In 1978 Mayor Ernest N. Morial began the process to improve Duncan Plaza, the open space in the middle of the New Orleans Civic Center, just across Perdido Street from City Hall. He appointed an Ad Hoc Committee on Sculpture in Duncan Plaza. To support planning for Duncan Plaza improvements the city applied to the National Endowment for the Arts and received funding through its Design Arts Program. The city and NEA agreed to make use of a Regional/Urban Design Assistance Team (R/UDAT) offered by the American Institute of Architects.

The Duncan Plaza R/UDAT process is well documented in these records as well as in files within the records of Mayor Morial, also housed in the City Archives. In addition, the R/UDAT in 1980 published a detailed report on its work and a year later a city report, The Public's Place in Art for Public Places: The Duncan Plaza Experience (by Robert L. Dupont and Stuart Arnett), placed the project within the context of a public art vision for the Crescent City. Copies of both reports are available in the City Documents Collection.