‘Our Culture Is Dying’: Rising Waters Menace More Than Land In Louisiana

"THIBODAUX, Louisiana --  Louise St. Pierre paints pictures of shacks and swamps on the insides of oyster shells – tiny scenes of Cajun culture she sees washing away amid the rising saltwater and periodic floods inundating southern Louisiana.

“Our culture is dying,” said St. Pierre, who lives in Lafourche Parish, where cypress trees are hung with lacy strands of Spanish moss and alligators lurk in bayous, the region’s slow-moving swamp waterways. “It’s not like it was.”

People are moving away from the parish, or county, some 60 miles (97 km) southwest of New Orleans, faced with growing flood risks and unable to pay for insurance, which can reach thousands of dollars and is required by mortgage banks in high-risk areas."

Ellen Wulfhorst reports for Thomson Reuters Foundation July 5, 2017.