New City Park President and CEO Rebecca Dietz has her work cut out for her.
A high-profile master-planning process started a year ago by her predecessor, Cara Lambright, has stalled amid pushback from the community over what critics have said is a lack of public engagement. Getting the process back on track will be one of Dietz’s top priorities, according to members of the two boards that govern the park and officially approved her hiring June 25.
The New Orleans City Park train, bottom right, winds its way alongside a lagoon and through oak trees on Friday, August 26, 2022. Bayou St. John can be seen to the top left. (Photo by Chris Granger | The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate)
Dietz, 48, who had been serving in the No. 2 position at City Park since 2021, is uniquely qualified for the task, according to those her know her. She’s an attorney with City Hall experience and an insider’s understanding of how to bring government agencies and the public together to get tough deals done.
Another feather in her cap: She worked at New Orleans’ other major park, the Audubon Institute, under Ron Forman, serving for more than three years as his second-in-command.
“She’s the perfect person for the job at this time,” said Emily Arata, a member of the City Park Improvement Association board, the state agency that oversees performance of the park. “She has extensive experience, an even hand, and a great background in community engagement. All those skills are going to serve her so well.”
Dietz was unavailable for an interview last week, according to a spokesperson, who forwarded a prepared statement.
“I believe in the future of New Orleans and value investment in its prosperity—this includes investment in City Park,” the statement said. “As CEO, I believe I have a responsibility, through collaboration and relationship building, to play a pivotal role in shaping the future of our remarkable community.”
An implementer
Dietz is an Arkansas native, who came to New Orleans in the late 1990s to attend Tulane Law School, married a local and never left. She started her career in the private sector and in 2012, joined Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s administration as a deputy city attorney. She quickly moved up the ladder, serving as general counsel for the airport, executive counsel to the mayor and then as city attorney.
“She is wickedly smart, calm under pressure and cannot be shaken,” said attorney Mike Sherman, who knows Dietz from her City Hall days. “Rebecca is an implementer who understands down-the-line logistics.”
In 2018, Dietz left City Hall for the Audubon Institute, where she spent three years learning the business of running parks from Forman, who has proven himself a master over the past half century at growing the Audubon empire through raising private dollars, tapping into government funds and generating revenue through attractions like the zoo and aquarium.
“She did a great job at Audubon,” Forman said. “She was very active running our legal department, running our government affairs and working very closely with the state administration and the city.”
The ability to bring public and private stakeholders together is no small thing in a city with two major parks—Audubon and City—and a host of smaller parks and greenspaces operated by two separate agencies, the New Orleans Recreation Department and the Department of Parks and Parkways. The four entities have historically operated in silos. Advocates of greater coordination among the park systems are hoping Dietz can help change things.
“She’s a little bit of an unknown because she has always been the number two,” said Scott Howard, president of Parks for All, a nonprofit organization that pushes for more funding equity among the various parks. “But she is smart, she knows the territory and she is a professional park manager.”
Planning problems
Dietz was actually the runner up for the CEO job at City Park in 2021, when a search committee tapped Lambright for the post after a months-long national search. But it was a close call at the time, according to Jay Batt, a board member of the City Park Conservancy, the nonprofit that runs the park day to day and hired Dietz to be Lambright’s No. 2. Earlier this month, when Lambright announced her surprise resignation, Batt moved to offer Dietz the job on the spot.
Cara Lambright
“To spend more money to do a national search would have been a waste,” Batt said. “She brings stability, character and leadership and has a low learning curve so we won’t miss a beat.”
Dietz inherits a City Park that is well poised for future growth. Lambright oversaw the park’s shift from a state-run governance model to a private nonprofit, which allows the Conservancy to handle daily operations and direct philanthropic funding toward improving the massive green space.
But key to that growth is a successful planning process that, at the moment, has stalled out. Launched one year ago, the $1 million process was intended to reposition the park for the next 100 years by suggesting long-term projects, which cost as much as $100 million over the next 20 years. The focus of the blueprint would be on making the 1,300-acre park and its collection of historic Live Oaks sustainable while also contributing to stormwater management in the city.
But the plan encountered criticism during a series of community meetings. A proposal to cut a new road through the park that would have forced the relocation of the Grow Dat community garden drew fierce opposition.
Planners also got pushback from the state, which contributed nearly $10 million towards the renovation of the Bayou Oaks South Golf Course in 2017 and balked at suggestions that the course be closed or relocated, according to minutes from the association’s April board meeting.
Amid the concerns, planners in April postponed the third in a series of community meetings scheduled for May. The meeting has yet to be rescheduled and a park spokesperson confirmed the master plan will not be completed by the end of this year as originally anticipated.
No new timeline for future meetings or a completed plan has been announced. A park spokesperson could not say whether the delay will add to the cost of the plan. MVVA, the national consultants doing the work, did not respond to a request seeking comment.
Members with both the conservancy and improvement association boards said they remain committed to the planning process and are looking to Dietz to pick up the pieces.
“One of Rebecca’s first charges is to go and engage the community in this process,” Arata said. “I think what we heard is that ‘we don’t want it done fast. We want it done right.'”