City shielding statue-removal bidders from protesters
7th March 2016 · 0 Comments
After a Baton Rouge-based firm backed out of a contract to remove four Confederate-era monuments from public spaces in New Orleans earlier this year, the City of New Orleans is taking a different approach to finding a contractor to carry out the task. A new approach also became necessary after opponents of efforts to have the statues removed launched a campaign to discourage construction firms from bidding on the controversial project.
Baton Rouge-based H&O Investments backed out of the project after its owner and his wife said they received death threats at their residence and some of their clients threatened to cancel existing contracts unless H&O Investments backed out of the deal. A Lamborghini belonging to the company’s owner was also torched as it sat in the company’s parking lot in January, just days after it was reported that the company decided not to carry out the statue-removal project. To date, investigators have not been able to determine whether the burning of the car was in any way connected to the Confederate monuments issue.
On Feb. 28, Nola.com reported that Save Our Circle, a group formed to block the removal of the monuments, is encouraging its nearly 10,000 Facebook members to let prospective contractors know that they disapprove of their involvement in the statue-removal project.
The City of New Orleans, which released bid specifications for the project, made an adjustment to its website that prevents the public from accessing information about the list of companies that have submitted bids or their contact information. This change was made after the Landrieu administration learned that Save Our Circle was encouraging its members to contact these campaniles by phone to discourage them from participating in the project.
Unfortunately, the changes were made after some of the companies that submitted bids had already been exposed to the wrath of the Save Our Circle phone campaign.
In all, four companies had downloaded the bid documents, exposing them to the public. Two of those companies told Nola.com that they had downloaded the information out of curiosity while the other two firms declined to comment.
Jonathan Maki of Save Our Circle defended the group’s phone campaign, telling Nola.com, “[T]here’s nothing wrong with us calling to express our opinion, our discontent. We want to make taking on this job as unattractive as possible.
Bids were initially due this month but the Landrieu administration has extended the deadline to April 22.
A spokesman for the Landrieu administration told Nola.com that changes were made to shield those seeking to bid on the project from the public “after reports of intimidation” surfaced.
“We have contacted the FBI and encourage anyone who has received threats to do the same,” the city spokesman added.
A woman whose company downloaded the bid documents told Nola.com that her inbox was flooded with messages from opponents of the Confederate monuments removal project.
While she told Nola.com that she was simply curious about the project, she says she never intended to take it on. Still, she said, the large volume of messages left her feeling vulnerable,even though she says she received no threats beyond business repercussions.
“They are threatening to put me out of business,” she told Nola.com. “To me, that’s a threat.”
Efforts to find a contractor to handle the removal of the Liberty Monument and three statues honoring Confederate leaders Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and P.G.T. Beauregard continue after the New Orleans City Council voted in December to remove the statues, calling them “public nuisances.”
The measure passed 6-1, although Councilmembers Stacy Head and LaToya Cantrell both said they didn’t think the Confederate-era monuments were an issue in New Orleans until the Landrieu administration made it an issue.
In truth, local civil rights and grassroots organizations have been seeking to have the statues removed from public spaces for at least five decades.
This article originally published in the March 7, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
