City Park's board on Tuesday endorsed -- with restrictions -- the idea of redeveloping flood-ravaged golf courses with the help of the nonprofit Bayou District Foundation, and a Louisiana Children's Museum proposal to build a new "early learning village" museum complex on the Roosevelt Mall.

But the board rejected a request by Louisiana Public Broadcasting and the WLAE public television station to build a studio in the park near Tad Gormley Stadium, saying the studio wouldn't be the sort of cultural facility typically seen in a park setting.

The park's Board of Commissioners followed advice of its staff in making changes to a master plan adopted for the 1,300-acre park months before Hurricane Katrina brought devastating flooding that wiped out recreational facilities.

The destruction created major operating budget woes for the park, and set in motion more debate about changes that could open up a new glory era for the beloved swath of greenspace.

Approved changes to the master plan also will allow development of a dog park and a skate park, on the north and south sides, respectively, of Interstate 610 and permit expansion of the Equestrian Complex next to Filmore Avenue.

Wednesday's late-afternoon meeting at the Pavilion of the Two Sisters followed a high-temperature Sept. 25 public hearing during which park advocates mostly opposed major changes, with some opposing any push to redevelop overgrown golf fairways. Since that hearing, the park's staff, directed by Bob Becker, the former planning director for New Orleans, has gathered data and documented public feedback on various development ideas.

"Things change, times change, the needs of the community change," Becker said Wednesday as the board unanimously approved master plan changes.

Golf, housing link proposed

In signaling it would continue talks with the Bayou District Foundation about how to redevelop the closed north, west and east golf courses, the board kept alive the foundation's drive to link restored recreational facilities to a mixed-income residential development at the nearby site of the shuttered St. Bernard public housing complex. The idea of linking golf to a new generation of public housing is modeled after the East Lake development in Atlanta, and has drawn support from federal housing officials.

That broad scheme, founded on an agenda for raising big donations from golf supporters nationally, would pour more than $30 million into City Park improvements and make it possible for the park to lure championship tournaments, as it did many years ago. But many City Park loyalists were leery of changes envisioned by businesspeople who represent the Bayou District Foundation, and City Park officials balked at early proposals to redirect a significant share of net income from golf to support services at the St. Bernard development.

Park officials placed rigid limits on just how golf courses can be redeveloped, but their willingness to move the venture forward excited Mike Rodrigue, a representative of the Bayou District Foundation.

"It's flexible. We're just glad to be in partnership with the park now -- openly," he said in an interview. "This is really the green light for us."

Among restrictions to be placed on redevelopment of golf courses:

• Improvements must be carried out almost exclusively within the footprint of the old golf courses, with no golf course expansion into the Couturie Forest or Scout Island areas. An existing softball quadraplex and a section now reserved for police horse stables could be made part of the golf complex, if the city determines the stables site isn't needed.

• The North Course area, on the north side of Filmore Avenue, would be returned to use first to generate income while renovations to the old East and West courses are carried out.

• The Bayou District Foundation would have to discard its plan to use $15 million in borrowed money to help finance course improvements, and the foundation would have to increase its target for private fundraising from about $12 million to $15 million. Park officials were concerned that relying on loans would force an increase in greens fees that would make the courses too costly for many New Orleanians.

• A new financing plan must be prepared that would ensure that golf courses would generate a net profit for City Park of at least $1 million a year by the third year of operations.

The park board endorsed a proposal for a Louisiana Children's Museum complex, relocated from downtown, that in its first phase would include a child-care center, a parenting center, a gift shop, a cafe and administrative offices. A second phase would contain a visual and performing arts building.

Less land for museum

The board said the amount of land that would be devoted to the museum would have to be reduced from a proposed area of 35 acres to about 12 acres, and it said directors of the museum would have to demonstrate within two years that they can raise necessary funds for the project. Park officials also rejected a museum proposal to include a general circulation public library in the complex.

A staff report said there is plenty of precedent to placing children's museums in urban parks, noting that the Association of Children's Museums lists at least 70 museums around the country that are in public parks.

City Park officials praised a proposal by Louisiana Public Broadcasting and WLAE to build a studio complex that would include a 200-seat theater, a music heritage museum and facilities for a music internship program. But officials said public cultural uses would comprise a small fraction of the complex, raising questions about whether it is appropriate for the park.

"The great majority of the use is to house a broadcast studio," a staff evaluation said. "While the broadcast studio contains a theater, it is primarily a facility for the production of television programming."

A better location for the studio would be the closed John Kennedy High site just outside the park's northeast corner, near Robert E. Lee Boulevard, park officials said.

Representatives of the Louisiana Children's Museum and the public broadcasting station didn't speak at the meeting and weren't immediately available for comment.

Coleman Warner can be reached at cwarner@timespicayune.com
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