Mold, maggots in New Orleans homes left to rot

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Mold, maggots in New Orleans homes left to rot

By Bigg

Mon Nov 13, 7:54 AM ET

Reuters via News

http://news./s/nm/20061113/us_nm/life_neworleans_maggots_dc_

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NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - More than a year after Hurricane Katrina hit

New Orleans, thousands of homes damaged by flooding still stand

empty, stained by black mold and some of them infested with maggots.

City authorities are now cranking up a $20 million drive to deal

with a problem until now addressed mainly by charities, home-owners

and contractors who have worked to gut the properties and eliminate

the health hazard they pose.

Volunteers from the charity Acorn began the two-day process of

gutting one such house belonging to Gwen Brown in New Orleans East

suburb in late October, removing damaged goods and stripping the

house to its walls, floorboards and ceilings.

They wore white full-body protective suits and put on gas masks,

goggles and thick gloves because the spores infested every corner of

the house.

" There's nothing like a maggot-filled refrigerator, " said Daryl

Durham, the team leader, as he hauled one into the street to join a

growing pile of possessions. The stench from the fridge filled the

road.

Flood waters that surged into the famed city of jazz in August last

year churned the house contents around like a whirlpool and then sat

at a depth of 5 feet for weeks before receding. Since then the

house, like thousands of others, has been left untouched.

Acorn says its volunteers have gutted around 1,600 homes at a rate

of around 20 per month and around 2,000 homes remain on its list to

be cleared out, though many other residents have signed up with

other groups to have their houses dealt with.

" People ... just think it was a city that was demolished. If people

realized that these were people's lives then more things would

happen quicker, " said Pembo, 19, a student volunteer and New

Orleans native.

CITY PLAN

As part of the Good Neighbor Program, Mayor Ray Nagin proposed $15

million in his $419 million November budget to strip 5,000 homes and

$5 million to demolish 10,000 more, said Faciane, chief of

development in the mayor's office.

The program, which started a year after the storm, involves a three-

step, 120-day process for homeowners who have not cleaned out or

demolished damaged homes or applied to a volunteer agency to do the

job.

Homeowners are first given notice that they are in violation of

local laws, then after 30 days a notice is put on the property and

on a Web site and 30 days after that authorities can seek permission

to demolish or to gut and board up a property.

" It is crucial that most of our resources have to be given for

making a high-quality of life for the pioneers, the people who came

back and started to rebuild. We need to clean neighborhoods up, "

Faciane told Reuters.

Around 120,000 properties were damaged by flooding in New Orleans.

Permits had been issued for around 100,000 to be gutted or repaired,

leaving around 20,000 untouched. Of those, around 15,000 would have

to be demolished, Faciane said.

Many homeowners, traumatized by their experience of losing so much,

were reluctant to make a decision on whether to return and rebuild

so the city was setting deadlines to help them decide, he said.

" What people don't realize is that this was the first time in

history is that an entire American city was shut down, " Faciane said.

CROWBARS, SENSITIVITY

Volunteers use crowbars to prize sheetrock from walls in damaged

homes. But they have to be careful -- items that look worthless may

be of intense personal value.

For many people, seeing the contents of their flooded houses piled

up in the street is traumatic.

Brown, whose New Orleans East home yielded the maggot-infested

fridge and who fled to Houston, Texas, just before the storm,

maintained telephone contact with the team clearing her single-story

home and the next day returned to see it.

" This was my first place. I was so happy here. I would sit on this

patio after work, " said Brown, 51, as she picked through old

records, carpets, plastic flowers and other items.

A neighbor who failed to get out before the storm drowned in her

back yard. The body was removed in the immediate aftermath of the

storm, she said.

Almost every item she found triggered memories. A framed print of

jazz singer Billie Holliday had survived as had a bottle stuffed

with coins her daughter used as a piggy bank.

Insurance money she received went to pay off the mortgage and she

planned, one day, to rebuild the house and move back.

But Brown was unsentimental about her ruined possessions and

marveled how much " junk " she'd accumulated over the years.

" It's a closure because this part of our life is over, " she said as

she surveyed her stuff. " We loved this house but I can't get none of

it back. "