More global warming in the time of Covid.
Louisiana Breaks Ground on Isle de Jean Charles Resettlement Project Amid PandemicRead time: 8 minsBy Julie Dermansky • Friday, May 22, 2020 - 22:38
The COVID-19 pandemic hasn’t changed life much for Chris Burnet, a lifelong resident of Isle de Jean Charles, a quickly eroding strip of land among south Louisiana’s wetlands. Though the island, about 80 miles southwest of New Orleans, can’t be saved from the sea-level rise and coastal erosion that’s been intensified by climate change, Burnet is happy he still lives there, even though his days there are numbered. Besides loving life on the island, he believes its remoteness has kept him and the remaining island residents safe from the coronavirus.
The Isle de Jean Charles received worldwide attention in 2016, when the Isle de Jean Charles Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw (IDJC) Tribe helped the State of Louisiana secure a $48 million federal grant to resettle the island’s residents, who face increasing danger with each hurricane season.
The land loss the island faces is a problem for all of Louisiana’s coastal communities, thanks to a combination of levee construction, coastal erosion, sinking land, rising seas, and damage from hurricanes worsened by climate change. About 16 square miles are lost from Louisiana’s coast each year.
Chris Burnet is a member of the IDJC Tribe, like the majority of the residents on the island. The tribe, along with other south Louisiana tribes, have been spared much of the ravages of the pandemic so far, which tribal leaders attribute to their remote locations, luck, and tribal members’ willingness to practice social distancing to prevent the virus’s spread.
I met with Burnet outside of his island home on May 12. He only recently opted to join the majority of the island’s residents in signing up for a free home in the state’s Isle de Jean Charles resettlement project — a decision he grappled with for years.
He plans to move to Schriever, Louisiana, 40 miles north of the island, when the first homes in the development are completed. The first phase of construction began earlier this month....
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