Without State Aid, Advocates Worry Port Arthur Will Bleed Residents Long After Harvey
Hurricane Harvey was destruction in three acts. The first occurred on August 25, when the storm crashed ashore north of Corpus Christi with 130 mph winds. For its second act, Harvey lingered over the Texas coast for days, disgorging an unprecedented amount of rain that turned Houston into a lake, before drifting out into the Gulf.
Janice Rogers faced Harvey’s third and final act when the storm swung back for a second landfall near the Texas-Louisiana border on August 30. Rogers, 57, waded through waist-deep water outside her west Port Arthur apartment to reach a helicopter that flew her to safety. After she slept in a shelter for two days, someone convinced her to board a military plane sending evacuees to Dallas.
Rogers, born and raised in Port Arthur, hasn’t returned. She probably never will. Her story worries housing advocates and community leaders in the city of 55,000, which battled high poverty and double-digit unemployment well before Harvey hit. They fear that without more government assistance to help the already struggling region recover, Port Arthur will continue to bleed residents.
“People already lived hand-to-mouth here,” said John Beard, a former Port Arthur City Council member and community activist. Most homeowners, including the city’s mayor, didn’t have flood insurance when Harvey hit. Few could afford to fix much on their own; some still lived with damage from hurricanes Rita in 2005 and Ike in 2008. Flooding was so widespread in Port Arthur during Harvey that even shelters had to be evacuated. “A lot of people were forced to leave because there was simply no place to go,” Beard said. “I still see what look like abandoned homes. I’m waiting to see if anyone ever comes back for them.”
Read more: https://www.texasobserver.org/port-of-no-return/
