With federal help delayed, nonprofits and volunteers fix hundreds of Laura-damaged homes

WESTLAKE - For two years, Rikki Fontenot and her four sons have managed to live in the portion of their house still habitable after Hurricane Laura tore through her neighborhood. Her 17-year-old, in a desperate bid for privacy, laid down floorboards in a gutted room and put up a bed frame made from scrap materials.

Since the storm, Fontenot has battled the usual challenges faced by southwest Louisiana residents after the storm: a battle with her insurance company, trouble with contractors, repeated weather events beating down on the region. In the meantime, most of her home has remained unlivable.

"My kids have been sleeping on the couches. We can't use upstairs because there's still boarded up windows," said Fontenot, who works as a personal trainer and whose sons range in age from 9 to 17. "I feel like I've had a weight on my chest for the past two years."

But finally, some relief is on the way for Fontenot and her children. They soon will be temporarily housed in an Airbnb nearby, while nonprofit SBP Southwest Louisiana returns the four-bedroom house into a "safe and sanitary" living space, the organization's standard for the over 100 home renovations and rebuilds it has completed since the storm.

In the absence of federal rebuilding funds and as residents' prolonged battles with their insurance companies continue, nonprofits and volunteer-based organizations have shouldered much of the home rebuilding in weather-battered southwest Louisiana. Combined, they have allowed hundreds of families to return to their homes, in a region where thousands have been displaced by repeated weather disasters.

Laura destroyed an estimated 44,000 homes in Calcasieu Parish and although it is unclear exactly how much of that housing stock has been repaired since, organizations in the area agree that the work of rebuilding is far from over.

"There's still a tremendous need out there," said Bill Howell, director of missional engagement and outreach at the Louisiana Conference of the United Methodist Church. The conference is working with Amish volunteer groups who were some of the first to come to the area after pandemic restrictions eased and have rebuilt dozens of homes since.

And the task hasn't gotten any easier, according to John O'Donnell, executive director of SBP Southwest Louisiana. "The level of devastation that we're dealing with per home has not changed since the storm," the southwest Louisiana native said.

With time, tarps and other temporary fixes to damaged homes have disintegrated, allowing water, black mold and termites to enter. And the calls just keep on coming. "Every Sunday I pray for a slow week and we never get it," O'Donnell said.

'Recovery is not over'

Meanwhile, it has been harder to raise the money necessary to fund these extensive repairs. The repeated devastation of several weather events and a global pandemic have left locals emotionally exhausted, a phenomenon researchers call "disaster fatigue." Many outside donors have moved on to the next battlefront, such as parishes hit by Hurricane Ida or communities suffering from floods in eastern Kentucky.

"The spotlight just continues to move," said Denise Durel, executive director of the United Way of Southwest Louisiana, which has been pooling donations for local organizations to use in their rebuilding efforts. "You have a very small window."

O'Donnell is hoping that local industry will pitch in to further support the work of SBP and others. It would be in their own interest, he points out. "Until we're able to bring everybody home into a safe, sanitary space, we're not going to be able to talk about economic recovery in a way that's meaningful at all."

"If people don't have somewhere to live, then they're not going to be spending money in the economy, they're not going to be investing in jobs, they're not going to be starting business, because they're worried about putting a roof over their head," O'Donnell said.

Following a series of disasters, Calcasieu Parish saw one of the biggest population drops in the nation, according to Census Bureau estimates from last year.

Still, there are people who continue to come to Lake Charles and help the city rebuild. This summer, in an effort coordinated by Southwest Louisiana Responds, 1,200 volunteers arrived in the region to rebuild homes. If all goes according to plan, an even larger number will be back in the fall, according to Executive Director Braylon Harris. The Amish, too, will be returning in November.

"We're not done, our organizations are not going away, we're not quitting," Harris said. "Our recovery is not over."

Rikki Fontenot is thankful for the help SBP Southwest Louisiana is providing in returning her home to a livable state. "Without them, I'd still be waiting," the single mother said.

Once the home is restored, she's hoping to rebuild the back porch, where she used to have coffee in the mornings and spend time with her sons in the evenings.