Assignment 1- Crafting a research question and locating a "problem" 

Background: The Office of Recovery Development Administration (ORDA) is made up various departments within New Orleans’s City Hall brought together under one umbrella to facilitate the recovery of the city.  The office has authority over the recovery of the city only.  ORDA, led by its current recovery Czar, Austin Penny, oversees the use of $411 million in federal CDBG money to assist recovery.  Although individually, each department has always operated separately within City Hall, they are now collected within ORDA. 

Process: Projects that ORDA executes are approved through a collaborative process with the state government.  ORDA develops plans that are subject to change from public input, city government partners and the mayor.  Final proposals are sent to the state Office of Community Development for approval, which takes 60-90 days.  Implementation then begins.  Currently, ORDA has approximately 70 state approved projects that are in various states of completion. 

Problem: The Office of Recovery Development Administration does not have, but is in the process of creating its own website to disseminate information about the projects that it is supporting.  However, as of now, information on ORDA’s projects is not readily available to the public.  ORDA needs to find a way to be more transparent to the public about how it is spending the $411 million it is currently in charge of, especially through is newly created website.  This will require the information is on the site and available in an easy to use manner. 

Research: Research may be focused on how other cities have been transparent with their projects via the Internet.  The purpose would be to learn from what other cities have done, in order to create as useful of a website as possible.