The French Quarter Management District: Neighborhood Stewards
The “other” Bourbon Street, at Governor Nicholls, photo by Ellis Anderson. “For the residents, the value is simple and strong. It is the sense that while the Quarter belongs to the world, it is still home.”
November 2025A founding member of the French Quarter Management District gives a brief overview of how the commission works to improve the quality of life in one of the country’s oldest neighborhoods.
– by Glade Bilby II
The French Quarter is old.
The streets are narrow and the buildings lean into one another like familiar friends who have seen too much. Or maybe drank too much – one custom here among others. The light comes down hard and hot in the afternoon, and the shadows move slowly across the balconies. It is a place of music, the sound of feet on stone, and labor. Lots of labor.
And like all old things, the Quarter must be cared for. That is why the French Quarter Management District exists.
Our 13-member Board of Commissioners is a quasi-governmental body, with members appointed to represent residential, tourism and business interests in the French Quarter. We face a daunting number of challenging missions: to beautify our appearance, maintain our architecture and improve the vitality of the French Quarter by fostering quality of life – all in an effort to aid in the preservation of our important historic city’s jewel.
View from an Esplanade Ave. balcony, photo by Ellis Anderson
Created by the Louisiana State Legislature in 2007, FQMD works quietly to strengthen what gives our region vitality - Louisiana’s tourist-centric industry. But our commission is made of people who also understand the Quarter is not only for the visitors with their drinks and their selfies, but for those who live here and wake to the sound of the street being cleaned, the luggage being unloaded, the train on the riverfront, and the bells of our historic St. Louis Cathedral. We wake up and smell the coffee – from Folger’s in New Orleans East, no doubt.
FQMD’s original mission was to assist the New Orleans Police Department with a chronic manpower shortage. This need begat a program that has developed into a mainstay in French Quarter security. In 2016 and again in 2021, residents of the French Quarter voted in a dedicated 0.0245% sales tax - the “Quarter [of one percent] for the Quarter” tax. This is used to fund our various programs.
Funds from the tax enabled FQMD to establish, support, and maintain the Supplemental Police Patrols (SPP) that we all see around the streets of the FQ. Colloquially known as “blue light patrols,” our French Quarter Patrols have resulted in over 10,500 hours of additional patrol hours and business checks this past year alone (read more about them in this 2023 French Quarter Journal story).
[Editor’s note: This tax is coming up for renewal in the November 15th election, so please vote.]
To make our patrols more effective, the French Quarter Task Force App was founded as a way to report various activities. The App and SPP have become a source of stability and security for our historic neighborhood. Through determined and effective management, we have an under two-minute response time for FQTF App reporting.
Graphic from the FQMD website
Graphic from the FQMD website
In addition:
FQMD has inspected, replaced and repaired over 600 streetlights this past year. This was the result of a driven 3-year plan since lighting is a crucial and important element for keeping our streets safer.
FQMD has installed monitoring equipment and crime cameras throughout the boundaries of the District by partnering with the Real Time Crime Center of the city to leverage resources.
FQMD funded and contracted for the street corners and No Parking zones to be properly painted and marked so that drivers knew where to park - and more importantly, where not to park – so first responders can access our narrow and densely populated streets. The Fire Department thanks us for this – for any fire in the French Quarter has the potential for catastrophic results.
Graphic from the FQMD website
One of the new street markings on Chartres Street, photo FQJ
To live in the French Quarter is to live inside history. It is to hold the past in your hands every day and try not to drop it. The FQMD helps you keep your grip. Its members understand that the Quarter is fragile, like that old pane of glass that has seen many dark nights that you struggle not to break, but still rings true when you strike it gently. They protect it so that it may continue to shine.
For the residents, the value is simple and strong. It is the sense that while the Quarter belongs to the world, it is still home. The FQMD helps make that possible. FQMD is the steady presence of people who care. It’s a story of keepers – people who steward the old city so that it may stand another day.
And that, in a world made hard by changing values, is enough.
For more information about how French Quarter Management District helps to support our neighborhood, go to fqmd.org.
Chartres Street at Madison, photo by Ellis Anderson