BIOSCIENCES ARE KEY TO CITY REVITALIZATION
January 2, 2006

The biosciences will play a leading role in bringing new people and businesses to New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, according to Yvette Jones, senior vice president for external affairs at Tulane.

Jones chairs the biosciences subcommittee of the Economic Development Committee of Mayor Ray Nagin’s Bring New Orleans Back Commission.

“This committee is particularly focused on the health, medical, pharmaceutical, and technology development-driven activities of the universities and the research environment downtown, primarily,” says Jones. “It’s focused on any new biosciences industries that might evolve from research that we do in the School of Medicine, that Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center does, and the work that we’re doing in the gene therapy and cancer consortium.”

There were already plans on the table to develop this industry before the storm, according to Jones.

“In fact, Tulane, together with GNO Inc., a regional economic development organization, had worked on federal legislation to create a medical district, a real geographical area that would be an impetus and support for this industry,” she says.

The proposed medical district centers on the long-established complex of medical schools, hospitals and clinics in downtown New Orleans.

“The boundaries of the medical district are from Canal Street to Poydras Street, and from Loyola Avenue to just beyond Claiborne Avenue,” Jones says. “We included Xavier University as well, because of their School of Pharmacy, and Dillard University, for the workforce development component.”

The biosciences committee is currently developing a report that articulates a vision of what an expansion of biosciences industries can mean to New Orleans, defines a set of goals for the city and identifies potential funding requests. This report will be merged with the mayor’s report that goes to the federal government as part of the relief effort for the city of New Orleans.

The next step is to develop a more detailed strategic plan for the medical district, a process that will take a number of months.

“The committee has agreed to stay together as a group to develop the strategic plan,” says Jones. “This is a very complicated subject. It’s dependent on the universities, the medical schools returning to the downtown area, the hospitals opening, a revival of clinical research activity and on the state providing funding to build the BioInnovation Center and the cancer research and gene therapy centers.

“Our No. 1 request is for the federal government to address the levee situation,” Jones adds. “Until this situation is addressed and everyone knows it is resolved, we feel it’s going to be a difficult thing to get the population back and rebuild the community.”

-- Arthur Nead

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