Entergy is proud to support programing on LPB and greener practices that preserve Louisiana.

The goal of our environmental and sustainability initiatives really is to ensure that our kids and future generations can be left with a cleaner planet.

Additional support provided by the Fred Bea and Ruth B Ziegler Foundation and the Ziegler Art Museum located in Jennings City Hall.

The museum focuses on emerging Louisiana artists and is an historical and cultural center for Southwest Louisiana and the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

With support from viewers like you.

There's a need for more units, probably more vouchers, more handle landlords, Hurricane Ida exacerbating an already difficult housing market.

They love what we catch, but nobody wants to help me maintain my ability to catch it.

Seafood leaders say help is promised, but where is it?

Everyone needs to be doing their part, trying to put the brakes on rising domestic violence.

Hi, I'm Kara St. Cyr sincere and I'm Andre Moreau.

first tonight shots in the arms of children.

This week, the CDC recommended that youngsters ages five to eleven get the Pfizer vaccine.

President Biden talked about it this week, saying the US is well equipped to vaccinate all 28 million children in that age group.

We've already secured enough vaccine supply for every single child in America ages five through eleven weeks ago.

We have states and pharmacies to put together their detailed plan to start placing their orders for these specially formulated vaccines for young children.

We started packing and shipping these orders last week as soon as the FDA authorized the vaccine.

State public health leaders say Louisiana will receive 148,000 doses of the pediatric vaccine.

Dr. Joseph Canter of the Department of Health expects providers to have those doses of the vaccine by the end of next week, and that number will be enough to vaccinate 35% of the children in the state.

Louisiana's vaccination rate remains stagnant.

Currently, 2.2 million people are fully vaccinated.

That's only about 47% of the population.

In an effort to get everyone vaccinated, the shot for $100 incentive program has been extended until November 30th.

Anyone receiving their first dose of the vaccine is eligible and now two other headlines around the state.

This week, Governor John Bel Edwards touted Louisiana's future with alternative energies like solar and wind.

He did so before an international audience at the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, Edwards said.

To have the economy of the future, we want where we continue as an energy producing state.

We're going to have to do more things like embrace wind energy.

Authorities arrested and charged three people from burning Paris with human trafficking and rape in connection with the alleged sex trafficking of a child over the span of four years.

This tragic case involving a young girl that began when she was only eight years old is an example of a widespread societal breakdown.

Few want to talk about a big finding in the reexamined autopsy ordered by the FBI in the deadly 2019 arrest of Ronald Greene Monroe.

The evidence rejects the claim by state police that a car crash caused his fatal injuries.

The second look confirms what Greene's family suspected the moment they saw his battered body and only slightly damaged car that the minor crash after a high speed chase had nothing to do with his death.

Voters in the state's November 30th election will decide on changes that would rewrite state sales and income tax laws.

They'd more closely matched the regulations of other states.

GOP lawmakers pushed the amendments.

They got overwhelming bipartisan backing and support from the governor.

Governor Edwards describes them as real fiscal reform for the state.

A 4 million dollar gift by Ochsner Health will establish the Ochsner Wellness Center in the newly renovated Huey Long Field House at LSU.

Capital outlay funding and philanthropic donations are helping pay for the 29 million dollar revamp of the historic built house, once the epicenter of student life, and LSU's first student union back in 1932.

Hurricane Ida dealt the state's seafood industry another blow when it roared through, and recovery has barely begun.

But one of the industry's most vocal leaders told me it's just the latest in a series of setbacks that since Katrina, just keep on coming.

George Perisic is a full time shrimper and oyster farmer.

He's also president of the United Commercial Fishermen's Association.

The headlines you hear now is basically because of the storm.

Hurricane Ida is the storm.

George Barris is a major face of Louisiana's commercial fishing industry is talking about.

But Barris says there are all kinds of storms that threaten the existence of Louisiana's precious and acclaimed seafood industry.

Others include the catastrophic storm stirred by the BP oil spill.

