United Houma Nation Receives Jumpstart Federal Funding

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By Donovan Quintero

July 27, 2024

PHOENIX — Perhaps it won’t save the marshlands and land itself from climate change in the next five years, but the $56.5 million in funding could be the catalyst to begin the fight to keep the United Houma Nation’s, or UHN, ancestral lands from disappearing forever.

On Friday, UHN Principal Chief Lora Ann Chaisson stood at the podium and became emotional as she briefly described how her 10 acres of land went from a prime deer hunting ground for her children to a prime fishing ground during a press conference. Chief Chaisson said Friday, “was a very emotional day.”

“I looked at my dad; where we’re at, there’s no land there any longer. Where our family lived, there’s no indication there’s land any longer. So, of course, where we hunt deer in my backyard, we’re fishing,” said Chief Chaisson, as she described her 10 acres of land and her father’s land were forever lost to the rising Gulf of Mexico ocean waters. “So, this grant means a lot.”

The encroaching Gulf of Mexico has dramatically transformed the landscape that Chief Chaisson once called home. Nestled within interconnected bayous, her memories are rich with afternoons spent gardening and deer hunting on Isle De Jean Charles, which is 80 miles south of New Orleans. Chaisson said the threat of rising seas and significant erosion is jeopardizing this cherished environment, which is central to the identity of Chaisson and her tribe, comprising nearly 19,000 members.

Chaisson was on hand to express her appreciation for the grant to her tribe, a state-recognized tribe, nestled near the coastlines and occupying six parishes, south of New Orleans. She spoke about the more than $56.5 million grant the U.S. Department of Commerce and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, awarded on Friday to the tribe she leads, how it would address critical issues, as well as enable UHN to preserve and celebrate their cultural heritage. NOAA is a science-based federal agency within the Department of Commerce.

“It will support initiatives that promote our language, traditions, education, or ensure that they continue to thrive and enrich the lives of future generations,” said Chaisson.

The funding would also help the tribe upgrade their tribal building and make it self-sustainable, with solar panels and energy-efficient materials.

“This funding is to invest in infrastructure projects that will improve not only our tribal communities, but this building that you have seen back here will be a state of the art,” she said as she pointed at the building.

The funding was made available through NOAA’s Climate Resilience Regional Challenge, a $575 million competitive grant program funded under the Inflation Reduction Act. The UHN award was part of a $59.8 million total awarded to Louisiana projects to make the state’s coast more resilient to climate and other coastal hazards.

The UHN, in partnership with the Community Resilience Center at The Water Institute, Greater New Orleans Foundation, the Law Offices of Michael J. Billiot, and the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability, secured funding, according to a UHN press release, to implement four out of five phases of their Hazard Mitigation and Resilience Plan. 

“Equitably and effectively strengthening a community’s ability to address climate change means enabling the leadership of those who have been most affected by climate impacts, and actively working with them to address these impacts,” said NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad, Ph.D. “This funding provides Louisiana communities with the resources that empower local leaders, building their capacity for coordination and resilience now and into the future.”

UHN has endured the worst the Gulf of Mexico has thrown at them, but they were not prepared for climate change. According to the City of New Orleans Hazard Mitigation Plan, Louisiana has the highest rate of wetlands loss in the Country 

Louisiana is experiencing the highest rate of wetland loss in the United States, accounting for 80 percent of the nation's coastal wetland degradation. According to the USGS, the state has lost approximately 1,900 square miles of coastal land since 1932. Over the past century, Louisiana's barrier islands have shrunk by more than 40 percent, losing over 75 percent of their land area. If current loss rates persist, numerous barrier islands may vanish within the next 30 years. This erosion threatens wetlands, and back-barrier estuaries, and increases risks to local infrastructure, highlighting a critical environmental crisis.

The New Orleans Hazard Mitigation Plan cites that if no action is taken to mitigate the onslaught of coastal erosion, it could devastate the tribe’s ancestral lands to the ocean waters.

Chaisson said the alligator has begun adapting to saltwater which is not normal to her. But she said she was told there is a reason why alligators have survived for hundreds of millions of years.

“But she said the reason why they're dinosaurs is because they've lasted, you know, this long, they adapt,” said Chaisson. “So, that’s very interesting to hear.”

Chaisson said she and her staff stayed after the press conference and held a town hall meeting with 75 tribal members. She said they mostly asked about lifting the height of the building from the ground from three feet to 10 feet, she said.

“We wanted to go through the details we had said seventy-five of our tribal citizens, and we went through the details with the phases because it was just a last-minute thing. And so we wanted to make sure that our tribal citizens understand what's about to happen,” said Chaisson. And so we went through the phases of each phase.” 

The plan includes Phase 1: Enhance the central community resilience hub, the current UHN administration building; Phase 2: Establish and enhance satellite community resilience hubs in each of the six service area parishes; Phase 3: Strengthen and expand communications; and Phase 5: Explore community-led migration strategies in the face of land loss and increased storm activity. Phase 4 is focused on building capacity for economic development and is not funded under this award. 

While the UHN has always endured living along the coastal areas, climate change seems to have caught them somewhat unprepared. Hurricane Ida, a devastating Category 4 storm, struck the Gulf Coast in 2021 and became the second-most destructive hurricane to hit Louisiana with maximum sustained winds of 150 mph. Ida tied for the strongest landfall recorded in the state, alongside Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The storm caused widespread damage across Louisiana, leading to significant power outages and infrastructure destruction. Its remnants triggered a tornado outbreak and catastrophic flooding across the Northeastern United States. The damages done by IDA, Chaisson said, are still being felt to this day.

People are still living in FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) trailers right now. So many insurance companies went bankrupt after Ida, and some people still have not recovered from it. This place has still not been up and running since Ida. This time there was so much destruction because it was like Katrina on steroids. It stayed and stayed and it was stronger and it stayed for hours over us and it destroyed,” said Chaisson.

The UHN Chief grapples with a stark reality—each storm and erosion event deepens the divide between the physical space of her home and the emotional connection she holds to it. At the age of 60, she said she worries about the future and the hurricanes that will come.

“They're going to be the one that's going to have this,” she said of the younger generation. “This is for them because we know that there's going to be another hurricane, they're going to have a place to be able to be secure, they're going to have a place to be able to come to when these hurricanes come. So, this grant means a lot, and this is not for us. It's not for me, it's not for my generation. It's for the younger generation that's coming up. This will benefit our future for the next generation.” 

The resilience advancements made possible by the federal grant will serve the United Houma Nation and residents across six parishes: Lafourche, Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Mary, St. Bernard, and Terrebonne.

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