Hurricane Delta
Acadiana’s hotel shelters wind down as COVID-19 and housing insecurity persist
This story was originally published by The Current, a nonprofit news organization serving Lafayette and southern Louisiana. Pillows are in short supply at the Lafayette warehouse operated by the Acadiana Regional Coalition on Homelessness and Housing. But not pillowcases. Workers with ARCH have gathered and stocked home necessities for dozens of families delivered into stable housing […]
Insurance companies reminded to obey law after complaints stream into commissioner’s office
Following complaints against insurance companies that are refusing to give policyholders full copies of their policies and refusing to work with public adjusters, Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon released a statement Wednesday reminding insurers of their legal obligations to consumers as they work on claims from the devastating 2020 hurricane season and last month’s extreme […]
Insurance claim deadline for Hurricane Laura is Tuesday
Tuesday, Feb. 23, marks the 180-day insurance claim deadline for Louisiana policyholders to file a proof of loss for any claims related to Hurricane Laura, and similar deadlines are approaching for hurricanes Delta and zeta. Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon urged all property and casualty insurers to grant deadline extensions to property insurance policyholders who […]
Winter storm leaves Louisiana with 1 million under boil-water notice and 125k without power
Much of the state remained bleak in the wake of a deadly winter storm that pierced Louisiana this week as nearly a million residents remained under boil-water advisories and 125,000 were without electricity in frigid temperatures as of noon Thursday, Gov. John Bel Edwards said. Of those without power, about 20,000 — mostly in the […]
Hurricane Laura evacuees have been forced to move 5 times in 5 months, lawyers say
A team of New Orleans lawyers and the National Center for Law and Economic Justice fired off a series of public records requests Monday as part of their investigation into how the state and federal governments have handled the thousands of Louisiana residents displaced by Hurricanes Laura and Zeta. Nearly five months after two major […]
‘They’re so weary’: Louisiana teachers recover from back-to-back hurricanes during the pandemic
This story was originally published in Southerly magazine with The Hechinger Report. It is second in a three-part series supported by the Pulitzer Center about how southwest Louisiana is recovering from Hurricanes Laura and Delta amid the pandemic. Read the first story here. Every weekday morning, Dr. Lisa Morgan wakes up at 3:45 a.m. at […]
Lake Charles and all of Southwest Louisiana deserve your Christmas generosity
KD Minor’s memories of Christmastime in Calcasieu Parish begin with the smell. “Lots of bonfires,” she said Wednesday. “That smell of burning wood and the Christmas lights down Lakeshore Drive.” Christmas in Lake Charles, she said, “is when all the kids who left come back.” This Christmas, though, many families in Southwest Louisiana have nothing […]
The end of the 2020 hurricane season?
There’s no guarantee that another storm won’t form before the end of the year — one formed on Dec. 30 in 2005 — but Nov. 30 marked the official end of the 2020 hurricane season, the likes of which neither Louisiana or the country has seen before. Twelve named storms hit the United States in […]
Zeta is the latest storm to put Louisiana on alert
Tropical Storm Zeta has emerged as yet the latest threat to Louisiana, and state and local officials are warning storm-fatigued residents to be vigilant yet again. Hurricane Laura and Hurricane Laura struck Southwest Louisiana six weeks apart. According to current forecasts, Zeta is expected to hit the Gulf Coast somewhere between Southeast Louisiana and the Florida […]
After hurricanes Laura and Delta, activists mobilize to get out the Black vote in Lake Charles
By Carly Berlin This story, the first in a three-part series on Hurricane Laura and Hurricane Delta recovery in southwest Louisiana was originally published by Southerly and was supported by the Pulitzer Center. On the first day of early voting in Louisiana, Tasha Guidry drove around Lake Charles to survey the wreckage from Hurricane Laura, […]
Federal aid for Delta approved for 5 Louisiana parishes
Federal help is on the way for five Louisiana parishes that suffered damage in Hurricane Delta, Gov. John Bel Edwards’ office has announced. Edwards asked President Donald Trump and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for a major disaster declaration on Oct. 14. Acadia, Calcasieu, Cameron, Jefferson Davis and Vermilion parishes qualify for aid. “I want […]
Climate change leads to more intense hurricanes — and more mosquitoes
Mosquitoes are a part of life in South Louisiana. But this year’s active hurricane season has made the biting insects intolerable — even to Cajuns. Parish mosquito-abatement offices around the state perform a simple test to see whether mosquitoes are bad enough to spray pesticides: They have a person stand still for one minute and […]