The storm of government regulations or lack of them.

50% of the people in the west side of the river from Grand Isle West.

They're gone.

The boats are gone.

The docks are gone.

Houses are gone, you know, and that's hurricane.

That's that's an act of God.

So hurricane damage, hurricane damage, but we never have a sea is the damage that is bipartisan.

The only thing has been bipartisan for the last 30 years is the abandonment of domestic fishing industry by the federal government.

I'm gonna give you a, for instance, Hurricane Katrina hit OK.

Right before that, they had a tsunami.

They said $400 million to Indonesia.

All right.

To help them?

OK, good Samaritan kind of stuff.

Louisiana had a 365 million dollar infrastructure lost fishing.

We got 58 million and these are the people that make the the 300 400 million that stimulate the economy.

What's wrong with that?

Peter Barasa is a regular in Washington and has fought for decades pleading for help from our many congressional delegations.

I can see every one of them.

You know, we get to see everyone.

Cassidy, Cassidy, Kennedy.

And it was before the one before and it was before.

And it was before I was telling you, I'm disappointed we have no stroke.

You know, they all said, Are you going to help?

You know, Steve Scalise.

The last time I saw him, I saw him in Kenner opening day, a shrimp season.

I said, Steve, do you understand what's going on?

I'm not out there shrimping.

I'm talking to you.

This is eight years.

I'm talking to you, and we're not getting any help.

We keep getting promises, promises, promises, promises.

one of his biggest concerns is over the epic 2 billion dollar mid barataria sediment diversion project, a key piece of the state's 50 billion dollar coastal master plan.

Governor John Bel Edwards and the Coastal Protection Restoration Authority CPA says it's the lifeline our vanishing coast needs.

Construction of the engineering feat is expected in 2022.

Though recent developments could delay the start, while the Army Corps of Engineers has given the plan a mostly green light.

It strongly cautions the major adverse permanent impact on shrimp and oysters.

The Marine Mammal Commission goes further.

It says the infusion of polluted fresh water from the Mississippi River will kill off most of the bottlenose dolphins in Barataria Basin.

Hundreds die whenever the bunny carry spillway opens to prevent flooding in New Orleans.

An ecological marker?

Dolphins are at the top of the food chain, the Canaries in the coal mine.

How can I support a freshwater diversion when I know what's going to put me out of business?

And it's not going to build Atlanta.

They want to build.

If you start pumping in Milan tomorrow, OK?

And we showed them, he explains.

There's areas where they accidentally pump lion out of a canal and his land in now is high, and it's still not even on purpose.

We showed them and things that have been pumped out, but they don't want to do what they want to do these large scale freshwater diversions.

You know, I said, why don't you pump it and do a small-scale freshwater diversion to maintain it?

Our industry can take some fresh water again.

But it's like flushing a toilet.

You can't do that and expect shrimp, crabs and fish, which is a brackish water environment, especially oysters.

This is a very delicate balance to survive.

Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser agrees with Borosage.

So do the parish councils of Plaquemines, Saint Bernard and St Tammany parishes like parishes.

Nungesser says a better, faster way is to build land now through dredging and the restoration of barrier islands.

In an editorial to the Advocate newspaper, he said the CPRS plan is deeply flawed that it's nothing more than another insider deal.

Barasa is Croatian.

His parents were born there, but came to Louisiana when he was young.

His family is part of the close knit Croatians of Lower Plaquemines Parish, little known to most Louisianans, but said to have built the oyster industry that has made Louisiana famous.

A commercial fisherman is an eternal optimist.

You leave the dock.

You don't know if you coming back.

OK. Commercial fishing is the most dangerous occupation in the world.

More people die from commercial fishing than any other occupation.

I know if you knew that embarrasses himself almost became a statistic.

In January 2020, his boat caught fire while shrimping on Lake Bourne.

The Coast Guard rescued him in time.

It's it's in here, OK?

Yes.

