Now, Audubon is shooting for a summer groundbreaking and an opening in summer 2003, says Dale Stastny, the organization’s chief operating officer.

Audubon officials say 90% of the construction documents for the insectarium will be ready by mid-April to show to the New Orleans Historic District Landmarks Commission and the state’s Division of Historic Preservation. The two offices must approve renovations to the historic U.S. Custom House building at the corner of Canal and North Peters streets where the museum will be located. Audubon signed a 50-year lease over two years ago with the federal government, through the U.S. General Services Administration, to occupy 25,000 square feet on the ground floor of the Custom House.

The GSA will let bids for museum construction this spring, says Stastny.

Audubon has hired Montreal-based Design+Communication and Academy Studios Inc. of Novato, Calif., to build museum exhibits, including interactive displays on Formosan termites and Louisiana insects, and a butterfly sanctuary. Williams & Associates Architects of New Orleans will build a small coffee shop within the museum.

Audubon officials say most of the money needed to build the museum is in place. The project has received $10 million in state and federal grants.

Audubon has access to another $5.8 million from bonds it refinanced last year, which were originally used to build the Aquarium of the Americas in 1990. About $4.5 million from the bond refinancing will go to the insectarium, another $1 million to the Aquarium and the rest to Woldenberg Park, says Bill Kurtz, Audubon’s chief revenue officer.

Audubon will have to hit up private donors for the rest of the insectarium’s construction costs and for a $5 million endowment the museum needs to sustain itself. Kurtz says the organization is $4 million away from that goal. "We’re extremely confident we’ll hit it," he says.

Fund-raising holds steady

The Audubon Nature Institute’s 2001 annual report, which shows how much the organization has raised from year to year, won’t be out until next month. But Kurtz offers an insight: Individual contributions to Audubon came in around $325,000 in 2001, about 10% lower than in the year before. However, a capital campaign to raise $4 million instead brought in $5 million, helping Audubon meet its total fund-raising goal, he says.

Meanwhile, Audubon officials say the organization’s contentious $6 million renovation of the Audubon Park golf course should be finished soon and ready for players by fall, as planned. Stastny says contractors underestimated the scope of the project and needed more time for construction than scheduled, but he says it didn’t affect the mid-October opening date.

The plan has been back in the spotlight this month as Audubon’s chief critic, Internet group SaveAudubonPark.org, sent out a rash of e-mails questioning city money that is going to the golf course renovation. At its March 21 regular meeting, the City Council will decide whether to allow the mayor to enter into a "cooperative endeavor agreement" with Audubon, which would allow Audubon to access $1.98 million in bond money for the golf course project. The money comes from a capital improvement bond issue, which included money for Audubon facilities, that Orleans Parish voters passed in November 2000.

Audubon officials say they will use the bond money to reimburse the institute for improvements already made to Audubon Park, such as resurfacing the walking track, and for other park enhancements still to come.

Getting the money now "is just paperwork," says Kurtz. "It’s not new money," he says, refuting rumors made by Audubon critics.

Members of SaveAudubonPark.org say the money was earmarked for park improvements and a less dramatic renovation of the golf course, not the $6 million plan they say Audubon railroaded through without public participation or government oversight.

Audubon officials dismiss the accusations as "disinformation."

No new ride

Late last month Audubon went to the Vieux Carré Commission with a request to install what it called a "simulator ride" outside the Entergy IMAX Theatre adjacent to the Aquarium of the Americas. The 12-foot-tall ride was planned in conjunction with the kick off of the theater’s “Space Station in 3-D” film in mid-April and was to stay for nine months, says Stastny.

The Vieux Carré Commission’s architecture committee, which makes recommendations to the full commission about exterior changes to French Quarter buildings, gave the ride a collective thumbs down. One of its reasons: Putting the ride in would be "a precedent ... for installation of devices more closely resembling carnival rides" in the Quarter.

Though Audubon could ask the full commission to judge the project, Stastny says, "my guess is we won’t try to get it approved."