New Orleans voters will decide Nov. 4 whether to amend the City Charter to give the city's forthcoming master plan the force of law, meaning that all zoning and land-use decisions would have to conform to the plan.
The master plan is supposed to guide the city's development for the next 20 years, creating a framework to guide decision-makers in promoting goals such as economic development, better housing, improved infrastructure and environmental quality while preserving the city's architectural and cultural legacies.
The City Planning Commission has hired a team of consultants to create the master plan, which is expected to be finished by late 2009.
The charter amendment also would require the city for the first time to create "a system for organized and effective neighborhood participation in government."
Giving the master plan the force of law is intended to make it more difficult for the City Council to change zoning laws or grant exceptions so as to advance or block specific projects.
Lawyer and preservationist William Borah, who for years waged an almost single-handed campaign for "a master plan with the force of law," says the charter amendment would end "planning by surprise."
"Despite the way the current zoning ordinance classifies the use of a particular piece of property, the city's major developments usually hinge on the will of the City Council member in whose district the development happens to lie," Borah wrote recently. "If the text of the zoning ordinance does not permit a development desired by a public official, the ordinance is simply amended and the zoning map altered."