{"id":70134,"date":"2025-08-09T13:59:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T13:59:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/70134\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T13:59:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T13:59:14","slug":"20-years-after-katrina-northshores-recovery-and-lessons-learned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/70134\/","title":{"rendered":"20 Years After Katrina: Northshore\u2019s Recovery and Lessons Learned"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\u201cIt kept getting larger. I never had seen a storm of that magnitude and that size,\u201d said former St. Tammany Parish President Kevin Davis.<\/p>\n

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It wasn\u2019t the levees. It was the wind, the surge, and the silence afterwards.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen you looked at it, it was the entire Gulf of Mexico, and I knew we were in trouble then,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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In St. Tammany Parish, communities like Slidell, Pearl River, Lacombe, and Mandeville were blindsided by the force of Hurricane Katrina.<\/p>\n

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\u201cTo us it was another hurricane fixing to hit, we\u2019d be able to handle it. As we found out later, it was a once-in-a-lifetime event I never want to live through again,\u201d said Slidell Police Chief Randy Fandal.<\/p>\n

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Living through it was tough for those who chose to stay and those who had to, like Fandal, who was a sergeant with the state police at the time.<\/p>\n


\n
\n
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\n Survival and Recovery:
\n Neighbors Helping Neighbors
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\u201cIt was pretty surreal. I can remember driving on I-10 and seeing people climb the fences to get on interstate side looking for some help,\u201d said Fandal.<\/p>\n

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The basics, such as electricity, water, and sewer, were completely destroyed. Much like the nights that followed, communication was completely dark.<\/p>\n

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\u201cCouldn\u2019t communicate, phones were all down, we had satellite phones, they didn\u2019t work,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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Davis says, thankfully, a lot of folks took evacuation pleas seriously. For those who stayed, many needed help.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere were quite a few memories there that stick with me,\u201d said Slidell officer Rodney West, Jr.<\/p>\n

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West remembers being in a flooded neighborhood, trying to save people.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe were losing flashlight power and everything and just having to leave from back in that neighborhood in the boat, and you still hear people yelling for help, and you can\u2019t get back there because there are too many trees, too many power lines, and it\u2019s definitely too dark. There was no light whatsoever,\u201d said West.<\/p>\n

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Like many areas, much of Slidell was under water.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt was definitely a sight to see if you had to see it. It was just kind of hard to take in at first,\u201d said West. \u201cJust going in places in a boat right after the storm passed through that I never thought I would ride a boat in.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Infrastructure across the parish was either crippled or lost. More than 40,000 homes were damaged or destroyed.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI saw houses, pine trees, just cut them like a piece of cake,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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\nLessons Learned: Building a Stronger, More Prepared Northshore Community <\/p>\n

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Tons of concrete that made up the Twin Span Bridge no longer stretched across the lake. They fell to the bottom of it.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAll the powerlines from Covington to here were completely destroyed. Everywhere you looked all the red lights, they were all on the ground,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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Recovery wasn\u2019t easy or fast.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019re going to make it through. That\u2019s what I kept telling people,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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It would be a while before FEMA could send help. At the time, there were few local organizations prepared to step in. Initial recovery depended on neighbors helping neighbors. Twenty years later, lessons learned have helped change that and so much more.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe didn\u2019t have a community foundation situated in this geographic area,\u201d said Northshore Community Foundation President and CEO Leslie Landry.<\/p>\n

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Because of Katrina, the Northshore Community Foundation was established in 2007. It now acts as a lifeline for relief, recovery, and long-term stability in the wake of disasters.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen disaster strikes, or any sort of pandemic, emergency situation, we have the resources and the capabilities to act quickly,\u201d said Landry.<\/p>\n

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Landry says Katrina\u2019s lessons run deep. Since its creation, the foundation has pulled in more $93 million to help communities. More than $1.5 million helped with Katrina recovery in 2008.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere\u2019s no one natural disaster that\u2019s ever the same, but we\u2019ve learned so much on how to respond and what to do when a storm is in the Gulf and be ready to strap our boots on and get to work,\u201d said Landry.<\/p>\n

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It also meant a new way to work for law enforcement. Chief Fandal says local, state, and federal agencies are much more connected now, and the planning for hurricanes is never \u201cjust another storm.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cAs agencies we really need to work together, and we have started that since Katrina. We don\u2019t have the same communication problems that we had then,\u201d said Fandal.<\/p>\n

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Parish leaders say revised emergency plans, upgraded infrastructure, and improved access to resources put the parish in a much better place. The Twin Span Bridge was rebuilt and renamed “Frank Davis ‘Naturally N’Awlins’ Bridge” in 2015, after the longtime WWL personality. All that\u2019s changed for the better, though, didn\u2019t come without immense loss.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe did a ceremony here at the water with the flowers and roses that we threw in,\u201d Davis.<\/p>\n

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On the one-year anniversary of the storm, community members gathered here, on the edge of Lake Pontchartrain, to remember the people who died during and after the storm.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI lost a good friend, a good man. He was cutting a tree, and it backflipped on him,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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Many who evacuated never came back.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI go through some subdivisions now and it breaks my heart to think about, \u2018Well that\u2019s where Mr. so-and-so lived and we grew up together.\u2019 They\u2019re no longer here. They moved,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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Today, St. Tammany Parish has a growing population. Part of it is because of the sudden spike in new residents who evacuated the Southshore and never returned. Since leaving office, Davis says he\u2019s forever grateful for a community that didn\u2019t give up on itself.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI don\u2019t know how to put into words. I\u2019m just grateful for the community we have, that they came together,\u201d said Davis.<\/p>\n

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Parts of the Northshore will always carry Katrina\u2019s scars. They\u2019re in broken tree lines and stories passed down. They\u2019re also in the quiet resilience of a region that learned you can\u2019t just wait around for help. You must be ready to give it.<\/p>\n

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Click here to report a typo.<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u25ba Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the\u00a0IOS App Store<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0Google Play<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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