City of New Orleans
The Emergency – forum of City Officials
on Rebuilding Infrastructure for a Sustainable Environment
- “ECORISE” –
Policy Objectives, Design Criteria & Best Practice Assessment
Under the Patronage of
The Honorable Mayor of New Orleans
The Honorable Minister of Transportation & Infrastructure of France
The Honorable Minister of Environment & Sustainable Development of France
The Honorable Ambassador of France to the United States
Hotel Omni Royal Orleans
621 St Louis Street (French Quarter)
New Orleans, LA 70140
New Orleans, 7 to 9 March, 2006
The Emergency – forum of City Officials
on Rebuilding Infrastructure for a Sustainable Environment
- ECORISE –
Under the Patronage of
The Honorable Mayor of New Orleans
The Honorable Minister of Transportation & Infrastructure of France
The Honorable Minister of Environment & Sustainable Development of France
The Honorable Ambassador of France to the United States
Goals Policy Objectives, Design Criteria & Best Practice Assessment
New Orleans, 7 to 9, March, 2007
Introduction & Context - In the aftermath of the Hurricane Katrina Disaster, City and State Officials, the local,
state and federal government agencies, and the public / private sector operators of the critical urban systems and
community services had to undertake the challenging tasks of disaster impact mitigation and recovery
management. The impacted stakeholders and the civil society of the urban environment have experienced
cascading disaster consequences, which have demonstrated the critical needs for improving disaster preparedness
and upgrading the storm protection system and the critical city infrastructure to an acceptable level of a disaster
resiliency. Consequently, city and state officials presently face critical decision making concerning alternative
recovery strategies and the challenges of rebuilding the city infrastructure for a sustainable environment to
efficiently catalyze its social and economic revitalization.
Within this context, we believe that a Franco-American cooperation on the critical issues presently faced by the
impacted cities in Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi, will be of mutual benefits. An international forum of city
officials focused on best practice assessment, sharing experiences and lesson learned among the participating
cities, could most significantly support the local governments in improving their capacity to respond to their
current recovery challenges and upgrade their emergency response, disaster impacts mitigation capabilities, and
recovery management strategies at the grass root level. In the long run, monitoring and evaluating the social,
economic, ecological, and operational impacts of selected recovery solutions on the revitalization of the cities
involved could be of significant contribution to improving practices of governance for crisis management and
sustainable recovery.
Goal - The goal of this Colloquium is to offer the necessary inter-city forum for bringing together the Mayors and
the major stakeholders of cities that have experienced and/or have to face the challenges of post-disaster recovery,
including policy makers of the local, state and federal governments, public and private infrastructure agencies, the
business community, insurance industry, representatives of the civil society, university faculty members,
international experts, and others in order to: i) assess current recovery strategies, ii) discuss real life observations
on the economical and socio-cultural revitalization of the city, iii) develop guiding principles for establishing the
level of disaster resiliency of the flood control systems and critical city infrastructures that would be acceptable to
the city stakeholders, and iv) promoting a long-term Government – Industry – University cooperation for
monitoring the recovery process and evaluating its social, economical, ecological, and operational impacts on the
revitalization of the city neighborhoods and communities.
Long-term Perspectives - The long-term purpose of this Colloquium is to establish an international emergency
forum of city officials and local governments in order to share their experiences and lesson learned, and assess best
practices of rebuilding critical infrastructure for catalyzing sustainable economic and social recovery of the cities
and their neighborhoods. This Colloquium is also expected to further the dialogue among French and American
cities on the critical issues of sustainable urban development which has been initiated in 2004 under the auspices
of the Association des Maires de Grandes Villes de France (AMGVF), Cités Unies France, the National League of
Cities, and the Association of Sister Cities with the support of the Urban Infrastructure Institute at the Polytechnic
University, New York. With the support the Non Governmental Cooperation Advisor, Embassy of France,
Washington DC, the Steering Committee of this Colloquium involves the University of New Orleans, Tulane
University, The Urban Infrastructure Institute at the Polytechnic University, New York, the Ecole Nationale des
Ponts et Chaussées, Paris, the Ecole des Ingénieurs de la Ville de Paris, and the French and US Associations of
Mayors