Judy: The atlantic hurricane
season started June 1 but people
in southeast Louisiana are still
recovering after being hit last
year by one of the strongest
hurricanes ever to make landfall
in the state.
Communities correspondent Roby
Chavez went back to visit the
rural coastal areas where
hurricane Ida's 150 mile per
hour winds left behind a housing
crisis.
Roby: Nine months after
hurricane Ida hit her
neighborhood in Terrebonne
parish, precious shepherd still
has no electricity.
>> Still running a generator.
Not being able to store food the
way I used to.
Eating fast food daily.
It's like I'm still living in a
storm.
Roby: After Ida, this entire
affordable housing complex was
deemed uninhabitable and most of
shepherd's neighbors moved away.
>> It feels like a ghost town.
I had nowhere else to go so when
I came home and seen my unit
wasn't as damaged, I was like,
well, you know, stay home.
Roby: And amid a driver
shortage, her school bus driving
job was busier than ever. But
the single parent's $23,000 a
year salary is hardly enough to
cover the daily cost of eating
out or the gas-guzzling
generator.
>> It normally runs about 16
hours before it runs out of gas
and have to be filled.
Roby: And how much does that gas
cost?
>> About $50 to $60.
Roby: That's per day.
In an area with a poverty rate
around 15%, Ida has had a
lasting impact on those who can
least afford it, especially when
it comes to stable housing.
Ursula ward stayed here because
she feared she couldn't easily
access healthcare elsewhere.
>> I have heart issues.
I have fibromyalgia and I have
digestive issues.
I would have to go try to find
those kind of doctors in a new
location all over again.
Roby: But with most of her
neighbors gone and no working
street lights, she doesn't feel
safe at night.
>> It scares me with the
darkness back here, not knowing
there is anybody there, not
knowing who is watching me when
I am leaving and coming home.
Roby: It's unsettling for ward,
who lives by herself.
>> Do you feel left alone here?
>> I'm very alone.
I cry most of the time.
Like, right now, I'm starting to
get emotional, but I'm trying
to, like, not cry right now.
It's just hard.
It is just like kind of hard to
deal with.
Roby: In hard-hit cocodrie, a
coastal fishing village south of
New Orleans, Heather young, her
fiance, her children and
grandchildren are among about
8000 Louisiana households still
in trailers provided by FEMA and
the state.
>> It's been like the hardest
thing I've ever did and been
through.
Losing everything.
We throughout all our clothes,
toys, furniture, appliances.
Everything had to go.
Roby: The family of seven set up
camp next to their ravaged home
on the water, where young's
fiance works as a fisherman.
>> I have never actually seen
underneath the tarps.
And the other day I did and I
just cried.
It's very heartbreaking to see
home like that.
Roby: Just down the road, Cecil
Lapeyrouse's store has been an
anchor of this community for
over 100 years.
>> Your biggest item here is
gasoline.
Gasoline, bait, refreshments.
Roby: But the store remained
closed while 70-year-old
Lapeyrouse spent his retirement
savings on repairs.
>> It's a lot of work plus a lot
of mental stress.
Roby: And how much money have
you kind of put into the
recovery?
>> Close to probably a hundred,
close to $100,000.
Roby: That's out of pocket cash.
>> Out-of-pocket.
Roby: Lapeyrouse could not
afford insurance, so he said he
spent his own money at a time
when the shuttered store brought
in no income.
But at least his house is
livable.
>> We never live like this
before.
Roby: In raceland, cherakee
Bradley is making do in a badly
damaged home.
Her mom, who lives nextdoor,
says she needs help to fix her
home too.
>> She wrote a letter to FEMA
and got denied.
And they keep telling that she
has insurance and she doesn't.
Roby: As for cherakee and her
three kids?
>> [00:02:51]their solution was
to find someone to stay with or
a relative, or that's it.
Because everybody's suffering
right now.
Roby: FEMA says it has paid out
over $1.2 billion in recovery
funds, including more than $700
million for housing assistance.
But residents and advocates say
it's still not reaching some of
the most vulnerable.
>> Recovery is a very long and
difficult process.
It takes years
Roby: FEMA federal coordinating
officer John long.
>> We can't wave a wand and put
things back the way they were.
There are unmet needs.
There was not enough affordable
housing before the disaster.
And so when a hurricane comes
and destroys that, it just
becomes a very difficult
situation, and that's part of
why recovery takes so long.
Roby: What do you say to your
own people that said, we are
struggling?
>> It's always a struggle.
And I can't tell you that we
dropped any one particular ball.
There are a couple of hundred
people, just FEMA people,
working to coordinate and and
make this entire mission work.
Roby: Adding to the difficulty,
says lafourche parish
administrator Mitch Orgeron,
critical infrastructure still
needs to be fixed.
>> We have some pump stations
that were damaged.
We need to be able to pump the
water when it rains.
Roby: Forecasters expect this to
be an above-average hurricane
season and that could mean
trouble for places like coastal
Louisiana where so many people
are still reeling from hurricane
Ida.
Even in non-hurricane storms,
Heather young feels unsafe in
her temporary trailer.
>> If the wind gets too bad, it
feels like you're going to flip.
Roby: So it's shaking.
>> If the wind is bad, it does.
Roby: So you don't even stay in
there sometimes.
>> We take the kids and come to
the car.
It feels safer in there because
it don't shake in case we'd have
to leave.
Roby: You can just get going.
FEMA has long mourned nobody
should ride out a hurricane in a
trailer.
>> We make a point of telling
people when they move into a
FEMA unit,
if the parish tells you to
evacuate, evacuate.
Roby: With so many still in
trailers, Orgeron says they'll
have almost double the number of
people to evacuate if a
hurricane hits lafourche parish.
>> One of the things that we
have to consider is, is how do
we move those people if we have
a hurricane?
Certainly can't ride a hurricane
out in a camper.
It certainly weighs heavy.
Roby: Cecil Lapeyrouse's
grandfather built his store in
1914.
>> It's a big tradition, it's
heritage.
That's the big thing of what's
making me go and keep going.
Roby: He finally reopened on
memorial day but he says he
simply can't take another
destructive hurricane.
>> I'm not going to try and redo
it again. You know, because I
mean, this is a lot.
I wouldn't do it again.
Roby: Commercial crabber Chad
canezaro, who is still
rebuilding his house, told us
the same thing.
>> The last last three years
I've evacuated seven times for
storms and then Ida was the
worst, obviously.
I'm not sure I could take
another one down here, to be
honest with you.
Roby: With so much uncertainty
remaining, this hurricane season
the state plans to have extra
evacuation shelters due to the
high number of people still
dealing with unstable housing.
For the pbs newshour, I'm Roby