Carly here, in for Lyndsey this week. It’s been quite a month here on the Gulf Coast. Three weeks after Hurricane Laura brought devastating wind damage to southwest Louisiana, Hurricane Sally made landfall on the Alabama coast. The succession of major storms eerily mirrors 2005, when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit just three weeks apart. We knew this hurricane season would be an especially active one: that was predicted back in the spring. As I write this, the National Hurricane Center is monitoring seven disturbances in the Atlantic Basin. When I look at those maps of the cone of uncertainty, I think not of potential storm surge and wind speeds and rainfall, but of the people who could be displaced from their homes, and the years it could take them to recover. 

In New Orleans, we’ve been spared the brunt of these storms. Even though I haven’t had to evacuate myself, the anxiety that comes with these ever-more frequent and intense hurricanes takes its toll. On top of the usual worries — Will our street flood? Will we lose power? What will we do with the cat? — the pandemic brings a host of other concerns. I can’t hit the road up to Atlanta to stay with my folks with any peace of mind unless I get a COVID-19 test beforehand, since my parents are at higher risk — but many testing sites close preemptively when severe storms are forecasted, and don’t necessarily reopen even if the risk has cleared. I’m grateful to have the financial security that allows me some flexibility in evacuation planning, but for the many people whose jobs have been affected by the pandemic, these decisions are even more difficult to make.

I’ve lived here for just over two years now, and have yet to experience a major hurricane (knock on wood--hurricane season doesn’t end til November). Yet I know I’ve absorbed a whole lot of secondary trauma from talking to folks who’ve had their lives utterly upended by natural disasters and, too often, their mishandled aftermath. As we begin to assess the damage from Sally, my heart goes out to all the people I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing on the Mississippi and Alabama coasts, along the Florida panhandle, and outside the levee system in Louisiana, and to everyone experiencing historic wildfires in the West, too. These concurrent disasters are climate change manifested, and here at Southerly we’re dedicated to telling stories of how our shifting landscape affects people’s lives. 

This weekend I’ll be celebrating Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year — hopefully with my family, depending on what the roads look like after Sally passes and when I get COVID test results back. Regardless, it’ll be my first time observing the holiday outside of a synagogue in my 24 years. Let’s hope the new year brings some better news for us all. Shana Tova to those celebrating.

—Carly Berlin

Stories worth your time

The Times Picayune / New Orleans Advocate teamed up with ProPublica for a report showing a correlation between air pollution and the per-capita death rate from COVID-19 in Louisiana. “Hazardous air pollution may help explain the disproportionate number of COVID-19 deaths in communities like West Baton Rouge Parish, home to Port Allen. With 39 deaths as of Sept. 7, the parish’s per-capita death rate from COVID-19 ranked it among the top 3% of all U.S. counties with at least 30 deaths.”

DaLyah Jones writes about Beyoncé’s upbringing in Houston, grounding the icon in a history of Black artists in Texas, for the Texas Observer. “Yes, Beyoncé’s legacy will be forever lasting, but it can’t be forgotten that those talents were inspired and supported by a motherland of Southern, Black autonomy which also saw a cultural shift with the rest of the country almost a century before.” 

Shameless plug: I’m eager to share a personal essay I wrote for the Oxford American’s latest issue, about following a traveling rabbi who serves the South’s small town Jewish communities. Be sure to check out more of the beautiful work from the mag while you’re at it.

News flying under the radar 

After Hurricane Laura, there have been a spate of large scale evictions at apartment complexes in Lake Charles. Bill Quigley, a lawyer representing tenants at one complex, won a temporary restraining order blocking their evictions. In a cease and desist letter to the owner, he wrote, “These actions by your corporation are particularly cruel when they target people who have been displaced through no fault of their own due to a hurricane and during a time when people are especially vulnerable from the effects of displacement due to the COVID-19 crisis.” 

Residents of Gulfport are speaking out against the city’s plans to add almost 2 miles of paved roads, fearing that “the roads would open hundreds of acres of wetlands to new development, adding to the flood risk in predominantly Black communities around Turkey Creek, including historic Forest Heights and North Gulfport. Streets in the area already flood during heavy rainfalls.”

Fifty years ago, there was a proposal to mine phosphate in Georgia marshes, but communities rallied against it. Their efforts led to the passage of the state’s Coastal Marshlands Protection Act, which has helped maintain marshes that mitigate the impacts of sea level rise.