“The City That Care Forgot” has been a New Orleans nickname since 1910, The nickname has been used mostly during Mardi Gras.
 
“The City That Forgot to Care” is an infrequently used flip of this nickname. “We’re called ‘The City Care Forgot’ but we don’t want to be known as ‘The City That Forgot to Care!’” was used in an advertisement for the Y.M.C.A.War Fund in November 1917.
     
Other New Orleans nicknames include “America’s Most Interesting City,” “Baghdad-on-the-Bayou,” “Big Crescent,” “Big Easy,” “Big Greasy,” “Big Sleazy,” “Birthplace of Jazz,” “Chocolate City,” “Chopper City,” “City of a Million Dreams,” “City of Yes,” “Convention City,” “Crawfish Town,” “Creole City,” “Crescent City,” “Erb City,” “Gateway of the Mississippi Valley,” “Gumbo City,” “Hollywood South,” “Jump City,” “Mardi Gras City,” “Metropolis of the South,” “N’Awlins,” “Necropolis of the South,” “Nerlins,” “No Orleans” (after Hurricane Katrina), “NOLA,” “Northernmost Banana Republic,” “Northernmost Caribbean City,” “Old Swampy,” “Paris of America,” “Queen City,” “Saint City,” “Silicon Bayou,” “Silicon Swamp” and “Sweet Lady Gumbo.”
 
   
Wikipedia: New Orleans
New Orleans (/njuː ˈɔːrli.ənz, -ˈɔːrˈliːnz, -ˈɔːrlənz/, or /ˈnɔːrlənz/; French: La Nouvelle-Orléans [la nuvɛlɔʁleɑ̃]) is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana.
 
The population of the city was 343,829 as of the 2010 U.S. Census. The New Orleans metropolitan area (New Orleans–Metairie–Kenner Metropolitan Statistical Area) had a population of 1,167,764 in 2010 and was the 46th largest in the United States.
   
18 November 1917, New Orleans (LA) Item, pg. 10 ad:
Mail That Check TODAY
We’re called “The City Care Forgot” but we don’t want to be known as “The City That Forgot to Care!”
(,..)
Y.M.C.A.War Fund
 
16 November 1959, The Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA), “Responsibility” (editorial), sec. 1, pg. 14, col. 2:
Each individual citizen is responsible, for each citizen is a potential litterbug. Each has a stake in whether the visitor regards New Orleans as “the city that care forgot,” or as “the city that forgot to care.”
   
9 February 1961, Lincoln (NE) Star, “Paying The Price” (editorial), pg. 4, col. 2:
Meantime, New Orleans had better modify its descriptive from a city that care forgot to a city that forgot to care.
 
27 April 1961, Cincinnati (OH) Enquirer, “Ordeal In New Orleans Is Remembered By Woman Who Helped Integration” by Margaret Josten. pg. 14, col. 4:
AN URBAN League speaker suggested last night that one of New Orleans’ taglines be changed from “the city that care forgot” to “the city that forgot to care.”
 
Google Books
American Grotesque:
An account of the Clay Shaw-Jim Garrison affair in the city of New Orleans
By James Kirkwood
New York, NY: Simon and Schuster
1970
Pg. 111:
Still, at this time of year they are barred from taking part in the organized festivities that are supposedly the culmination of the work year in The City That Care Forgot— which one cannot help scramble to read, The City That Forgot to Care.
       
Google Books
Poor Women, Powerful Men:
America’s great experiment in family planning
By Martha C. Ward
Boulder, CO: Westview Press
1986  
Pg. 42:
For many inhabitants, however, New Orleans is the city that forgot to care. Its atmosphere of bread and circuses for the masses cloaks poverty in significantly greater shadows than in other Southern cities like Atlanta, Dallas, or Houston.
   
Google Books
New Orleans
By Martha Ellen Zenfell
Hong Kong: APA Publications
1992
Pg. 71:
As a Carnival town, New Orleans is often called the City that Care Forgot. Politically, it might be characterized as the City that Forgot to Care. But that’ s not quite true. This is a city that cares, but in its own way.
     
Google Books
Waiting for Godot in New Orleans:
A Field Guide
By Paul Chan
Badlands Unlimited
2011
Pg. 16:
However, worse than the name-calling is the fact that New Orleans is now a city that forgot to care. In the aftermath of the greatest flood trauma ever suffered by a major American city,
   
Google Books
How Do Hurricane Katrina’s Winds Blow?
Racism in 21st-Century New Orleans
By Liza Lugo
Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger
2014
Pg. XXII:
The City That Care Forgot back to the late 1930s and alludes to the carefree attitudes of its citizens—yet this is actually an illusion, at least for many African Americans in the city. From the time of Jim Crow to after Hurricane Katrina, it was the City That Forgot to Care.
 
Twitter
Danil Faust‏
@0NoneOfTheAbove
I grew up in the city that care forgot, now it’s the City that forgot to care. #nolaflood
4:26 PM - 8 Aug 2017
 
Twitter
E.A.Hecate 🖤‏
@brunhildebrand
The city that care forgot, the city that forgot to care. ⚜️ As the flood waters rise, so do we. #12years #proudtoswimhome
12:00 PM - 29 Aug 2017
 
NOLA.com
11 New Orleans nicknames: the good, the bad, the silly
Posted October 03, 2017 at 06:00 AM | Updated October 03, 2017 at 06:04 AM
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COMMENTS
Ben Sketch
Years ago, for a class at Tulane, I read an excellent article by the above-mentioned Richard Campanella about this very topic. Unfortunately I can’t find it now.
 
One fun one I remember was ‘The City That Forgot To Care,’ obviously playing off the more positive The City That Care Forgot. I believe the nickname was in response to lackluster government response to crime in the ‘70s/‘80s, but Campanella explained it much better than I could.
 
I wish I could find that article!
 
Melinda Morris, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune
@Ben Sketch I read that the YMCA used that as a slogan back in the day to get New Orleanians to contribute money