Then there's something that's innate, which is why he'll do all he can to protect it.

You see, like southeast Louisiana, southwest Louisiana, it seemed like you were red headed stepchildren, commercial fishermen like your redheaded stepchild.

It's it's it's really sad the amount of disrespect we get.

But have you ever talked to anybody that didn't say, I love Louisiana seafood?

I live for it.

The restaurants that make their business and entice people from all over the world to come and eat in New Orleans and other places.

And it's because of the seafood supply.

A lot of seafood, a lot of them chefs, OK. And it's ironic that they love what we catch, but nobody wants to help me maintain my ability to catch it versus tells me today and 2021.

6500 make a living as a commercial fisherman, compared to 30,000 the number of back in the 1970s.

Hurricane Ida exacerbated an affordable housing crisis in Louisiana as the housing supply took a hit.

Rent prices are through the roof.

I talked with several people displaced by Ida and Veronica Reed, the executive director of Jane's Place Neighborhood Sustainability Initiative.

When Hurricane Katrina 16th anniversary winds of 150 miles per hour pelted south Louisiana on the East Bank in New Orleans, ten inches of rain fell on Norwood Creek, where Shannon Paxton lives.

Her apartment was destroyed, ruining several irreplaceable objects in the process.

Some of the things I make.

Because I'm in the culture.

They really do we have a sentimental value.

And so those is stuff like that.

I don't think people realize.

How much they mean to people until it's done with no power?

Mold, mildew and water soaked through the walls.

Paxton's apartment quickly became unbearable.

The apartment deemed the complex, deemed the apartment unlivable.

So I have to move.

And what's been so hard about that is financially is difficult because all of the places that they have available have skyrocketed on what they want for rent.

Exhausted, Shannon wondered where she was going to move.

She'd only lived here for a year before Hurricane Ida destroyed it.

Now, Paxton is being thrust into a difficult housing market.

one Veronica Reid, the executive director of Jane's Place Neighborhood Sustainability, says has been getting steadily worse.

When Hurricane Katrina rocked the city's housing market for the majority of New Orleanians, Katrina Hurricane Katrina was the point that tended to expose the depth and breadth of the housing crisis that was New Orleans.

But it also was exacerbated by the sort of like the wholesale loss of units that came with Hurricane Katrina.

After a big storm like Katrina or Ida, things were thrown out of whack for months and sometimes years.

Prices for housing increase, often due to limited supply.

If a large number of homes are damaged, they may not be livable for months or even years.

In a study from the Federal Bank Reserve of Dallas, economists found that hurricanes make prices rise shortly after and the increase peaks around three or 4% about three years after the storm, which can cause a housing nightmare for people like Paxton.

I really can't afford to go more than 1000 and then like I've, you know, I've been looking in different areas.

It's not I'm not really picky about the area per se.

But.

So much has changed is just like the homeowners have skyrocketed their rent for their, you know, apartments or houses, a duplex or whatever the rent has went up, you know, so it's making it harder to afford in Okezie, as a town has also seen these trends up close.

Hurricane Ida hit Terrebonne Parish with when strong enough to knock out the power for weeks.

Settlements apartment complex was among some of the severely damaged properties in the parish.

Parts of her roof caved in while the rest of her home filled with water and eventually mold.

My own apartment didn't survive iota like we had ceiling damage and more than mildew, well, accelerated growth and all my furniture was.

Not salvageable.

So my lease was terminated Saturday and commuted four hours daily, driving from Lafayette to Homa for a while before ultimately making the decision to live in her office at the home, a courier.

She's cramped into a small space with an air mattress and her dog while in the process of looking for a new place, Zetland says the prices in a once affordable town like Homa have dramatically increased.

My reporting has touched upon and talking with other residents here in and down the bayou.

It's not there.

There are no units available and for their units or a lot of units aren't available.

And for the units that are available, if you like, just take a brief brief look at like apartments, dot com or on Craigslist.

