Crowd jams hearing on Fat City makeover

Hundreds of people packed the Jefferson Parish Council chamber in Elmwood tonight for a public hearing on an ambitious plan to reshape Fat City, which supporters hailed as the path toward creating a showpiece destination in Metairie and detractors panned as a ploy to discriminate against certain businesses. "Fat City can and should be much more than it currently...

Hundreds of people packed the Jefferson Parish Council chamber in Elmwood tonight for a public hearing on an ambitious plan to reshape Fat City, which supporters hailed as the path toward creating a showpiece destination in Metairie and detractors panned as a ploy to discriminate against certain businesses.

BRETT DUKE/THE TIMES-PICAYUNENew light posts with banners and planters, as well as new sidewalks and a new street surface on 18th Street, represent the first steps in a sweeping plan to overhaul Fat City.

"Fat City can and should be much more than it currently is," said Ronnie Sloan, chairman of the Jefferson Chamber, in endorsing the plan at the hearing of the Jefferson Parish Planning Advisory Board. "Fat City can be the next economic jewel of Jefferson Parish. However, changes are necessary."

The long and complex plan moving through the Jefferson Parish Council's approval process includes dozens of changes, remaking Fat City's zoning, building standards, parking procedures, sign rules, allowed businesses and operating rules for businesses. The last of those, especially earlier closing times for bars, drew a crowd of opponents.

"It attacks certain businesses and therefore it violates those businesses' civil rights," said George Peterson, a Waggaman civic activist, referring to rules that would make bars in Fat City close at midnight Sundays through Thursdays and 1 a.m. Fridays and Saturdays. "It goes to overreach and government control."

Board member Lynne Parker, whose district includes Fat City, said she understood the changes cause pain for some but that the detailed, long-studied overall plan charts a promising path for Fat City. She endorsed it and the rest of the planning board unanimously agreed, affixing its stamp of approval and sending the plan to another public hearing and possibly a final vote by the Jefferson Parish Council on Sept. 22.

But the board's vote came only after turmoil in the audience over time limits on speakers.

Under board rules, each side in the debate received a combined 25 minutes for all of its speakers. Eighteen people spoke in total, but supporters and opponents were left standing in line as time elapsed.

With some audience members groaning and getting up to leave in frustration, board Chairwoman Lynn Giordano apologized that the board didn't realize early enough that it could suspend its rules and add speaking time. The proponents had already finished their turn before Richard Brown, a civic activist speaking on the opposition, raised the possibility of more time.

That happened near the end of what was a civil but intense round of discussions, which filled almost all the seats in the room and attracted an unusually large security contingent from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office.

Jason Jaume, who owns The Bar, a Fat City heavy metal music venue, continued an ongoing debate he has with parish officials over their claims that bars are contributing to a crime problem that is stunting Fat City's potential. He has argued the point repeatedly with Cynthia Lee-Sheng, the Jefferson Parish Council member whose district includes the neighborhood.

Jefferson Parish Planning Director Ed Durabb presented a study showing clusters of police calls near the bars along Fat City's 18th Street core. Jaume cited a different set of statistics he gathered, pegging the source of crime to troubled apartment complexes. Parish officials have said housing issues will be part of a broad, ongoing effort to remake Fat City, but they are outside the reach of the zoning ordinance under immediate consideration.

"What we would like you to do is step back," Jaume said, "and focus on the housing area first. These are people that I don't allow in my bar that are walking the streets at night."

Jaume said bar owners want an improved Fat City, too, but feel excluded from the current effort.

Kathy duTreil, a longtime activist against drunk driving, criticized the plan from another perspective, saying early closing times for bars invite more danger.

"Mandatory closing times tend to lead to higher blood alcohol levels," duTreil said. "Last call is the signal to hurry up."

But a procession of business, civic and law enforcement leaders praised the plan,

many of them citing years of study and a long overdue need for improvement in Fat City, a strategically located section that has been in long decline. They said it should be a magnet for shoppers, diners, families and businesses and a defining district for a parish that lacks such distinguishing attractions.

"This is our best chance to move Fat City forward," said Jim Hudson, president of Omni Bank and the chairman of a team assembled by the Jefferson Parish Economic Development Commission that launched the new focus on Fat City. "It is going to take courage and a lot of dedication. It will be very hard to attract private investment dollars into that area unless we change the rules."

David Andignac, a retired senior vice president of Whitney National Bank and a leader in JEDCO's long-term planning on multiple fronts in Jefferson Parish, gave this assessment: "It's a dream that we can make possible."

Mark Waller can be reached at mwaller@timespicayune.com or 504.883.7056.