Local Man Travels to South Louisiana To Help Flood Victims
This story should be near and dear to our hearts, as it wasn't long ago when North Dakota expereinced major flooding, during that time, help came from near and far. Now, for one Grand Forks man, it's time to return the favor.
This story hits home for me, as I am from South Louisiana and I know family and friends who've lost businesses and homes to the devestation of the non-stop rain that casued major flooding in the Southern Parishes of Louisiana.
A Grand Forks man, Tom Tezel traveled to my hometown of Lafayette, LA to help the flood victims. Tezel is a member of the Red Cross and is providing support, water and food for the victims. His flooding memories from Grand Forks are still fresh in his mind from 1997. He plans to stay on the ground for three weeks.
There are several ways you can help. Here are organizations that are on the ground helping the flood victims.
- United Way of Southeast Louisiana
- Second Harvet Food Bank of Acadiana
- Gulf Coast Floods Children's Releif Fund
- Samaritan's Purse in need of voluenteers to help residents clean up debris
From talking to family and friends in SOLA, they are resilient people. They don't expect the President to cut short his vacation. The Governor, John Bel Edwards (D) has said if the President would make a visit, it'd be better in the coming weeks as a current visit would take away from the police and first responders helping currently in the recovery effort. The people I spoke to, don't want to make this a political issue. As one person told me "we don't expect Obama to show up with a huge dry vac to suck up the water". The Governor also said he'd rather receive a check from Donald Trump opposed to a visit, which Trump is expected in Baton Rouge today. ( August 19th) The Govenor said Trump is welcome in Louisiana.
FEMA is on the ground and has been since the event started.