Like those 23 bedroom apartments per se are now marked up to like $2,000.

When like market like regular market value would be closer to like 700 800.

And I guess like those things are.

Those things are just things I have to look into more.

But it is really frustrating to see that so many in our community are being failed every level.

Reed says that the problems creating an affordable housing crisis are a lot bigger than just hurricanes.

Cost of living, access to jobs, short term rentals and a lack of clearly defined tenant laws are to blame for the rising cost, especially in big cities like New Orleans.

I think there's a need for more units, probably more vouchers or more units that accept vouchers.

There's a need for more funding so that non-profits and developers who build affordable housing can actually sort of have the funding to do it.

And then there's probably a need for permanent affordability, right?

A lot of the funding that comes up that supports affordable housing has a timeframe attached to it.

15 years, 30 years seems like a long time when you're doing it.

But you know what, 15 years or 15 years out from Katrina now, aren't we finding a new home has been a challenge for Paxton, and time is ticking.

If she can't find a place to stay, she may have to leave the city and her community behind.

No one should have to go through.

Help trying to find somewhere to live since we interviewed both Zeitoun and Paxton, they were finally able to find new housing.

Both are focused on picking up the pieces from months of their lives being on hold.

A St Francis Bill man was relentless in the pursuit of his estranged wife three weeks before he broke in, shot her and then turned the gun on himself in one afternoon.

He violated a restraining order five times.

He had an ankle bracelet.

None of this stopped him.

None of the system made to stop him did.

It's an example of the worst of domestic violence that happened just in October.

Mariah Wenski is executive director of the Louisiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

And I'm so glad to talk to you about this because we've seen the increasing statistics and how much more challenging has COVID made your mission against domestic violence?

We have seen a significant increase over the last, especially in 2021, but beginning in 2020, a significant increase in the severity of cases that we're seeing in the level of violence that we're seeing and the number.

There were lockdowns, a loss of income.

Those contribute people being held together and then when suddenly people are not having to be locked down.

It doesn't just immediately eliminate that, does it?

Right.

So COVID part of what it did, it didn't magically cause more domestic.

Sure, right.

But what it did is it created a a social environment where domestic violence can flourish.

So you have your increase in isolation was a huge component, right?

So you're separated from your support systems.

That makes it harder for victims to seek safety.

So that's been the main issue is that over the last year and a half with the various effects of COVID 19, we have seen an increase in barriers that victims face when they're trying to get to safety.

Tell me all about the program that and the things that you do to help victims.

Sure.

So we are the statewide network of domestic violence, shelter and advocacy organizations, so we have 16 member programs all across the state.

Those programs provide emergency shelter counseling, legal advocacy, children's services, safety planning, a wide array of services for domestic violence victims.

And we also operate a 24 hour statewide hotline for domestic violence.

And then in addition to those direct services, we also have a social change and legislative advocacy component.

So we do we do work on legislation to try to improve the laws around domestic violence and also try to educate the public and change some of those social conditions that allow domestic violence to happen.

What are some of the things that you've had to work on, maybe differently or different ways because of this past year and a half?

So we have done a lot of listening over the last year and a half really, truly listening to what survivors need and what they say they need .

And we've taken those issues and we've found ways to the best of our ability to decrease those new barriers that have that have come up in survivors lives.

So one thing that we've done is we've focused on meeting survivors needs outside of a domestic violence shelter setting.

So, for example, we've secured additional funding to get rental assistance for domestic violence survivors and utility assistance.

So let's say they don't necessarily want to come into shelter or they don't need to come into shelter, but they're having a hard time maintaining their financial independence apart from their abuser.

You've worked all over the U.S., you've worked internationally and of course, in Louisiana.

I'm curious how how does the Louisiana stack up in terms of the laws and the protections against people?

So Louisiana actually has really good strong progressive laws on the books.

What we struggle with in Louisiana is implementation of those laws.

So a lot of our laws are not appropriately or consistently enforced.

