Tannen says that HUD's plans to demolish public housing projects across New Orleans are in sync with its HOPE VI redevelopments, most of which involved demolition followed by rebuilding. (A local example of this concept is the former St. Thomas project, which was torn down to make way for the all-new River Garden community.)

But even housing experts who generally support the HOPE VI model question HUD's demolition plans in New Orleans. "These public housing buildings are some of the most sturdy housing in New Orleans, and I'm hesitant to see them torn down," says Urban Institute principal research associate Susan Popkin, who has tracked relocated public housing residents for the past five years through the institute's Hope VI Panel Study.

The goal of HOPE VI is to build mixed-income neighborhoods by eliminating developments with "high concentrations of poverty," a term that easily describes the Lafitte, where the average annual household income was $11,900. Popkin thinks that eventually converting the Lafitte to a mixed-income community makes sense, but that might take a decade. "So why not clean up those buildings and use them as worker housing for people helping to rebuild New Orleans?" she asks.

Popkin's suggestion seemed even more practical last week, when newly released documents made it clear that renovation is more cost-effective than demolition. HUD's and HANO's own internal email and memos, recently obtained by the plaintiffs' attorneys (and posted on www.justiceforneworleans.org), reveal that the price tag for extensive modernization of the Lafitte would run $84,354,252, significantly less than complete demolition and rebuilding costs, estimated to be $100,180,650. "I'm reluctant to say this," says Bill Quigley, one of the plaintiffs' attorneys, "but it's clear that HUD and HANO have been routinely and regularly lying to the public. The discussions that they've had internally and with each other are completely different from what they've been saying publicly."

At press time, it seemed clear that HANO would submit an application on Friday, Oct. 20, for federal affordable-housing tax credits that could foot the bill for the Lafitte redevelopment. If that application contains any of the same sort of "deliberately skewed information," Quigley says, it should be resoundingly denied.

Over the past few months, an unlikely mix of preservationists, housing experts, residents, and protestors have begun speaking out in support of the Lafitte—specifically, that renovation is a better solution than demolition. Only renovation, they say, acknowledges New Orleans' historic architecture and the work of its gifted craftsmen in the Lafitte. Only renovation can immediately begin to address the current rental-housing shortage and the shortage of able-bodied workers. Without a focus on renovation, they add, HUD and HANO will never release accurate damage information or acknowledge every evacuee's right to prompt return.

The last two factors most concern the Advancement Project's Browne-Dianis. "Lafitte is the symbol of what the fight is about," she says. "It's not about damaged units, it's about whether low-income African Americans are welcome in New Orleans."

The choruses rang clear, from girls with bright ribbons in their hair. "Hey, Ms. D., abibblybop—you sure look sweet, abibblybop-abibblybop." Nearly every afternoon, groups of little girls would chant favorite rhymes like these as they skipped rope beneath big live-oak trees in Lafitte courtyards. For 65 years, their Double Dutch rhymes echoed off light-brown bricks that were a source of pride for Lafitte residents. Lafitte's 79 buildings, brown-brick with burgundy trim and lacy-iron balconies, were finished in 1941 and have since stood strong through countless tropical storms and at least two devastating hurricanes. "You see, Katrina did not even rumple a brick on them," says chef Leah Chase, gazing admiringly at the project's buildings from her soon-to-be-reopened restaurant across the street.

Often, neighbors speak almost lovingly about the bricks, as if they were a friend. Jerome Smith, who heads up the nearby Treme Community Center, remembers the first time he saw the Lafitte empty, its windows and doors sealed shut by heavy steel panels. His mind just froze, he says. "I couldn't think. It was like attending a wake for someone who had died and you had just seen them the day before in perfect health."