or a drive-through coffee shop. The building at 3200 South Carrollton Avenue (at the corner of Oleander Street about a block off Earhart Boulevard) was owned by the Patterson family since the 1970s until it was sold to Evelyn Evans Freiberg for $200,000 in early March, according to documents included with the demolition application. “We hope to build a sports bar there, though we also have been approached by a local coffee chain about leasing the property,” John Freiberg told the Neighborhood Conservation District Advisory Committee on Monday afternoon. “We would like to rebuild it because it is an old service station. It’s fairly dilapidated.”