It's applied.

Let's say Francisville case is an example of not being enforced.

Yes, and there's even a statewide, only about 50% of restraining orders that are issued are ever even served to the defendant.

And so if an order isn't served and of course, it's really difficult to enforce, right?

So you've got implementation issues in our state and we've actually even before COVID, we in Louisiana consistently have led the nation in the rate of women murdered by men.

So this has been something that we've been dealing with for a long time, 20 plus years, we've led the nation.

And so we have this underlying these systemic issues in the way that we address domestic violence.

And then the pandemic came and hurricanes came, and they've exacerbated all of those preexisting issues.

So what do we need to know for the average person need to know?

I would say that it's important to keep in mind.

That domestic violence, if we want to stop and prevent domestic violence homicides, then every single entity, whether it's systemic or individual, everyone needs to be doing their part.

So not just the victim services, of course, there's a lot that we need to do.

But on the criminal justice side, are we looking at everything that we need to be looking at?

Are we adequately assessing risk that somebody poses to their victim before we set bond, before we decide what interventions we're going to do in a criminal justice manner, right?

And then as an individual, yeah, I suppose friends or family, you say something expects, you know or suspicious of something reported.

Say something.

Yeah.

The most important thing that an individual can do is if you know somebody who is experiencing domestic violence and you're concerned for their safety.

Talk to them about it.

Tell them that you're concerned.

Show, explain to them what you see in their relationship that's making you concerned for their safety.

And let them know that you will be there for them, no matter what, that you will always support them, no matter what they decide to do.

Right?

Don't give them the ultimatum of leave or else don't do that right, but always support them no matter what, and then refer them to the to the resources that are available to help them.

Yeah, they already live in an ultimatum situation.

Exactly.

Yeah, you don't want to play into that abusers isolation.

All right.

Thank you so much.

It's good to talk to you.

Thanks for being here.

Thank you.

If you've been keeping up with safe haven, you know, we've put together a total of eight episodes for you to watch.

Now we won't be airing any more of those on S.W.A.T..

But I wanted to give you a sneak peek of this week's episode, which highlights Porto's beauty school in New Orleans and Carrie's beauty school in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Take a look.

It's hard to believe if I were to travel just seven years ago, this little guide could potentially save my life.

I'm Cara sincere and this is safe haven Louisiana's Greenberg.

When I was a little girl, I learned a very valuable lesson.

Hair is never just hair for black women anyway.

And it never has been.

Hi, I'm going to show you how you and all Christine can find a fantastic new hairstyle.

It's called an ultra natural.

If you want to watch the rest of this episode of Safe Haven, you can head to our YouTube page where you can not only watch that, but you can catch up on all the episodes that you've missed.

That's the link right there on your screen.

Big congratulations to Cameron Paris port director.

Claire Marcel We have spoken to her several times this past year about hurricane recovery at this week's World LNG Summit in Lake Charles, Marceau was named America's LNG and Gas Female Executive of the Year.

She said it was surreal having the world event and the city that is still battered Lake Charles.

No one, though, more deserving.

Congratulations to Claire Marcel.

Love to hear that.

That's our show for this week, everyone.

Remember you can watch anything LPB anytime, wherever you are with their LPB, the app.

You can catch all TV news and public affairs shows, as well as other Louisiana programs you've come to enjoy over the years.

And please like us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

For everyone here at Louisiana Public Broadcasting, I'm Andre Moreau and I'm Kara St. Cyr.

Until next time, that's the state we're in.

Entergy is proud to support programing on LPB and greener practices that preserve Louisiana.

The goal of our environmental and sustainability initiatives really is to ensure that our kids and future generations can be left with a cleaner planet.

Additional support provided by the Fred Bea and Ruth B Ziegler Foundation and the Ziegler Art Museum located in Jennings City Hall.

The museum focuses on emerging Louisiana artists and is an historical and cultural center for Southwest Louisiana and the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

With support from viewers like you.