The Wall Street Journal
NEW ORLEANS—Nilima Mwendo's life, in some ways, is the best it's ever been.
Five years after the floods unleashed by Hurricane Katrina, her memories of the "smell of death and mold and mildew" are receding. Her freshly painted pale green house looks better than it did before the storm, thanks in part to a federal program that offered funds to repair historic houses.
Her four grown children have moved back to New Orleans, to be close to family and part of the city's rebuilding.
"We're a bunch of bad-ass, strong, committed people," said the 56-year-old Ms. Mwendo. She lives on the 800 block of Jourdan Avenue in the Holy Cross neighborhood, which borders the Mississippi River. The damage was heavier there than in many parts of the city, though not as severe as in the rest of the devastated Lower Ninth Ward.
Before Katrina, Ms. Mwendo's block had 11 occupied houses. Now there are seven. Two homes are boarded up, one is being repaired but is unoccupied, and one burned down after the storm. Four households that lived on the block when Katrina hit moved back. In three houses, there are newcomers.
Across the street from Ms. Mwendo, Ann Schexnyder, a 51-year-old dental lab technician, is still trying to reclaim her old life. She moved back into her house last year after three years in a FEMA trailer in her backyard, but work on the house is far from finished. She has running water—cold only—in one room, minimal electricity, and sleeps on a mattress on the bathroom floor, the one part of the house not cluttered with construction supplies.
She, too, received federal aid to rebuild, but says she has had bad luck with contractors and is overwhelmed trying to oversee the renovation by herself. "For the first time, in the last month, I've thought about giving it up and cutting my losses and just leaving," she said.
The contrast between the neighbors' recovery illustrates that five years on, New Orleans is a work in progress. While city residents are returning—the population is back up to 78% of pre-Katrina levels—there are still streets where refurbished homes sit next to ones with boarded windows and shin-high grass.
Some people have been inspired to rebuild or even move to New Orleans for the first time, while others are still trying to get back to where they were. Still others have given up altogether, leaving their homes for new cities.
"We didn't realize it would take so long," said Loretta Harrison, 54, a candy-shop owner who frets that in her neighborhood of New Orleans East, the hospital that closed after being ravaged by the storm hasn't been rebuilt.
In the Lakeview neighborhood, which was deluged after a massive levee break at the 17th Street Canal, Roy Arrigo, a 54-year-old sales manager for an air-conditioning company, has rebuilt his home. He has also erected a sign excoriating the Army Corps of Engineers over the levee failures and comparing the disaster to the Chernobyl meltdown. "Me and all of my neighbors are at a level of bitterness like you've not ever seen," he said.
Meanwhile, in the verdant Gentilly section, in northeast New Orleans, Laurie Watt, a 51-year-old hotel human-resources director, said neighborhood spirit is up since Katrina. "In a weird funky way, I really think the disaster brought us together," she said. The neighborhood was submerged under eight feet of water in some places.
Ms. Schexnyder was one of the first to return to the 800 block of Jourdan Avenue. She snuck in after the storm to check on her historic house, made of wood from barges, and once a music and dance club called "The In For Fun Social Club."
The floodwaters, which reached six feet or more on her block, had receded, but gray mud caked the street, cars were overturned, and her house stank of rotting food. "I threw up," she said.Hearing rumors that the city was going to bulldoze the neighborhood, she spray-painted in red on plywood covering the front window: NOT 4 SALE @ ANY $ I'M STAYING PUT!
After living in an apartment subsidized by FEMA, she moved into a government-issued trailer on her property in May 2006, around the same time neighbor Dianne Blackwell, a 60-year-old widow, took up residence in a FEMA trailer two doors down. Ms. Schexnyder gave her a plastic whistle, a souvenir of a Mardi Gras parade, and kept one next to her own bed so the women could alert one another if danger arose.
Surrounded by the clutter in her own home, Ms. Schexnyder estimated she's received more than $100,000, in insurance, federal Road Home and historic grant funds. But she's hit one snag after another, between contractors who did little, to termite wood damage discovered in the rebuilding. Her father, who she says might have been able to help, died in January 2007.
Mike West and his family chose not to stay put. A French Quarter folk musician who once lived across the street from Ms. Schexnyder with his family and a flock of chickens, Mr. West decided post-Katrina New Orleans was too rough. In November 2005, the family landed in Lawrence, Kan., a city where they knew no one.
Although they still own their Jourdan Avenue home and rent it out, they have no plans to move back. They have made friends in their new city. Mr. West says his children enjoy the local public pools and other recreation facilities, which he says his New Orleans neighborhood lacked even before the storm.
It would be too "psychologically hard to take my kids from living in a safe Midwestern town and move them back to a city which is beautiful and wonderful but which can also kind of devour you," Mr. West said.
But post-Katrina New Orleans is a draw for young idealists coming to work for nonprofits or in urban redevelopment.
This spring, Mary Ellen Stitt and Blake Hansen bought the house next door to Ms. Schexnyder, paying $18,000. The new home for the recent graduates of Carleton College in Minnesota is full of holes, has no running water, and the two use a compost toilet in the backyard.
Ms. Stitt, 24, works at a local nonprofit. Mr. Hansen wants to do urban gardening. "The city just has this energy that captivated me," she said.
