New Orleans

After Hurricane Katrina, the Harmony Oaks site was identified by the Department of Housing and Urban Development as a major public priority for redevelopment.

Originally built in 1941, the complex was one of the four largest public housing communities in New Orleans, but it contained no amenities for residents and was not integrated into the street grid.

Goldman Sachs committed $61.2 million in financing to support the rebuilding effort. The new project was designed in close consultation with residents and contains buildings in several classic ‘New Orleans’ styles. There is also a community center, pool, childcare facility and adult education and employment training center.

Hurricane Katrina destroyed the Lafitte public housing complex in 2005. Goldman Sachs committed $60.5 million to redevelop the area, which was identified by Federal, State and local officials as a major public priority in the city’s rebuilding effort.

The rebuilt housing complex, located in the historic neighborhood of Tremé, is an important milestone in the city’s ongoing renewal with 517 housing units, all of which are fully occupied. Residents displaced by the flooding were given priority for these homes, as well as for the 295 rebuilt homes in the surrounding neighborhood. Those returnees now occupy 59% of the neighborhood’s 812 units.

After Hurricane Katrina destroyed the Chalmette Medical Center, this community’s healthcare facilities consisted of a mobile clinic in a vacant parking lot. Goldman Sachs made an $11.7 NMTC equity investment to help finance the construction of the St. Bernard Parish Hospital, a forty-bed acute care general hospital and medical office building.

The 104,000 square foot hospital provides essential inpatient and outpatient care to the community, as well as emergency services.

ReFresh Project turns a formerly vacant building – located at the intersection of several historic neighborhoods, including Tremé, Faubourg St. John and Mid-City – into a 60,000 square foot ‘fresh food hub,’ revitalizing an area that was previously known as a ‘food desert.’ This is a traditionally underserved area, with high poverty and unemployment rates.

Tenants include:

• A 25,000 square foot Whole Foods supermarket, which will anchor the surrounding small business corridor.

• A commercial kitchen and café operated by Liberty’s Kitchen, a nonprofit culinary workforce development organization focused on at-risk youth.

• A teaching and nutrition education kitchen operated by Tulane University.

• Office space for a local charter school operator, nonprofit organizations and accessory parking.

In a neighborhood where almost 90% of children qualify for free and reduced-price lunches, Goldman Sachs committed $9.7 million as part of the New Markets Tax Credit program to finance the leasing of property and construction of the Phillis Wheatley Community School.

The state-of-the-art facility provides education for hundreds of students from pre-K through the 8th grade, as well as publicly accessible community spaces, including a gymnasium and black box theater.

The Wheatley school is occupied by FirstLine Schools, an open-enrollment public charter school, dedicated to preparing students for college and developing the skills of their staff. The school created almost 500 construction and permanent jobs to a community with an unemployment rate that is 2x the national average.

In support of a public-private partnership led by the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority (NORA), Goldman Sachs established the Enterprise Louisiana Loan Fund (ELLF) to help refinance construction loans on single-family homes in New Orleans neighborhoods hit hard by Hurricane Katrina.

ELLF encourages local lenders to extend credit towards the development of housing for low and moderate-income homeowners. ELLF plays a critical role in reducing the rate of vacancy and blight in several New Orleans neighborhoods, and in supporting the construction of affordable, energy-efficient single-family homes. Many of the homes that ELLF helps to finance are built on sites controlled by the Louisiana Land Trust, a publicly-controlled nonprofit created after Katrina to return vacant properties to private ownership.

Goldman Sachs has committed $20 million for small business education and financing through the 10,000 Small Businesses program in New Orleans. The program has already helped over 400 small business owners grow their companies and hire more employees, and will continue to reach hundreds more.