Federal agencies won't seek to block removal of Liberty Place monument (LA)
BY JEFF ADELSON
AUG 26, 2016 - 6:30 PM
Two federal agencies have said they have no reason to try to keep a monument to an 1874 white supremacist uprising on public view in New Orleans, potentially clearing the way for the city to take it down along with statues of three Confederate leaders.
The monument to the so-called Battle of Liberty Place has long been one of the most controversial historical markers in the city. Ironically, it also seemed that it would be the most difficult for city officials to remove because of a federal consent order from the 1990s that mandated it be put back on public display after federal funds were used for its temporary removal.
But in court filings late Friday, the two agencies involved in that agreement, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, both said they no longer have any "legal or programmatic interest" in the case.
A memo from the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation said the city has met the requirements of that two-decade-old order and that neither it nor federal rules on historic preservation "prohibit the city from proceeding with the disposition of the Liberty Monument" ...
http://www.theadvocate.com/new_orleans/news/article_01693818-6be2-11e6-aa2a-6bf5ffd01ade.html