Five years after the floods unleashed by Hurricane Katrina, her memories of the "smell of death and mold and mildew" are receding. Her freshly painted pale green house looks better than it did before the storm, thanks in part to a federal program that offered funds to repair historic houses.
Her four grown children have moved back to New Orleans, to be close to family and part of the city's rebuilding.
"We're a bunch of bad-ass, strong, committed people," said the 56-year-old Ms. Mwendo. She lives on the 800 block of Jourdan Avenue in the Holy Cross neighborhood, which borders the Mississippi River. The damage was heavier there than in many parts of the city, though not as severe as in the rest of the devastated Lower Ninth Ward.
Before Katrina, Ms. Mwendo's block had 11 occupied houses. Now there are seven. Two homes are boarded up, one is being repaired but is unoccupied, and one burned down after the storm. Four households that lived on the block when Katrina hit moved back. In three houses, there are newcomers.
Across the street from Ms. Mwendo, Ann Schexnyder, a 51-year-old dental lab technician, is still trying to reclaim her old life. She moved back into her house last year after three years in a FEMA trailer in her backyard, but work on the house is far from finished. She has running water—cold only—in one room, minimal electricity, and sleeps on a mattress on the bathroom floor, the one part of the house not cluttered with construction supplies.
She, too, received federal aid to rebuild, but says she has had bad luck with contractors and is overwhelmed trying to oversee the renovation by herself. "For the first time, in the last month, I've thought about giving it up and cutting my losses and just leaving," she said.
The contrast between the neighbors' recovery illustrates that five years on, New Orleans is a work in progress. While city residents are returning—the population is back up to 78% of pre-Katrina levels—there are still streets where refurbished homes sit next to ones with boarded windows and shin-high grass.
Some people have been inspired to rebuild or even move to New Orleans for the first time, while others are still trying to get back to where they were. Still others have given up altogether, leaving their homes for new cities.
"We didn't realize it would take so long," said Loretta Harrison, 54, a candy-shop owner who frets that in her neighborhood of New Orleans East, the hospital that closed after being ravaged by the storm hasn't been rebuilt.
In the Lakeview neighborhood, which was deluged after a massive levee break at the 17th Street Canal, Roy Arrigo, a 54-year-old sales manager for an air-conditioning company, has rebuilt his home. He has also erected a sign excoriating the Army Corps of Engineers over the levee failures and comparing the disaster to the Chernobyl meltdown. "Me and all of my neighbors are at a level of bitterness like you've not ever seen," he said.
Meanwhile, in the verdant Gentilly section, in northeast New Orleans, Laurie Watt, a 51-year-old hotel human-resources director, said neighborhood spirit is up since Katrina. "In a weird funky way, I really think the disaster brought us together," she said. The neighborhood was submerged under eight feet of water in some places.
Ms. Schexnyder was one of the first to return to the 800 block of Jourdan Avenue. She snuck in after the storm to check on her historic house, made of wood from barges, and once a music and dance club called "The In For Fun Social Club."
The floodwaters, which reached six feet or more on her block, had receded, but gray mud caked the street, cars were overturned, and her house stank of rotting food. "I threw up," she said.Hearing rumors that the city was going to bulldoze the neighborhood, she spray-painted in red on plywood covering the front window: NOT 4 SALE @ ANY $ I'M STAYING PUT!
After living in an apartment subsidized by FEMA, she moved into a government-issued trailer on her property in May 2006, around the same time neighbor Dianne Blackwell, a 60-year-old widow, took up residence in a FEMA trailer two doors down. Ms. Schexnyder gave her a plastic whistle, a souvenir of a Mardi Gras parade, and kept one next to her own bed so the women could alert one another if danger arose.
Surrounded by the clutter in her own home, Ms. Schexnyder estimated she's received more than $100,000, in insurance, federal Road Home and historic grant funds. But she's hit one snag after another, between contractors who did little, to termite wood damage discovered in the rebuilding. Her father, who she says might have been able to help, died in January 2007.
Mike West and his family chose not to stay put. A French Quarter folk musician who once lived across the street from Ms. Schexnyder with his family and a flock of chickens, Mr. West decided post-Katrina New Orleans was too rough. In November 2005, the family landed in Lawrence, Kan., a city where they knew no one.
Although they still own their Jourdan Avenue home and rent it out, they have no plans to move back. They have made friends in their new city. Mr. West says his children enjoy the local public pools and other recreation facilities, which he says his New Orleans neighborhood lacked even before the storm.
It would be too "psychologically hard to take my kids from living in a safe Midwestern town and move them back to a city which is beautiful and wonderful but which can also kind of devour you," Mr. West said.
But post-Katrina New Orleans is a draw for young idealists coming to work for nonprofits or in urban redevelopment.
This spring, Mary Ellen Stitt and Blake Hansen bought the house next door to Ms. Schexnyder, paying $18,000. The new home for the recent graduates of Carleton College in Minnesota is full of holes, has no running water, and the two use a compost toilet in the backyard.
Ms. Stitt, 24, works at a local nonprofit. Mr. Hansen wants to do urban gardening. "The city just has this energy that captivated me," she said.
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