Louisiana projects received almost $60 million from the Biden Administration’s Climate Resilience Regional Challenge funded through the Inflation Reduction Act on Friday.
Most of that money is going to the United Houma Nation, which received $56.5 million to implement its Hazard Mitigation and Resilience Plan.
The United Houma Nation is the largest tribe in Louisiana with about 19,000 citizens. Most of them live along the coastal bayous in the southeast. Because of that, land loss and extreme weather intensified by climate change are threatening the tribe’s existence.
“Where our family lived at, there's no indication there's land any longer,” said Chief Lora Ann Chaisson holding back tears during a press conference announcing the funding. “So this grant means a lot and this is not for us. It's for the younger generations that's coming up because this is who it's going to benefit.”
The tribe partnered with the Water Institute, the Greater New Orleans Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to develop a plan to protect the tribe and get funding for it.
The plan has five phases, but the tribe will start working on all of them at the same time. The first phase will be improving its administration building (which was badly damaged during Hurricane Ida in 2021) to make it more resilient to floods, wind and power outages. It will become a community resilience hub for emergencies and also be used to provide access to health care, food, education and economic opportunities.
“Part of being a resiliency hub is it’s not used just in a disaster. It's used in good times for the community,” said Lanor Curole, the tribe’s administrator.
The second phase will be to establish other satellite hubs across six parishes. The third phase will focus on improving communications during disasters, as well as blue skies. The fourth phase, which is not funded by the grant, will be increasing economic growth.
The fifth and final phase will be for migration, to make a plan for those who want or need to move away from the coast.
“We're very thoughtful of the language, so we absolutely avoided relocation because it's not a word that resonates with our community exceptionally well,” said Curole, adding it’s important that this migration strategy be led by the community.
The tribe is considering establishing a tribal land trust, which will allow them to have land to place people on when the time comes.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is partnering with the tribe on the project and will share its science, data and training resources. The agency is also hoping this project will serve as a model for other coastal communities.
“We know that we are going to learn so much,” said Heidi Stiller, the South regional director for NOAA’s Office for Coastal Management. “So in advance, thank you for all that we will learn from this work in Louisiana, because then we can take that and help additional communities all around this country.”
The entire plan is on a five year timeline, but the tribe aims to complete the community resilience hub in the next two and a half years.
